Resilience - Atlantic Council

Prepare for the worst: Five steps for leaders in an age of crises

Elizabeth Sizeland and Veera Parko — Fri, 21 Jul 2023 10:37:06 +0000

Crises are guaranteed: war and pandemics, infrastructure failures and terror threats, extreme weather and climate disasters. In a world in which extreme events seem to be increasing in frequency and severity, policymakers and government officials need to do more to prepare for them.

That means gleaning emerging lessons on preparedness from crises such as the COVID-19 pandemic, even if they take years to fully understand, while also preparing for worst-case scenarios in other areas. Doing so is time-consuming and expensive, but ultimately sensible and proportionate. Ukraine, for instance, withstood Russia’s cyber aggression in the early part of Moscow’s 2022 military campaign by drawing on lessons learned from prior threats, investing in cybersecurity, and building effective international partnerships.

Why does proactive leadership matter in a time of crisis? Preparedness and resilience—including a genuine commitment and actual follow-through—are the cornerstones of a government’s ability to address the emerging impacts of a crisis effectively while simultaneously accomplishing broader goals. Areas of crisis work such as mass fatalities management, mass evacuation and shelter, and continuity of government can feel almost fanciful or alarmist for officials who are not in the day-to-day business of understanding relative risk. And this kind of work competes for resources with more politically attractive and immediate needs. Yet, to protect societies in a manner proportionate to the risks they face, it is essential that politicians across the political spectrum, together with senior officials, consistently champion the resourcing needs of national preparedness and shepherd them through often reluctant governmental systems. Insufficient preparation and a lack of up-front investment will have severe consequences, both economically and in terms of human welfare.

No government will say it doesn’t care about these issues, but the practical steps and leadership focus on long-term improvement and innovation are often lacking. Yes, it can be a daunting task for any government. But the last few years have shown that addressing some of the fundamentals will never be a bad investment. With that in mind, here are five steps policymakers should take to build resilience for the next crisis.

1. Shore up the foundations

Now is the time to focus on the undervalued but important work of organizing systems for success. A government’s ability to assess and, crucially, to communicate relative risk lies at the heart of this. Governments with a clear national strategy that sets out priority activities for the whole of society will give themselves a solid foundation: Finland’s comprehensive security model is a good example of this, and the United Kingdom recently published its own resilience framework. The basics of governance and resourcing are especially important to ensure that key institutions locally and nationally are engaged and have the leadership, skills, resources, and facilities needed to plan for and respond to crises.

Evidence shows that it’s a false economy not to invest in crisis preparation and resilience. Munich Re, a multinational insurer based in Germany, estimates that natural disasters in 2021 cost $280 billion globally—of which only $120 billion was insured. And that doesn’t include the unquantifiable individual and societal impacts of such events. Crisis preparation needs to be protected even when new priorities appear because stripping resources from preparedness functions inevitably results in critical gaps when future crises hit.

In addition, governments need to place a high value on the deeply unglamorous work of putting in place structures and governance to ensure momentum and oversight to deliver a clear plan of work—the absence of which will quickly become a critical weakness. Consistent and energetic leadership together with clear accountability on resilience really matters.

2. Exploit technology wisely

Many governments have vastly underestimated and underimagined the utility of science and technology in risk management. Governments need more curiosity among leadership teams about how technology can be harnessed to assess risk and support decision makers. Challenging the status quo to develop new capabilities that fuse the best of technical knowledge with traditional risk-management expertise offers some exciting potential.

The United Kingdom’s new National Situation Centre is a vanguard example of how data science can help officials anticipate and navigate unfolding emergencies by bringing together public and government information to answer tough questions. Fusing all-source data in this way has already proved useful in managing risks around major national events, such as the 2021 Group of Seven (G7) summit, as well as anticipating risk during periods of extreme weather. Synthetic environments could also provide safe and low-cost ways of working through crises and decisions, using data and information to simulate a crisis scenario and testing different courses of action to see what the impacts might be. In addition, recent advances in artificial intelligence can help professionals by flagging risks to consider and manage before they become acute.

3. Understand supply chains

The interdependencies of supply chains are extremely complex, and the threat of disruption is now a regular occurrence. The impacts of supply chain disruptions on national security can be severe, even life-threatening. The COVID-19 pandemic provided a salutary lesson in how medical supply chains can unravel, leaving countries struggling for basic resources to manage the critical health of the population. And much of the world’s production of key technology components happens in areas with considerable risk of natural hazards or geopolitical conflict.

Most worryingly, the West’s adversaries often have a better understanding of supply chain vulnerabilities than Western governments do. Investing in professional technical teams to collate and exploit data will help to anticipate risk and support both governments and the commercial sector to shore up vulnerabilities before they are exposed by events or deliberately exploited.

4. Invest in practical international partnerships

The cost of preparedness for high-impact but low-probability events is huge. Investing in outreach, understanding work in other countries, and finding like-minded international partners are smart options for governments. International cooperation can create extra capacity to respond to many kinds of events.

Why do it alone if you can pool resources such as niche medical capacities or highly specialized chemical, biological, radiological, and nuclear (CBRN) expertise? Many countries are already doing this: for example, the European Union is coordinating its civilian aid to Ukraine through the EU Civil Protection Mechanism and building CBRN equipment stockpiles in different countries. Governments should continually benchmark each other’s best practices, bilaterally or through multilateral bodies—something NATO does well. Governments could make use of guidelines and objectives developed in international fora, such as NATO’s seven baseline requirements for national resilience. In a moment of crisis, close personal contacts between crisis management officials is extremely useful; key officials need time to develop these relationships before crises hit.

5. Adopt a whole-of-society approach

There are some things only a nation-state can do to prepare and respond to crises, but that is only one piece in the jigsaw puzzle. Local governments, individuals, academia, commercial entities, and charities all play an extremely important part in underpinning a country’s resilience: supporting this at a national level is vital.

Governments need to engage across society to develop a “preparedness mindset” that inspires everyone to understand their role and take responsibility. This means sharing as much information as possible before and during crises to empower everyone in society to make sensible decisions. It also means engaging early with parts of industry to generate solutions, something that worked well during the COVID-19 pandemic in terms of developing new vaccines in record time with support from governments. Engagement in government-led risk scenario exercises and improvements to governments’ crisis communication also are key factors in broad societal resilience in the face of serious disasters. For example, both Sweden and Finland have invested in upskilling individuals and organizations so that they can understand risk and can act in their own best interest. This reduces the burden on government, leaving officials to manage only what governments alone can handle.

Heeding the wake-up call

The COVID-19 pandemic and the horrors of conventional warfare in Ukraine should have had a profound impact on how seriously governments take the work of resilience professionals, both nationally and locally. Yet, this area of national security is still underinvested in and rarely placed center stage. Chronic risks like climate change only reinforce the need to prepare and equip the whole of society to be more resilient. Western governments cannot afford to sleep through the wake-up call that recent emergencies have sounded.

With so many live, high-pressure issues to manage, it is hard for any government to prioritize planning for future risk. But, when severe crises inevitably arise, governments rarely regret having invested time, resources, and consistent focus in this field. Now is the time for governments to learn from the past and place resilience and preparedness at the heart of their national security strategies.

Elizabeth Sizeland is a nonresident senior fellow at the Scowcroft Strategy Initiative of the Atlantic Council’s Scowcroft Center for Strategy and Security, and a former UK deputy national security adviser.

Veera Parko is a visiting fellow at the Centre for the Study of Congress and the Presidency and director of international affairs at the Finnish Ministry of the Interior (currently on leave).

The post Prepare for the worst: Five steps for leaders in an age of crises appeared first on Atlantic Council.

Ukraine’s tech sector is playing vital wartime economic and defense roles

David Kirichenko — Thu, 20 Jul 2023 16:35:49 +0000

The Ukrainian tech industry has been the standout sector of the country’s hard-hit economy during the past year-and-a-half of Russia’s full-scale invasion. It has not only survived but has adapted and grown. Looking ahead, Ukrainian tech businesses will likely continue to play a pivotal role in the country’s defense strategy along with its economic revival.

While Ukraine’s GDP plummeted by 29.1% in 2022, the country’s tech sector still managed to outperform all expectations, generating an impressive $7.34 billion in annual export revenues, which represented 5% year-on-year growth. This positive trend has continued into 2023, with IT sector monthly export volumes up by nearly 10% in March.

This resilience reflects the combination of technical talent, innovative thinking, and tenacity that has driven the remarkable growth of the Ukrainian IT industry for the past several decades. Since the 2000s, the IT sector has been the rising star of the Ukrainian economy, attracting thousands of new recruits each year with high salaries and exciting growth opportunities. With the tech industry also more flexible than most in terms of distance working and responding to the physical challenges of wartime operations, IT companies have been able to make a major contribution on the economic front of Ukraine’s resistance to Russian aggression.

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Prior to the onset of Russia’s full-scale invasion in February 2022, the Ukrainian tech sector boasted around 5,000 companies. Ukrainian IT Association data for 2022 indicates that just two percent of these companies ceased operations as a result of the war, while software exports actually grew by 23% during the first six months of the year, underlining the sector’s robustness. Thanks to this resilience, the Ukrainian tech sector has been able to continue business relationships with its overwhelmingly Western clientele, including many leading international brands and corporations. According to a July 2022 New York Times report, Ukrainian IT companies managed to maintain 95% of their contracts despite the difficulties presented by the war.

In a world where digital skills are increasingly defining military outcomes, Ukraine’s IT prowess is also providing significant battlefield advantages. Of the estimated 300,000 tech professionals in the country, around three percent are currently serving in the armed forces, while between 12 and 15 percent are contributing to the country’s cyber defense efforts. Meanwhile, Ukraine’s IT ecosystem, hardened by years of defending against Russian cyber aggression, is now integral to the nation’s defense.

A range of additional measures have been implemented since February 2022 to enhance Ukrainian cyber security and safeguard government data from Russian attacks. Steps have included the adoption of cloud infrastructure to back up government data. Furthermore, specialized teams have been deployed to government data centers with the objective of identifying and mitigating Russian cyber attacks. To ensure effective coordination and information sharing, institutions like the State Service for Special Communications and Information Protection serve as central hubs, providing updates on Russian activities and the latest threats to both civilian and government entities.

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Today’s Ukraine is often described as a testing ground for new military technologies, but it is important to stress that Ukrainians are active participants in this process who are in many instances leading the way with new innovations ranging from combat drones to artillery apps. This ethos is exemplified by initiatives such as BRAVE1, which was launched by the Ukrainian authorities in 2023 as a hub for cooperation between state, military, and private sector developers to address defense issues and create cutting-edge military technologies. BRAVE1 has dramatically cut down the amount of time and paperwork required for private sector tech companies to begin working directly with the military; according to Ukraine’s defense minister, this waiting period has been reduced from two years to just one-and-a-half months.

One example of Ukrainian tech innovation for the military is the Geographic Information System for Artillery (GIS Arta) tool developed in Ukraine in the years prior to Russia’s 2022 full-scale invasion. This system, which some have dubbed the “Uber for artillery,” optimizes across variables like target type, position, and range to assign “fire missions” to available artillery units. Battlefield insights of this nature have helped Ukraine to compensate for its significant artillery hardware disadvantage. The effectiveness of tools like GIS Arta has caught the attention of Western military planners, with a senior Pentagon official saying Ukraine’s use of technology in the current war is a “wake-up call.”

Alongside intensifying cooperation with the state and the military, members of Ukraine’s tech sector are also taking a proactive approach on the digital front of the war with Russia. A decentralized IT army, consisting of over 250,000 IT volunteers at its peak, has been formed to counter Russian digital threats. Moreover, the country’s underground hacktivist groups have shown an impressive level of digital ingenuity. For example, Ukraine’s IT army claims to have targeted critical Russian infrastructure such as railways and the electricity grid.

Ukraine’s tech industry has been a major asset in the fightback against Russia’s invasion, providing a much-needed economic boost while strengthening the country’s cyber defenses and supplying the Ukrainian military with the innovative edge to counter Russia’s overwhelming advantages in manpower and military equipment.

This experience could also be critical to Ukraine’s coming postwar recovery. The Ukrainian tech industry looks set to emerge from the war stronger than ever with a significantly enhanced global reputation. Crucially, the unique experience gained by Ukrainian tech companies in the defense tech sector will likely position Ukraine as a potential industry leader, with countries around the world eager to learn from Ukrainian specialists and access Ukrainian military tech solutions. This could serve as a key driver of economic growth for many years to come, while also improving Ukrainian national security.

David Kirichenko is an editor at Euromaidan Press, an online English language media outlet in Ukraine. He tweets @DVKirichenko.

Seville: Naming heat waves is changing the way people understand extreme heat

Seville, Spain, has been leading the charge on naming extreme heat events. So far, Seville has experienced two named heat waves: Zoe in July 2022 and Yago in June 2023.

Seville has named heat waves through a naming and categorization system called proMETEO. This system, piloted by Arsht-Rock in collaboration with the University of Seville and Seville City Council, monitors the weather forecast and categorizes heat waves into three tiers ranging from least (Category One) to most severe (Category Three).

Seville is in its second year of naming and categorizing heat waves. In addition to better protecting Seville’s residents, this project is creating important social dialogue on the harmful impacts of extreme heat, and it is serving as a model for other cities to pilot similar initiatives.

Miami: The world’s first Chief Heat Officer is tackling heat head-on

Miami, where temperatures routinely hit the high 90s, was the first city in the world to appoint a Chief Heat Officer (CHO). CHOs are officials supported by Arsht-Rock’s Extreme Heat Resilience Alliance who are responsible for unifying their city governments’ responses to extreme heat.

Miami’s CHO, Jane Gilbert, has more than thirty years of experience working in climate resilience. She has worked closely with Miami-Dade County Mayor Daniella Levine Cava to launch the Miami-Dade County Extreme Heat Action Plan, which outlines nineteen key actions to protect people from extreme heat, including cooling schools and expanding access to shade and water.

In her role as CHO, Gilbert has implemented extensive heat season campaigns to raise awareness on the dangers of extreme heat. She also manages mobile Community Resilience Pods, which empower people to prepare for climate stressors through educational storytelling.

Freetown: Outdoor market shade covers are providing relief for more than 2,300 women

In Sierra Leone’s capital, extreme heat is devastating for outdoor and informal workers, who spend long hours laboring in extreme temperatures. Many of these workers are women and girls, who face disproportionate health and social impacts from extreme heat.

Arsht-Rock has been working with Eugenia Kargbo, Freetown’s CHO, and a network of partners to address this. Through the Freetown Market Shade Cover project, Arsht-Rock installed shade covers over three outdoor markets, expanding the daily window for safe and comfortable shopping in hot conditions.

The Market Shade Cover project has given more than 2,300 market women better working conditions and economic opportunities. By minimizing the health impacts, food spoilage, and financial losses resulting from extreme heat, this intervention has benefitted entire communities dependent on the market women.

Santiago: New partnerships are protecting the most heat-vulnerable workers

Even though Chile’s capital has a cool and temperate climate, Santiago has been scorched by extreme temperatures in recent years. Local authorities are taking a wide range of approaches to build heat resilience, from advocating for workers’ protection policies to providing air-conditioned ambulances to more than twenty-five communities.

Santiago’s CHO, Cristina Huidobro Tornvall, partnered with the Chilean Security Association (ACHS), an entity representing more than one million Chilean workers, to promote heat safety measures among outdoor workers. Together, they are educating employers on how to recognize and respond to the dangers of extreme heat.

The partnership’s goal is for employers to institute practices to protect their workers and provide health coverage for workers injured on the job. To this end, ACHS is planning to monitor how often workers seek medical care for exposure to extreme heat, which will help inform worker protection policies.

Cities are a crucial part of the solution

Severe heat can arrive with little or no warning. However, there are several steps cities can take in advance to prepare for extreme heat events.

Cities can conduct baseline heat risk assessments to understand which communities and parts of the city are most vulnerable to extreme heat.

Cities can create heat action plans that identify strategies and responsible actors in advance of extreme heat events.

Cities can implement educational campaigns in advance of heat seasons to build public awareness of the dangers of extreme heat.

Arsht-Rock’s Heat Action Platform brings together diverse case studies of these solutions with guidance on how to plan for, finance, and implement projects into one comprehensive platform. The platform is designed to be a step-by-step guide for those starting out their heat resilience planning, as well as a reference guide and implementation resource for cities already well into the heat-planning process.

Local leaders are positioned to take these ideas and run with them. Cities have an urgent responsibility to respond to climate change. Billions of people are already living with the impacts of extreme heat, and even more will become more vulnerable as the world continues to urbanize. We already have the solutions, knowledge, and resources needed to protect people from heat—now, we just have to take action.

Kashvi Ajitsaria is a project associate at the Adrienne Arsht-Rockefeller Foundation Resilience Center.

The post How four cities are building resilience to extreme heat appeared first on Atlantic Council.

The minilateral moment in the Middle East: An opportunity for US regional policy?

Jean-Loup Samaan — Wed, 05 Jul 2023 13:00:00 +0000

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In a new Scowcroft Middle East Security Initiative issue brief, “The Minilateral Moment in the Middle East: An Opportunity for US Regional Policy,” the Atlantic Council’s nonresident senior fellow Jean-Loup Samaan analyzes how regional powers are reconsidering the multilateral balance of their foreign policy arrangements, and the emerging implications for US Middle East policy.

Over the past three years, the Middle East has experienced major intra-regional changes. After a decade of fierce competition between two blocs—one led by Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and the other by Qatar and Turkey—both parties now seem willing to cooperate. One of the key features of this new regional environment, according to Samaan, has been the growth of so-called minilateral initiatives that regroup several countries on an ad hoc basis.

Samaan also addresses how powers outside the region have embarked on a similar path of building relationships with countries in the Middle East. Russia’s recent attempt to build a similar framework with Turkey and Iran, he argues, provides evidence of how minilateralism is increasingly considered an effective instrument of regional diplomacy.

About the author

Jean-Loup Samaan

Nonresident Senior Fellow
Scowcroft Middle East Security Initiative, Rafik Hariri Center & Middle East Programs

Senior Research Fellow
Middle East Institute, National University of Singapore

Samaan serves as a senior research fellow at the National University of Singapore’s Middle East Institute. Prior to that, Samaan was a policy analyst at the Directorate for Strategic Affairs of the French Ministry of Defense from 2008 to 2011, research advisor at the NATO Defense College from 2011 to 2016, and associate professor in strategic studies detached by the US Near East South Asia Center to the UAE National Defense College from 2016 to 2021.

Scowcroft Middle East Security Initiative

The Scowcroft Middle East Security Initiative (SMESI) provides policymakers fresh insights into core US national security interests by leveraging its expertise, networks, and on-the-ground programs to develop unique and holistic assessments on the future of the most pressing strategic, political, and security challenges and opportunities in the Middle East.

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USAID’s Samantha Power: LGBTQI+ crackdowns are ‘the canary in the coal mine’ for declining freedoms

Atlantic Council — Thu, 29 Jun 2023 00:00:21 +0000

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USAID Administrator Samantha Power on advancing LGBTQI+ inclusive development

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Event transcript

Uncorrected transcript: Check against delivery

Speaker

Samantha Power
Administrator, United States Agency for International Development (USAID)

Moderator

Jonathan Capehart
Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist, the Washington Post and MSNBC

VICENTE GARCIA: Hello. Welcome to this special Pride edition of #ACFrontPage. I’m Vicente Garcia, senior director of engagement and external affairs at the Atlantic Council, and we’re delighted for today’s conversation featuring USAID Administrator Samantha Power on a topic important to me as a member of the LGBTQI+ community, but also to the Atlantic Council in our mission to shape the global future together through US global leadership and global engagement.

Today’s conversation will be led by Pulitzer-winning journalist Jonathan Capehart, who is the host of his own show on MSNBC, serves on the Washington Post Editorial Board, and a frequent commentator on PBS, and the list goes on. We welcome participation by those here joining us today in person during our Q&A session, but also welcome those joining online by using the hashtag #ACFrontPage.

Administrator Power, thank you for joining us here today. We’re very eager to hear from you about the Biden administration’s and USAID’s priorities at addressing global LGBTQI+ human rights. And so now I’ll turn it over to Jonathan to lead our discussion. Thank you.

JONATHAN CAPEHART: Thank you very much, Vicente, for the invitation to be here. Thank you all. One more thing, Vicente. As someone who reads teleprompter for a living, I really felt for you because that print is so small.

SAMANTHA POWER: Yeah, seriously. We’re just old, dude.

JONATHAN CAPEHART: I know, it’s true, given the distance. But thank you very much for that introduction. And, Administrator Power, thank you very much for being here and taking the time to be a part of this important conversation.

So, as you well know, within the first month of taking office President Biden issued a memorandum that directed various parts of the US government responsible for foreign policy, such as USAID, to prioritize efforts to advance LGBTQI+ rights around the world. How are those efforts going? And what have been the biggest challenges?

SAMANTHA POWER: Thank you so much. And thanks to everybody for turning out. It’s a great energy in the room, great energy this month, and much needed, because we harness this energy to try to do this work in the world.

Well, first to say that USAID is one of fifteen agencies that is being responsive to President Biden’s direction to promote and protect and respect the human rights of LGBTQIA+ people around the world. And I’d say I feel very fortunate every day, no matter what issue I’m working on, to be at USAID, because we have this toolkit. We have programming in public health on maternal and child health. Of course we have PEPFAR, where we work with the State Department and CDC, which has, of course, made a major difference, saving twenty-five million lives and 5.5 million babies is the estimate for the good that it has done over time. And that’s had a particular effect on LGBTQIA+ communities around the world.

But beyond that, we do agriculture. We do economic growth and inclusion, livelihoods work. We’ve helped vaccinate the world. In many parts of the world, if you are LGBTQIA+, coming forward to seek social services may risk something near and dear to you, depending on the legal environment in which you’re working.

When the fallout from COVID occurred and you saw such economic devastation around the world, given the fact that LGBTQIA+ people are often working in the informal sector and may have had, in some instances, less backup, the kinds of crises that have befallen the planet have a disparate impact on marginalized communities and those that have, in a sense, faced preexisting conditions, you might say, including discrimination, stigmatization, violence, et cetera.

So we went forth. We have tripled the size of our staff. We have the great Jay Gilliam, who many of you work with, as our lead LGBTQIA+ coordinator at USAID. That position had been unfilled in the previous administration. This fiscal year we’ve had a dedicated pool of resources of around sixteen million dollars, which does everything from spot emergency assistance to people who need legal defense because they’re being rounded up in some cases or evicted to working really closely with the State Department to help identify people who would be eligible for asylum or to become refugees because of their vulnerability, because of their sexual orientation or gender identity.

So, you know, I’d say you see a massive surge in programming, in attention. But for me, I think the—and the thing that Jay has helped us so much with and the team, if you believe in development in 2023—I mean, and actually seeing development outcomes that matter and reversing development setbacks that have occurred—it’s not enough to have, like, a little pot of money, or a big pot of money, even, dedicated to LGBTQIA+. All the programming we do on food security, on education, on health, needs to be—and the list goes on—needs to be attentive and intentional about going out of our way to make sure that we are not just practicing development but inclusive development.

And the biggest challenges—I’m sure we’ll get into them, and I know many in the audience are seized with them—is criminalization, and even in countries that already have criminalized LGBTQIA+ status, you know, new moves, desire to render more salient laws that may be on the books but being ignored by some communities, work in places like Uganda, because of the introduction of the anti-homosexuality act, vigilantes and citizens and others taking what’s happening in the legal space or in the parliament and getting signed into law and viewing it as license to do whatever the hell they want to vulnerable people.

And so it’s not just happening in Uganda. That’s, of course, something that has happened very recently. But we see the instrumentalization of the human-rights agenda that so many in the world aspire to see progress, that being turned on its head. And in places where anti-democratic forces are ascendant or are getting either support or abetted or at least not counteracted by authorities, you see those voices getting louder. And even when there’s not a law and that kind of legal ballast behind those voices, that, in and of itself, is terrifying and exclusionary and a deterrent, again, for these communities to come forward and access these programs at the very time where we’re really seeking to make sure that we’re leaving no one behind.

JONATHAN CAPEHART: So since you brought up Uganda and also your point about, you know, USAID has all of these programs. But there are countries where just presenting yourself to make yourself—avail yourself of these programs could put you in danger. So the question is what is the United States government doing or can it do to push back on what’s happening in countries like Uganda?

SAMANTHA POWER: Well, to start—and I would start with what I consider a statement of the obvious but, nonetheless, I think does need to be said because it’s not always the way things are done, which is you start from the proposition of nothing about you without you. This question of tactics and how to prevail or how to counteract are super complicated, right.

Imagine, like, being part of the Biden administration and the tactical questions about how we moved the Inflation Reduction Act and, you know, convinced Joe Manchin to be part of the—I mean, when we’re operating in someone else’s country, you know, understanding, you know, the complex ecosystem in which we work, drawing, I should say, at USAID very heavily on the expertise of our local staff, two-thirds of—at least-two thirds of USAID staff abroad are nationals of the countries in which we work so they can be a great resource, but fundamentally it is the communities that are going to be affected by these laws that provide cues to us on how vocal to be, how much to signal in a deterrent way in advance of the movement of a piece of legislation, which risks then putting the United States at the center of a national drama and potentially triggering nationalism and other forces or some, you know, historical, you know, dynamics—let’s put it that way.

And so—but even what I’ve just said is kind of simplistic because there is no one view. I mean, even within an organization people are debating at fever pitch, you know, what the right approach is. This is just really, really hard.

But we do come in with humility and really try to be in lockstep with the groups who we may have funded in the past or may be funding currently, and in the case of the anti-homosexuality act in—that Uganda has moved forward with President Biden was very clear that the law should be repealed. Came out with a public statement. Has talked—and this is one of the approaches that we have taken not only in Uganda but in other places that are threatening to put in place similar laws—talking about the effects, Jonathan, on this incredibly successful partnership that we’ve had in combating HIV/AIDS.

There’s one report in Uganda that shows that service utilization is down by more than 60 percent since the law was introduced and that’s people who are afraid of coming forward for vital health services because they’re afraid it could lead to their arrest or it could lead to their eviction or it could lead to vigilante violence.

And so here we are, you know, trying to get this epidemic under control by 2030 and we’re part of this grand global coalition and at the same time these steps are being taken that would set back not only the health of LGBTQI+ communities but the health in this instance of all Ugandans.

And so, in a sense, you know, really looking at what the practical effects are of being seen to license community involvement in discrimination, stigmatization, and even law enforcement as you see citizens, again, taking things into their own hands but trying to find also arguments that have broad appeal in terms of services or programs that a broad swath of the societies in which we work are enthusiastic about, you know, showing the link between those—for example, private sector investment. There’s not one country in which USAID works that isn’t interested in fueling economic growth recovering from COVID, getting young people to work.

Well, what does it mean if the multinational companies that we and the Commerce Department and the State Department have been working with to try to encourage them to invest in these countries? Their own anti-discrimination policies and values are not going to make that an attractive place for investment.

So it’s a combination of, you know, the State Department taking steps now potentially to sanction individuals involved in this measure in Uganda. That’s been something that’s been messaged publicly and, again, these sort of practical effects that are going to extend practical harms, that are going to extend beyond if this law is not repealed.

JONATHAN CAPEHART: And so let’s talk about another country. I was thinking when you say, in response to my question about Uganda, talking to the groups on the ground, getting their input into what USAID and what the US government should do, let’s talk about Ukraine. There’s a war going on, but hopefully at some point that war will end and reconstruction will begin. Where does the LGBTQI+ community play—come into the conversation about rebuilding? Both from making sure that they are whole in Ukrainian society, but also that their rights are protected and respected?

SAMANTHA POWER: Well, this is a complex issue and a complex question, and I could come at it a few different ways. But, first, let me just say that, you know, part of Putin’s motivation, as we well know, for invading Ukraine was watching Ukrainian society, the Ukrainian government, move at really rapid pace to integrate itself into Europe. And, yes, that carries with it a lot of economic benefit for young people in Ukraine, but much of the impetus behind what was, you know, between really 2013 and last year, such a shift, right, in an orientation that went in one direction and then shifted in another direction. Much of it was values-based.

That doesn’t mean everybody was with all aspects of the European agenda, or the European program, or the European Convention on Human Rights immediately. We’ve seen that, of course. But, you know, part of what Ukraine is fighting for and part of what Russia is trying to squelch is liberalization, is broad understanding of who human rights protections apply to. Now, again, that’s a kind of general statement.

What we do—then, shall I say, of course, following Russia’s invasion Ukraine’s work to liberalize and build checks and balances and build in human rights protections, although not making headlines in the American or even the European headline, that work has accelerated. Which is, frankly, remarkable that a country that’s fighting for its life and its people can walk and chew gum at the same time. But meaning, you know, you see [LGBTQI+] protections progressing not only through legislative measures, and regulation, and as we vet—as the Ukrainians vet and we support programs to vet judges, you know, their human rights credentials being assessed in this much more comprehensive way.

But also, again, as the economy—parts of the economy actually flourish—I know this is hard to believe. But, like, the tech sector grew by, I think, seven or eight percent last year. You know, that itself, young people being out and being integrated in the world, there’s just things happening in the society that I think is going to put Ukraine, you know, and above all [LGBTQI+] communities and individuals, in a much more supportive legal and social ecosystem as the whole rationale for the war is about integrating into Europe. And the criteria by which—that Ukraine is going to need to meet, the roadmap and so forth, is going to entail much stronger protections than have existed in the past.

To your point, I think, if I understood it, about reconstruction, again, that’s incumbent on this intentionality that I was talking about. USAID is a critical partner. I was just meeting with the minister of finance yesterday talking about reconstruction out of the recent conference in the United Kingdom. You know, as we think about procurement and nondiscrimination in procurement, you know, how are those checks and those protections built in? As we think right now about health services and making sure that those are restored every place we can, even places close to the front line or as territory is liberated, how does USAID support flow in a manner where we are constantly vigilant to how inclusive those services are, and whether or not they are provided?

I mean, you know, we’ve actually managed to distribute I think it’s something like sixteen million antiretrovirals in Ukraine, you know, just since the war, you know, has started. So, you know, in terms of the mainstream PEPFAR and HIV/AIDS programs, like, those have continued. We’ve managed to be able to keep those afloat. And that took real intentionality on the part of our health team and our Ukraine team.

But I think, again, the principle that we want to bring to everything we do in terms of inclusive development is just that it’s a design feature of any program that we do that we are looking to make sure we are going out of our way, just as we would for religious minorities and on behalf of religious freedom or for women in countries where women are discriminated against, to make sure that we are reaching the full spectrum of beneficiaries, and that any kind of social deterrent or normative factors are ones that we try to circumvent to make sure that we are being inclusive because that’s going to be in the interests of all—again, all individuals living in a country economically and in terms of their ability to—in this instance, to integrate into Europe.

JONATHAN CAPEHART: So what would you—what do you say to people who question why supporting LGBTQI+ rights should be a part of American foreign policy? Because you could see there might be some people around the world, or even in our own country, who think, you know, I’m down with the community, but why make that part of our foreign policy.

SAMANTHA POWER: Well, I think one way to take that question, which we do hear a lot and you might even say increasingly in certain quarters, but—is to imagine the counterfactual. You know, imagine a world in which US taxpayer resources are expended in a manner that, you know, in a sense perpetuates or deepens exclusion of individuals who are really vulnerable. I mean, that would be bad. And not only that, it would have the flavor, I think, in many of the countries we work, for a country that for all of our imperfections has long stood for human rights, it would have—it would have the effect, I believe, of being seen to kind of legitimate some of the rhetoric and actions and legal measures that are being put forward.

So, you know, there’s not, like, some place of neutrality here, right? We are the United States. We, you know, for many, many years in a very bipartisan way have stood for human rights. We have stood behind the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which doesn’t have exceptions or footnotes excluding particular communities. We stand for implementation of the Sustainable Development Goals, which explicitly say that no person should be left behind—again, without footnotes or caveats. So I think there are really hard questions about tactics, about in some places how vocal to be to not, again, put ourselves at the center of a narrative, because that in some sense is just what people who would seek to repress or terrorize vulnerable communities would like to see happen. So, again, it’s very, very difficult on the ground to find the right balance of tools.

You know, if you look at the Anti-Homosexuality Act in Uganda, the—you know, we spoke out with thirty-one countries. We spoke out with the United Nations independent expert that US diplomacy, when I was the UN as ambassador, was absolutely critical in securing the creation of that position. And the fact that that position has been renewed three times now, including most recently last year, speaks to, again, changing norms. The fact that international instruments more and more are including—sometimes explicitly, sometimes less so—[LGBTQI+] rights as human rights, the fact that we see same-sex marriage legalized this last year in Estonia and Slovenia, but also decriminalization in places as varied as Barbados and Singapore means that these principles are getting traction.

And these international instruments—and this is a critical part of President Biden’s agenda—are really important, Jonathan, because it gives citizens in a country, you know, where on the books there’s lots of happy talk about human rights, but it gives [LGBTQI+] organizations and individuals, you know, something to hang their arguments on; something to say, look, but the United Nations Human Rights Council just appointed this individual, this individual says this. And so when we can act in company, in a coalition, I think that’s always advantageous, and that is something we seek to do.

When the norms themselves—I was part of getting the Security Council for the first time in what at that time was the seventy-five-year history of the UN to condemn the targeting of individuals on their—on the basis of their sexual orientation—that had never happened before—and hearing from around the world what it meant for the United Nations Security Council to have done that. I mean, this was something that was a consensus document; you know, the Russian Federation, a number of African governments that had laws that were not respectful of these human rights on the books went along with that.

And so, again, thinking tactically about how to do it and how these norms become more salient in international law, I think, is very important. But it is in our interest to have maximum economic inclusion that’s consistent with our economic objectives as a country and our foreign-policy interests. It is in our interest to fight repression against whomever it is being carried out. And it is in our foreign-policy interest to stand up for our values.

President Biden’s polling, I think, reflects broad approval, surging poll numbers; I think a tripling in global polls about—when the question is posed, do you think Joe Biden will do the right thing, a tripling from his predecessor. And if you talk to people around the world and sort of get a sense of why, the fact that human rights are so central to President Biden’s argument and democracy and the importance of democracy delivering, that’s a major distinguishing feature not only of this administration but really of US foreign policy from some of the big geopolitical actors who are more and more active.

So if we go quiet, just in the same way that if we were to go quiet on the rights of Christians in societies in which they are being persecuted, and just defer to prevailing, you know, what is taken as prevailing popular sentiment, I think we would really shortchange what is distinguishing about American foreign policy.

JONATHAN CAPEHART: One more question from me before we open it up to Q&A, and that’s this. Everything you say is, you know, terrific and wonderful in terms of what the administration is doing, American values. But I just wonder, when you travel around the world or talk to your counterparts, particularly those in, say, Uganda and elsewhere, how do you respond to what they might say, such as, you know, well, your own country’s, you know, no—you know, no garden party. You’ve got book bans and drag-queen story hours being banned and don’t-say-gay laws. And we’re awaiting a Supreme Court decision, possibly tomorrow, definitely by Friday, on whether a cake decorator can say, no, I’m not going to decorate your cake because your same-sex marriage, you know, goes against my beliefs.

How do you deal with that when that is thrown back in your face from foreign leaders?

SAMANTHA POWER: You know, we have a policy that Jay has helped shepherd through USAID which will be the first-of-its-kind LGBTQIA+ policy that’ll be out soon. And one of its many, I think, important features is it speaks of the importance of going forth in a spirit of humility and ally-ship. And I’ve already spoken, I think, a little bit about the ally-ship point.

But in general—you know, you didn’t mention the insurrection. You know, like—

JONATHAN CAPEHART: Well, I mean, it wasn’t—

SAMANTHA POWER: There’s plenty—there’s—

JONATHAN CAPEHART: It wasn’t an LGBTQIA+ insurrection. So I figured I’d just leave—

SAMANTHA POWER: No, that’s a good point.

JONATHAN CAPEHART:—leave that out. But go on.

SAMANTHA POWER: No, but what I mean is in general we are standing up for democracy and human rights as we are facing domestically very, very significant challenges. And I’ve broadened the aperture a little bit from your question, though your question is very valid, you know, as focused on our discussion, our topic for today.

But I don’t even think we can think about LGBTQIA+ rights outside of the broader context of the anti-democratic movements that exist all over the world, including—you know, which include not recognizing results of elections, including resorting to violence, including, you know, some cases partnering with, you know, outside repressive actors who would seek to widen divisions within democracies.

So, you know, the statistics, it’s—you know, I think it’s sixteen years of freedom in decline around the world. And what we see is attacks on minorities generally—sometimes religious minorities; sometimes LGBTQI+ communities—are often the canary in the coal mine about a broader set of measures and a broader kind of consolidation of power away from the people and in the center. And certainly, a diminishment of checks and balances. I think that’s the abiding feature. And minority rights and the rights of marginalized communities fundamentally are checks on majoritarianism in our country and globally.

So, you know, I think if you go—and I’m not saying that we don’t have, you know, as you put it, kind of thrown back at us things that are happening in this country. But I think really since President Obama, and very much carried through with President Biden, we tend to kind of preempt that moment by situating the dialogue about [LGBTQI+] rights in our own struggles, and not leaving the elephant in the room, you know, over here. But to say, look, we’re—this is—we’re in the midst of, you know, many of these same challenges. There are forces in our countries—in our country that would also wish to go back to what is remembered as a simpler time.

And, you know, often I think that actually sets the stage for a more productive conversation, because it’s not a finger-wagging—you know, you may condemn something that has happened and use the leverage of the United States to demand, you know, a repeal. But it is not from a glass house that we are having conversations like this. And I was just in Africa, and I’ll be traveling again. I mean, the dialogue that we have is a humble dialogue. But it is one that has a North Star that I think can animate us both and that is rooted, fundamentally, not only in American values, at their core, but in international instruments and in universal values.

JONATHAN CAPEHART: And so we’re going to open it up to questions. There is a microphone, oh, I thought it was on a stand. It’s an actual person. Thank you. Thank you very much. We’re going to go until about—if I can find my thing—until about quarter to four. So the microphone is there. Short questions, so we can get more answers in. Go ahead.

Q: Hi, Administrator Power. My name is Ryan Arick. I’m an assistant director here at the Atlantic Council. I’m really thrilled to have you here today.

I wanted to ask a question related to US development assistance to Ukraine, and specifically how we’re looking at the LGBTQI+ angle as far as our assistance during the ongoing war. I would appreciate your thoughts. Thank you.

SAMANTHA POWER: You want to go one by one, or?

JONATHAN CAPEHART: Yeah.

SAMANTHA POWER: OK.

JONATHAN CAPEHART: Quickly.

SAMANTHA POWER: OK. So in brief, one of the things you’ll see, again, in the forthcoming policy, is a broad emphasis on thinking within USAID and within our humanitarian emergency programing about inclusion and about proactive outreach and services. I think there’s been—we’ve always, of course, been for an inclusive process to find and to serve beneficiaries. But to think—you know, to think that all beneficiaries will come forward equally in all communities is not accurate. And so, you know, how this plays out in any specific crisis area, you know, that’s going to be fundamentally up to our engagement with our implementing partners, like the World Food Program, like the ICRC and others. But there is a broad embrace of inclusive response and a broad recognition that gravity alone is not going to get you there.

Again, we’re quite far along in Ukraine because I think the government has every incentive—you know, not saying that there isn’t discrimination that occurs in Ukraine, or that some of those fears don’t still exist. But there are a lot of incentives pulling policy and enforcement in a constructive direction, given the European journey that they are very committed to. But imagine, you know, in other parts of the world where there isn’t that, you know, legal framework or that political will at high levels and so that’s why crisis is going to be very important.

The other thing I’d say is, of course, just continuing our HIV/AIDS work full speed ahead, any work we do in human rights, thinking—so, again, there’s the dedicated LGBTQI+ work and then there’s making sure that all of our programming in these other areas is inclusive of that.

So just—and, finally, just we’ve done a lot with hotlines. There’s so much trauma, so much need for psychosocial service and care. We work very closely with Mrs. Zelensky as well, who has really pushed mental health and so forth. So you will see both in our development programming and in our emergency humanitarian programming, provided the resources are there, which we have to work with Congress to continue to mobilize, but a very significant allocation as well to recognizing the trauma and then the unique traumas that may apply to different communities, including this one.

JONATHAN CAPEHART: OK. We’ve got six questions, ten minutes. So what I want to really try to do is two questions at a time. And, Madam Administrator, if you could—a little more brief—to the first two, ask the questions and then we’ll have the administrator answer. Quick questions.

Q: Hi, Administrator Power. My name is Katie. I’m a graduate student at Johns Hopkins SAIS right in Dupont Circle.

And my question for you kind of revolves around the other countries we haven’t talked about. We’ve talked a lot about Ukraine, Uganda. But what should the USAID and other people in the United States what other countries should we focus on for human rights violations, especially in the community?

JONATHAN CAPEHART: OK. Great.

I’m going to get one more.

Q: Hi, Administrator. My name is Divya. I’m an undergraduate at Stanford University and I’m currently an intern at the Cyber and Infrastructure Security Agency.

My question for you is how and if you have handled and talked about tech governance in regards to LGBTQI+ rights and misinformation, perhaps, regarding HIV/AIDS, vaccines, and more.

JONATHAN CAPEHART: OK. Two simple questions—in nine minutes. I’m going to—I’m keeping us on time.

SAMANTHA POWER: So on the first question, I would say that there is a spate now of laws, particularly in sub-Saharan Africa but not only, that are at various stages of legislative movement. Let’s put it that way.

Now, what focus entails, again, you know, I think filtering it through what do our partners on the ground think would be most advantageous for any particular individual or entity or institution to do, as we’ve discussed, it’s—you know, figuring that out is no easy proposition. But I think the New York Times recently did a study that did a lay down of how many country—what stage of passage, you know, these laws were.

I mean, it’s kind of—it’s kicked up what’s happened in Uganda and even our response to it has kicked up, you know, more vocal leadership to push through further exacerbating criminalization measures as, by the way, have really important positive decisions that have been made in Africa.

That, in turn, has generated a backlash and we’ve seen something very similar here, of course, over many, many decades where anti-discrimination ordinances, for example, in Florida—you know, I mean, decades ago—then kicked off major—you know, very, very pronounced counter reactions, massive fundraising, et cetera. That’s happening, too, where for a step forward it then, you know, ignites, you know, certain forces and antibodies and then you see, you know, proactive moves that really can set back those rights.

So, again, the tactics I think we’d have to be very, very case specific. But, you know, where I would—especially for those of you who are in civil society or not in the government per se, the actual support for the organizations. And you’ll have the chance, as well, in this country—those of you who are active in the LGBTQI+ community—through the Welcome Corps at the State Department—this is—I’m sorry I’m going on, but this is a very exciting development that we will actually have the chance—in addition to processing people who are being persecuted on the grounds of their sexual orientation or gender identity, we will have the chance as community members to welcome these individuals. Now, that infrastructure is being built and it’s not, you know—you know, yet where there’s a number for you to call, but all of us will have a—well, there’s a number to call for Welcome Corps, but I’m saying very specifically—

SAMANTHA POWER: For—from this—OK. I was told that we were—we were still some weeks away from that. Well, what is the number that people should call, then, if they want—

AUDIENCE MEMBER: There’s a link on—

SAMANTHA POWER: What is the link?

AUDIENCE MEMBER: RainbowRailroad.org.

SAMANTHA POWER: OK. That’s the State Department program?

AUDIENCE MEMBER: No.

SAMANTHA POWER: No, no, no, OK. So I’m—sorry, I was talking—

AUDIENCE MEMBER:—to Welcome Corps.

SAMANTHA POWER: OK, great. OK. So RainbowRailroad.org will refer you. I think the State Department piece we are still moving out to make sure that these partnerships can be ignited in rapid fire.

And then the second question, Jonathan, was?

JONATHAN CAPEHART: I wrote in my notes tech governance.

SAMANTHA POWER: Tech governance.

JONATHAN CAPEHART: Yes.

SAMANTHA POWER: Yes is the short answer. I’ve engaged them—

JONATHAN CAPEHART: We have—we have five minutes and five questions to go.

SAMANTHA POWER: Yes. I have—I have engaged them on disinformation generally, and this is a very important subcomponent. Discrimination isn’t new. Persecution isn’t new. The amount of disinformation, including deepfakes showing President Biden vilifying LGBTQI+—I mean, you know, these things are really exacerbating an already very challenging situation.

JONATHAN CAPEHART: OK. And so we have one, two, three, four, five questions, five minutes. Lord Jesus. All right.

Here’s what I want to do. I want you each to ask your very brief question so your question at least gets articulated, and then Administrator Power will answer. Real quickly.

SAMANTHA POWER: All five.

JONATHAN CAPEHART: All five. All five. Because now we have four minutes.

Q: Thank you very much.

Very quickly, what would you say to other countries that stand on principle of noninterference, we don’t get to tell other governments how to treat their people? Very briefly. Thank you.

JONATHAN CAPEHART: OK. Thank you.

Q: Yes. My name is Bishop Joseph Tolton.

Domestically in our country, White supremacy one can argue is cradled by the far religious right in our country. These actors are also responsible for the racialization of homophobia across Africa. Are there whole-of-government conversations about how to hold these actors accountable for their racialized efforts?

JONATHAN CAPEHART: Great question.

Q: Hi. David Stacy, Human Rights Campaign.

As you know, nondiscrimination is a touchstone of equality, and the administration right now is reviewing the requirements for grantees and cooperative agreements and across the foreign assistance agencies. Can you speak to the need to do that and USAID’s role in helping the other agencies do something where we’re applying it across the board with all of the agencies on an equal basis?

Q: Hi. Mark Bromley with Council for Global Equality.

You spoke about the value of both dedicated LGBTQI+ funding and integrated funding, and we’re excited that that fifteen million is increased to twenty-five million this year. But on the integration point, how are you thinking about measuring integration for LGBTQI+ persons, particularly in places where, you know, being [LGBTQI+] may be criminalized, it’s difficult/dangerous to measure? How do we make sure that’s more than lip service and that that integration is really happening? Because that is where the true value lies.

JONATHAN CAPEHART: OK. Last question.

Q: Hi there. My name is Bryce Dawson from Counterpart International.

You mentioned the difficulties of minimizing intrusion and tactically advocating for LGBTQI+ rights in other nations, as well as mentioned potential procurement policies to ensure [LGBTQI+] protections. Do you have any in the pipeline that you’re working on or anything in the future?

JONATHAN CAPEHART: I want to thank everyone for their—for their questions, all five of you or seven altogether. Madam Administrator, you have two minutes.

SAMANTHA POWER: Thirty seconds.

Well, you know, I think that in general we—in our engagements on human rights issues, we hear a lot about noninterference. I mean, there’s no question. I heard about it a lot at the UN. We hear it often from, you know, countries like the Russian Federation that have invaded another country and tried to take over the other country. We hear it from countries that are providing surveillance technology, you know, to other countries, or fueling disinformation in the countries in which we are working.

So, you know, it is a shield. It is an important one to take seriously, because we also, of course, respect sovereignty, and territorial integrity, and so forth. So USAID is active across sectors and involved in these countries. And this agenda, I think, is—and, by that, it’s the human rights agenda more broadly—is central to how we believe as well that we will get the most out of the programs that we are doing across sectors.

And that brings me—and that’s the kind of conversation we have. Is, like, I was using Uganda as an example about making sure that we are also making the pragmatic case for people who are very skeptical because, again, they—there is a kind of seamlessness to the way our work across governance and human rights in citizen security and in the broad sweep of development sectors—from agriculture, to education, to health, et cetera—they do come together in service of development objectives. And that’s what the SDG’s also enshrine.

And then I’m not going to be able to do justice to the other questions in full, beyond I think the point about measuring integration is very important. You know, for those who are not making their identity known to us, that’s not going to be something that, you know, we will be able to measure in that sense. But I think these are the kinds of things that we are working through, through this policy, to make sure that this isn’t just, yes, here’s our standalone programming, and then by everything else we do, you know, operates in the way that we’ve always done it.

And so it’s not going to be, you know, instant, where everything is happening all at once. But all of our missions have to have inclusive development advisors or somebody—and this will be evident out of the policy—but somebody who is a focal point for working on LGBTQI+ rights and programming. So we’re hopeful that that, plus our new office of chief economist, will help us develop a kind of methodology that will be responsive to this concern that somehow it’s going to be invisible and not done, which is certainly our objective is for it to be done and, when appropriate, visible. And certainly, at least visible to us so we know whether we’re achieving what we’re setting out to achieve.

And then, lastly, I would just say, because it’s coming, the point about nondiscrimination among beneficiaries is just really important. And that guidance will be forthcoming, we hope, soon.

JONATHAN CAPEHART: Do you have any thoughts on the other question about—I wrote it down real fast, but I know I got it wrong—about the racialized religious efforts on LGBTQI+ rights that have been happening?

SAMANTHA POWER: Well, I guess all I would say on that—because there are others in our government, I think, who are working on the kind of conversation that was asked about—is just this is another part of the response to the noninterference charge, is—that we do hear from people who don’t want to be engaged on human rights issues. And that is that there are a lot of actors from outside who are very active actually in pushing certain forms of legislation that would have these discriminatory, and these exclusionary, and these dangerous effects. And so, again, the noninterference claim is usually made in a selective way.

JONATHAN CAPEHART: And with that, and just two minutes overtime, Samantha Power, nineteenth administrator of USAID. Thank you very, very much for being here.

SAMANTHA POWER: Thank you.

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Meaningfully advancing the green agenda

Pepe Zhang — Mon, 26 Jun 2023 16:00:00 +0000

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This is the 5th installment of the Unlocking Economic Development in Latin America and the Caribbean report, which explores five vital opportunities for the private sector to drive socioeconomic progress in LAC, with sixteen corresponding recommendations private firms can consider as they take steps to support the region.

How does the private sector perceive Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC)? What opportunities do firms find most exciting? And what precisely can companies do to seize on these opportunities and support the region’s journey toward recovery and sustainable development? To answer these questions, the Atlantic Council collaborated with the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) to glean insights from its robust network of private-sector partners. Through surveys and in-depth interviews, this report identified five vital opportunities for the private sector to drive socioeconomic progress in LAC, with sixteen corresponding recommendations private firms can consider as they take steps to support the region.

Meaningfully advancing the green agenda

The private sector identified the green agenda as a major opportunity, with more than half of survey respondents flagging “addressing climate change” as a top sustainable development and business priority to drive full economic recovery from COVID-19.¹ While climate action is critical on a global level, companies recognize that it is particularly pressing in LAC.

LAC is the world’s most economically unequal region and the second-most disaster-prone region in the world, highly vulnerable to climate consequences.² This vulnerability threatens to further entrench inequality and undermine the wellbeing of people and communities. Every year, between one hundred and fifty thousand and two million people in LAC are pushed into poverty or extreme poverty because of natural disasters, while as many as seventeen million people could migrate across LAC by 2050 due to climate change.³ Climate change also threatens food security, which can heavily impact rural communities.⁴ It will generate economic costs of up to $100 billion annually by 2050, which undercut growth and limit the ability of businesses to operate, prosper, and thrive.⁵

Recommendations for the private sector

Advancing the green agenda is not only imperative as a means of addressing the threat of climate change, but also as a means of unlocking massive business opportunities with the potential to drive private-sector-led economic recovery and growth in LAC. In particular, private firms have an important role to play by creating green jobs, promoting the circular economy, and partaking in green finance.

Creating green jobs: Firms can help create green jobs by adopting sustainable practices, seizing business opportunities in emerging green sectors, and providing upskilling, reskilling, and other support for workers displaced by the green transition.
Promoting the circular economy: Firms can help drive a transition to a circular-economy model by financing circular-economy efforts, supporting multistakeholder initiatives, and adopting and promoting sustainable business practices.
Partaking in green finance: The financial sector can help foster a green-finance ecosystem in the region by tightening environmental, social, and governance (ESG) requirements, aligning investments with green objectives, and nurturing green[1]bond markets in LAC.

About the author

Staff

Pepe Zhang

Senior Fellow

Adrienne Arsht Latin America Center

China Coronavirus

Report Jun 5, 2023

Enhancing market size, scalability, and regional integration in Latin America and the Caribbean

By Pepe Zhang

To sustain the ongoing recovery against short-term headwinds and boost inclusive, productive, and sustainable development in the long term, governments cannot, and should not, act alone. The private sector can strengthen the hard and soft infrastructure supporting Latin America and the Caribbean’s economies, while drawing them closer together through trade, regulatory, and other integration.

Americas Economy & Business

Report Jun 16, 2023

Accelerating digitalization and innovation in Latin America and the Caribbean

By Pepe Zhang

To sustain the ongoing recovery against short-term headwinds and boost inclusive, productive, and sustainable development in the long term, governments cannot, and should not, act alone. The private sector can improve infrastructure, foster skills, and promote adoption to help the region transform its digital potential into development gains.

Americas Economy & Business

Report Jun 20, 2023

Improving state governance, institutional capacity, and transparency

By Pepe Zhang

To sustain the ongoing recovery against short-term headwinds and boost inclusive, productive, and sustainable development in the long term, governments cannot, and should not, act alone. Technological, governance, and other cooperation between the public and private sectors can enhance institutional capacity, integrity, government service delivery, and regulatory quality in LAC.

Americas Inclusive Growth

Report Jun 22, 2023

Addressing multidimensional inequality

By Pepe Zhang

To sustain the ongoing recovery against short-term headwinds and boost inclusive, productive, and sustainable development in the long term, governments cannot, and should not, act alone. Private-sector actions to reduce gender inequality, like level the playing field between SMEs and large firms and narrow the urban-rural divide, can enable a more inclusive economy for LAC.

Americas Inclusive Growth

Online Event Thu, February 17, 2022 • 9:00 am ET

#ProactiveLAC: A digital future for regional prosperity

A virtual conversation on the role of public-private partnerships and policy actions in increasing digital connectivity across Latin America and the Caribbean.

Coronavirus Digital Policy Inclusive Growth Latin America

The Adrienne Arsht Latin America Center broadens understanding of regional transformations and delivers constructive, results-oriented solutions to inform how the public and private sectors can advance hemispheric prosperity.

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1 Opportunities and Challenges in Latin America and the Caribbean: The Private Sector Perspective,” June 2022, question 10.

2 “GHO 2023: at a Glance,” Humanitarian Action, last visited January 25, 2023, https://gho.unocha.org/appeals/latin-america-and-caribbean#footnote-paragraph-136-1.

3 Carlos Felipe Jaramillo, “A Green Recovery of Latin America and the Caribbean is Possible and Necessary,” Latin America and the Caribbean World Bank Blog, September 11, 2020, https://blogs.worldbank.org/latinamerica/green-recovery-latin-america-and-caribbean-possible-and-necessary.

4 Enrique Oviedo and Adoniram Sanches, coords., “Food and Nutrition Security and the Eradication of Hunger: CELAC 2025: Furthering Discussion and Regional Cooperation,” Community of Latin American and Caribbean States, July 2016, 74–75. https://repositorio.cepal.org/bitstream/handle/11362/40355/S1600706_en.pdf?sequence=1&isAllowed=y.

5 Walter Vergara, et al., “The Climate and Development Challenge for Latin America and the Caribbean: Options for Climate-Resilient, Low-Carbon Development,” Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean, Inter-American Development Bank, and World Wildlife Fund, 2013, 13–14, https://publications.iadb.org/publications/english/document/The-Climate-and[3]Development-Challenge-for-Latin-America-and-the-Caribbean-Options-for-Climate-Resilient-Low-Carbon-Development.pdf.

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Pavia joins BBC World Service to discuss potential outcomes as EP’s committee visits Lampedusa for a search and rescue fact-finding mission.

Atlantic Council — Thu, 22 Jun 2023 19:47:32 +0000

Original Source

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Addressing multidimensional inequality

Pepe Zhang — Thu, 22 Jun 2023 16:00:00 +0000

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This is the 4th installment of the Unlocking Economic Development in Latin America and the Caribbean report, which explores five vital opportunities for the private sector to drive socioeconomic progress in LAC, with sixteen corresponding recommendations private firms can consider as they take steps to support the region.

Addressing multidimensional inequality

A fourth private-sector-led opportunity for accelerating socioeconomic development in LAC is tackling one of the region’s most long-standing issues: inequality. Inequality in LAC is multidimensional in that it affects a wide range of issues and population groups based on gender (recommendation 1 below), geography (recommendation 3 below), socioeconomic status, occupational sector, age, ethnicity, digital access, healthcare, and other factors.¹ Tackling these multidimensional and often interrelated inequalities can improve economic wellbeing. For example, evidence suggests that reducing gender inequality alone—in terms of lifetime earnings losses—could boost regional GDP by at least 8 percent.² Since these and other inequalities are often interconnected, mitigating them will often require a holistic approach.

Recommendations for the private sector

Tapping into the financing, expertise, and technological capabilities of private firms will be crucial to mitigating multidimensional inequality in LAC. Practical training, mentoring, capacity building, supply-chain integration, and other programs help bring new talent into the region’s workforce, expand business operations, and increase productivity in LAC. This will particularly benefit underprivileged groups such as women, SMEs, and rural populations, making LAC’s growth more inclusive and resilient against future shocks.

Addressing gender-based inequality: Companies must empower female professional advancements, e.g., by addressing constraints arising from caregiving and unpaid domestic work, or by providing skills, entrepreneurial, or other training for women.
Empowering SMEs: Larger firms can shore up SME competitiveness by facilitating access to financing, supply-chain integration, and capability-building opportunities.
Tackling place-based inequality: Public-private collaboration and investment can make rural areas more accessible to basic services (like water and Internet) and more economically productive, thus reducing the rural-urban divide.
Preparing for shocks: Employer-led relief initiatives not only serve to cushion the impact of financial, climate, and other shocks on the lives and livelihoods of employees, but fortify societal cohesion and broader economic resilience.

About the author

Staff

Pepe Zhang

Senior Fellow

Adrienne Arsht Latin America Center

China Coronavirus

Report Jun 5, 2023

Enhancing market size, scalability, and regional integration in Latin America and the Caribbean

By Pepe Zhang

Americas Economy & Business

Report Jun 16, 2023

Accelerating digitalization and innovation in Latin America and the Caribbean

By Pepe Zhang

To sustain the ongoing recovery against short-term headwinds and boost inclusive, productive, and sustainable development in the long term, governments cannot, and should not, act alone. The private sector can improve infrastructure, foster skills, and promote adoption to help the region transform its digital potential into development gains.

Americas Economy & Business

Report Jun 20, 2023

Improving state governance, institutional capacity, and transparency

By Pepe Zhang

To sustain the ongoing recovery against short-term headwinds and boost inclusive, productive, and sustainable development in the long term, governments cannot, and should not, act alone. Technological, governance, and other cooperation between the public and private sectors can enhance institutional capacity, integrity, government service delivery, and regulatory quality in LAC.

Americas Inclusive Growth

Report Jun 26, 2023

Meaningfully advancing the green agenda

By Pepe Zhang

To sustain the ongoing recovery against short-term headwinds and boost inclusive, productive, and sustainable development in the long term, governments cannot, and should not, act alone. Private firms can help advance the green agenda by working to create green jobs, taking measures to promote a transition to a circular-economy model, and partaking in green finance.

Americas Climate Change & Climate Action

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A virtual conversation on the role of public-private partnerships and policy actions in increasing digital connectivity across Latin America and the Caribbean.

Coronavirus Digital Policy Inclusive Growth Latin America

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1 Pepe Zhang and Peter Engelke, 2025 Post-Covid Scenarios: Latin America and the Caribbean, Atlantic Council, April 21, 2021, https://www.atlanticcouncil.org/in-depth-researchreports/2025-post-covid-scenarios-latin-america-and-the-caribbean.

2 Quentin Wodon and Benedicte de la Briere, “The Cost of Gender Inequality: Unrealized Potential: The High Cost of Gender Inequality in Earnings,” Canada, Children’s Investment Fund Foundation, Global Partnership for Education, and World Bank Group, May 2018, 2, “Human capital measured as the present value of the future earnings of the labor force,” https://openknowledge.worldbank.org/bitstream/handle/10986/29865/126579-Public-on-5-30-18-WorldBank-GenderInequality-Brief-v13.pdf?sequence=1&isAllowed=y.

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A blueprint for Turkey’s resilient reconstruction and recovery post-earthquake

Karim Elgendy — Tue, 20 Jun 2023 19:36:30 +0000

The earthquake that struck Turkey and Syria on February 6, 2023, caused widespread devastation. The death toll was estimated at over fifty thousand people, of which around 46,000 were in Turkey. In addition, the earthquake initially left millions of people homeless and without access to basic necessities across the two-hundred-mile-long path of destruction.

In the aftermath of such disasters, there is often a rush to quickly rebuild and restore affected areas. However, Turkey must rebuild its affected cities in a sustainable way that provides for both the short- and long-term needs of its residents. This requires holistic planning, community engagement, and integrating urban sustainability and resilience.

In Turkey, more than 160,000 buildings containing 520,000 apartments collapsed or were severely damaged across provinces such as Hatay, Kahramanmaraş, Adıyaman, Gaziantep, and Malatya. According to data from the Turkish Ministry of Environment, Urbanization, and Climate Change, the vast majority of the affected buildings were built before 1999. In addition, official estimates in the months after the earthquake indicated that more than 230,000 buildings would have to be demolished, representing approximately 30 percent of the existing building stock.

In response, the Turkish government announced an ambitious plan to build 488,000 homes in the affected region within a year. It also pledged to build an unspecified number of nonresidential buildings such as schools and hospitals. The plan also includes retrofitting and strengthening the existing properties that have sustained light, nonstructural damage, as well as redeveloping infrastructure such as roads and bridges.

The plan is overseen by the Ministry of Environment, Urbanization, and Climate Change, and the work is being assigned to the Turkish Housing Development Administration (TOKI), a government agency that has been building public housing for the last four decades. TOKI had recently reported that 134,000 of the houses it built in the earthquake zone did not suffer any structural damage. It did not, however, rule out that any of its buildings were affected.

Construction is already under way in some areas. On May 3, the outgoing minister of environment, urbanization, and climate change announced that 132,000 housing units are already under construction. The total reconstruction cost is estimated to exceed one hundred billion dollars.

Sustainable reconstruction

As long as builders follow Turkey’s earthquake codes for construction, those units and others will be built to be earthquake-resistant. Yet to capitalize on this massive investment and to reduce future risks, the planned neighborhoods and buildings should not merely be resilient to future earthquakes: They should also be rebuilt resilient to known hazards caused or intensified by climate change.

According to the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, Southern Turkey is expected to experience more frequent heatwaves and droughts, in addition to higher temperatures and sea levels. If newly built homes become unlivable in a just few decades because builders didn’t take into account future cooling and ventilation needs, or if neighborhoods rebuilt after this earthquake suffer from congestion and pollution in the future, such large-scale investments could become stranded assets. Major reconstruction at this scale should also not only adapt to climate change but also mitigate it; cities should be sustainably rebuilt so that their damage to the environment—and contribution to climate change—is limited.

Turkish officials’ desires to reconstruct quickly is understandable given the urgency to restore normalcy. However, the benefits of rebuilding with long-term viability in mind—by taking the time to plan for more sustainable, resilient, and inclusive neighborhoods—far outweigh the short-term gains of hasty reconstruction.

In order to rebuild sustainably, builders should approach reconstruction with a wider focus on districts and neighborhoods rather than a narrow focus on individual buildings and infrastructure. These new neighborhoods should use land efficiently, with buildings that have smaller footprints, in order to make more land available for public green spaces—which offer nearby residents improved air quality, among other benefits—urban agriculture, and pedestrian and cycling paths.

Despite the availability of bus networks, cars still represent a significant share of transportation in the five most affected provinces, which contributes to air pollution and traffic congestion. Planning for future neighborhoods should mix residential and commercial areas to reduce the need for commuting. The planning should also develop reliable and sustainable transportation networks, similar to the Kahramanmaraş 2030 transportation plans. This includes measures to reduce air pollution such as encouraging residents to use public transportation and minimizing spaces dedicated to car parking.

The planning that shapes these new neighborhoods should also aim to create a more comfortable environment for residents. This includes orienting the street network and designing buildings in a way that allows for breezes during hot seasons. It also includes planting trees and vegetation and using new materials for roofs and pavements. These measures help keep the sun’s heat at bay while managing rainfall naturally to reduce flooding risk. Local ecosystems such as forests, wetlands, and agricultural lands under threat from deforestation, pollution, and climate change should also be restored.

New neighborhoods also need to be planned with future energy and water use in mind. This includes reducing peak electricity demand by designing buildings that require minimal energy to heat and cool and providing spaces for power installations on rooftops and above pedestrian walkways. Improving water efficiency is also critical given that the five most affected provinces already face high levels of water stress.

The new neighborhoods should also be planned so that they do not displace vulnerable communities and disrupt their social networks and livelihoods. These risks can be avoided by including these communities in the planning, including at the local community level, and engaging stakeholders in the decision-making process.

Leveraging international assistance

In any humanitarian crisis, the pressure on local and national decision makers to act quickly is always immense. Yet, hasty reconstruction brings many risks: inefficient land use; the increased use of energy, water, and material resources; increased carbon emissions; a higher flooding risk; increased congestion; poor air quality; limited access to public spaces; loss of biodiversity; increased vulnerability to climate change impacts; and increased social and economic inequality. The long-term cost of failing to address these issues is nothing short of a failure to protect the surviving earthquake victims and other residents from future disasters.

Being less constrained by the pressure to rebuild hastily, international donors could play a role in ensuring a more positive outcome in Turkey. The European Union pledged six billion euros in grants and loans, while the World Bank pledged $1.78 billion in initial assistance to help with relief and recovery efforts in Turkey. If those institutions and future international donors encourage Turkish policymakers to create sustainable, resilient, and inclusive neighborhoods, they could have a positive impact on the trajectory of the reconstruction efforts.

The window of opportunity to create the foundations for more sustainable and resilient cities is narrow and closing quickly. Thoughtful and inclusive planning requires additional coordination and consultation and may result in a delay of a few weeks or months. Yet it remains the only way to capitalize on this opportunity for Turkey and to address the needs of both current residents and future generations.

Karim Elgendy is an urban sustainability and climate expert based in London. He is an associate director at Buro Happold, an associate fellow at Chatham House, and a nonresident scholar at the Middle East Institute in Washington. Elgendy is also the founder and coordinator of Carboun, an advocacy initiative promoting sustainability in cities of the Middle East and North Africa through research and communication.

The post A blueprint for Turkey’s resilient reconstruction and recovery post-earthquake appeared first on Atlantic Council.

I work in Syrian civil society. There were gaps in our performance after the February 6 earthquake.

Kenda Hawasli — Mon, 12 Jun 2023 14:50:56 +0000

When people imagine a natural disaster, they often picture destruction and loss. However, there is an implicit political meaning many overlook. As defined by the United Nations Office for Disaster Risk Reduction, a disaster is a “situation in which hazard and vulnerability intersect leading to damage or potential damage exceeding the coping capability of those affected without outside support.” This fragility is the consequence of a government’s policies, such as negligence or the failure to apply laws, prepare for emergencies, or learn from mistakes, which can cause harm to a populace.

The February 6 earthquake in Turkey and Syria reflects this political dimension clearly, especially in northwest Syria, where there were over 5,900 deaths and eleven thousand injuries. Neither the de facto authorities nor local actors—such as Syrian non-governmental organizations (NGOs)—were able to provide the required emergency services to keep more than five million people alive, which was exacerbated by the poor and slow response from the international community and international NGOs.

Syrian NGOs during a disaster

The case of Syrian NGOs calls for further study. Since the 2011 civil war began, they emerged in abnormal circumstances under conflict, developed very quickly, and had to deal with the absence of a government response and the vast needs resulting from military operations and forced displacement waves. Despite such realities, these NGOs were somehow able to quickly address the effects of the earthquake while being one of the parties most affected by the disaster.

Syrian NGO offices are mostly concentrated in areas where the earthquake struck, such as Turkey’s Gaziantep and Hatay provinces. Some NGO employees and their families ended up becoming victims as a result. Others suffered from instability. Despite this, they arranged their affairs within a short period and designed the required response for the affected people in northern Syria.

However, notwithstanding their brave efforts, there were many gaps in their response due to faults in organizational structure, policies, and management. It may seem harsh to make criticisms in these circumstances, but introspection is necessary to learn from these mistakes and avoid repeating them. The Syrian humanitarian NGOs’ responses reflected many gaps that are supposed to be remedied in their structure, policies, and management. It was evident that there was a lack of expertise and qualified cadres to deal with disaster situations, who had access to courses—offered by the international community—that did not focus on this aspect effectively.

The cadres of international NGOs—particularly the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA —were not in a better position. Emergency responses were absent from these offices, which were located on the other side of the border, and aid was delayed for days—something that is considered to be a crucial flaw in a rescue operation. Moreover, the assistance provided—food and tents—did not initially include items of priority, such as heavy equipment to clear rubble, specialized teams to assist in rescue missions, and medical aid to treat the wounded.

When comparing this poor United Nations response to that of the Haiti earthquake in 2010, the differences are evident, although the conditions are similar. The OCHA office in Haiti was heavily impacted, yet the staff was mobilized with the help of the international community and its NGOs to support the three-month response. In addition, adequate humanitarian action was taken, exhibited by the collection and disbursement of funds three days after the earthquake occurred and the arrival of hundreds of organizations.

Thus, an important question arises: Why did the response of the UN cadres not live up to expectations despite their field experience and previous recommendations to develop disaster responses?

Chaos and poor response

From monitoring the forms of humanitarian response the Syrian NGOs took, I identified chaos as the prominent feature, especially in the first week. For example, the NGOs completely failed to activate the existence of local humanitarian networks, which include dozens of international NGOs. Each organization designed its response individually and launched the same activities without having a clear strategy regarding the utilization of available resources, leading to duplication and waste in providing in-kind assistance and meals. Communication and coordination to improve the response took a long time in these critical hours.

The powerful collaboration between Syrian humanitarian local networks did not emerge except in advocacy activities and via political pressure. As a result, this showed the actual effect of networks in coordinating work on the ground and managing dozens of new volunteer teams that launched humanitarian activities without having any of the required experience.

The earthquake response caused a decline in Syrian NGOs’ reputations. People were divided between those who supported the NGOs’ work and praised their experience and those who questioned the NGOs and demanded that donors deliver their donations directly to people in need. Although this division came to the fore due to this natural disaster, it is not new and cannot continue to be ignored. That is why this case needs to be studied in greater depth. It is imperative that we restore the Syrian public’s confidence in these organizations.

The disaster also revealed other flaws, according to my evaluation. The risk management of humanitarian organizations and international donors extended to nothing more than warehouses storing foodstuffs. There was an acute shortage of rescue machinery and equipment, specialized medical materials, and fuel, and the process of securing and purchasing aid was confusing during this chaos. Moreover, the absence of prior preparation and the lack of experience in dealing with this type of calamity caused a lot of improvisation and uncertainty.

Lessons learned from the disaster response

It is often the case that the focus during and after a natural disaster is on losses or physical destruction, while the weaknesses of the society in question, which surfaced during the event, is ignored. This creates the potential for new disasters that will intensify the disadvantages of a society and exacerbate the problems in its aftermath mainly due to the weakness and fragility of government policies.

The international community and its NGOs bear a large part of the responsibility for the losses incurred by the earthquake in northwest Syria. They have led a cross-border humanitarian response since 2014 and possess the expertise and qualifications to help local communities and NGOs get out of the aforementioned weakness cycle. During these eight years, relief and in-kind aid—such as cartons containing foodstuffs, clothes, or hygiene baskets—have plunged these communities into new levels of vulnerability, by increasing their dependence without helping them to reach self-sufficiency or building their capacity. The international responses have exhausted local authorities, councils, and professional syndicates from emergency response procedures instead of investing in building their capabilities and training them effectively, thus producing cadres with insufficient experience and tools. Consequently, the local councils were highly unprepared to take the initiative, manage responses, and reduce the chaos of the disaster.

On the other hand, the response of the UN, international NGOs, and Arab countries was shameful, as they sided politically with the Bashar al-Assad regime and ignored the most fragile and needy areas. These actors delivered the majority of aid through the regime and the organizations founded by the security apparatus of the Syrian regime. According to the Syrian Network for Human Rights’ report, 90 percent of the aid intended for earthquake victims was stolen.

Such corruption, which ignored opposition areas and left them mired in cycles of weakness and need, could stir up the conflict again and renew military operations. The financial and diplomatic activities that occurred under the guise of “disaster diplomacy” have broken the Assad regime’s international isolation and secured funding that it can use to regain control of northwest Syria.

From these mistakes, it is clear that humanitarian response planning in Syria requires a full review process that reconsiders existing approaches and involves local partners while listening to their experiences. A good place to start would be to redesign the risk management training provided to NGOs and local communities, as well as providing them with capacity-building projects. This way, those on the ground will be empowered to carry out their own affairs, enhance their own stability, and break out of the cycle of weakness to stand prepared for any disaster that may come.

Kenda Hawasli is the director of the social unit at the Syrian Dialogue Centre based in Istanbul, Turkey.

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Saudi Arabia is requiring companies to establish headquarters in the kingdom. That strategy may pay off.

Stefanie Hausheer Ali — Fri, 09 Jun 2023 17:41:50 +0000

In 2021, Saudi Arabia issued an ultimatum to international companies: they will no longer be eligible for government contracts starting in 2024 unless they have a regional headquarters (HQ) in the kingdom. There are minimal exceptions to this new policy and, according to experts I consulted, the HQ requirement may eventually impact contracts with state-owned enterprises as well. Some companies are also concerned that the government could shift the goalposts and require more executive presence or include more stringent criteria down the road.

Saudi Arabia’s goal is to get 480 companies to open regional HQs by 2030, believing that this will ensure their sustained presence and retain more corporate expenditure in the kingdom. This will also help achieve the objectives of Vision 2030 and grow the Saudi economy.

Already, eighty companies have been granted licenses to establish headquarters in Saudi Arabia, with companies like PepsiCo leading the way. Other companies are resigned to the fact that they must open an HQ in Saudi but are assessing loopholes, such as how many executives and employees must work from the Saudi-based HQ, what percentage of Saudi citizens need to be hired, and the tax implications.

Albright Stonebridge Gulf Cooperation Council Regional Manager Imad Al-Abdulqader explained to me that: “The government sees this as a long-term effort, and wants to shift decision-making personnel to Saudi Arabia because it believes that if senior company leaders live there, this will allow them to see the opportunities and grow their business in a way that benefits the companies and the country instead of what is seen currently as a transactional relationship for many companies that have benefited from government procurement for decades despite hardly any economic footprint in the country.”

This policy is also a deliberate move to upend the United Arab Emirates’ (UAE) monopoly on hosting multi-national company headquarters, particularly since Saudi Arabia is the top market for most.

In 2021, Saudi Arabia hosted less than 5 percent of regional company headquarters in stark contrast to the UAE, which currently hosts the regional HQ for 76 percent of companies on the Forbes Middle East list. Although the UAE’s GDP is half the size of Saudi Arabia’s, the UAE has received more foreign direct investment since 2013. This lopsided business preference in favor of the UAE is primarily due to the ease of doing business in the country and its liberal social policies, which have appealed to expats.

Saudi Arabia’s desire to change this dynamic is generating competition between these “frenemies” that is good for the region and good for business, as venture capital investor and Atlantic Council empowerME Chairman Amjad Ahmad has written. Both countries have made significant reforms. The UAE has announced a Monday to Friday work week, introduced a ten-year “golden visa” for foreigners, and is implementing a new corporate tax this month—the lowest in the region besides Bahrain’s—that will eliminate the current fee structure.

For its part, Saudi Arabia launched a Quality of Life Program in 2018 that is rapidly developing more “cultural, entertainment, sports, tourism, and urban activities” to make Saudi cities rank “among the world’s top livable cities.” The kingdom has also streamlined its tourist visa process, boosted women’s labor force participation from 18 percent in 2009 to 30 percent in 2020, and curtailed the influence of the religious police.

Dana Alajlani, head of public affairs for the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) at Sanofi, explained to me: “The rapid pace of change in Saudi Arabia is inspiring, and the eagerness of the young generation to drive the transformation is palpable. I would encourage executives and investors to visit the country to see for themselves how much the country has transformed and the myriad of business opportunities that exist.”

Yet, some companies may lack an understanding of the new reality in the kingdom.

Business executives I’ve spoken to are often shocked by the rapid and profound change in Saudi Arabia. Mickey Stewart, the deputy CEO of Saudi consulting firm AEI Saudi, told me: “Riyadh is an exciting and rapidly developing city, with many emerging lifestyle opportunities for relocating expats. Nonetheless, a handful of businesses have described to us the [Regional Headquarter] initiative as a tax for doing business.”

The Saudi government recognizes this, which is why the HQ program is an ultimatum rather than a bushel of incentives. Expats accustomed to life in the UAE or elsewhere may view a move to the kingdom with dread, imagining religious police, a ban that prevents women from driving, and other relics of Saudi Arabia’s recent past. However, Saudi Arabia has become a much more appealing place to live.

Creating jobs for Saudis

Above all, the HQ program is designed to create more jobs for Saudis as part of the government’s push to diversify the economy through Vision 2030.

Two-thirds of the country’s approximately thirty-five million people are under the age of thirty-five, which represents an opportunity and a challenge. When the oil wells run dry, and as the world begins to shift to greener energy sources, alternative sources of revenue are essential for the country.

In 2022, Saudi Arabia’s non-oil sector grew by over 6 percent. Since 2011, oil rent has comprised less and less of the kingdom’s GDP, although it is still a significant source of revenue.

The Saudi government requires foreign companies to reinvest some of their profits in society, as well as train and transfer knowledge to locals. As former US National Security Advisor Stephen Hadley explained to me: “Companies that want to be successful in Saudi Arabia need to make sure their plans align with the objectives of Vision 2030 in terms of creating jobs and training people, because that’s what the country’s leadership is looking for. Fortunately, this is something American companies are very good at.”

The challenges of operating in the kingdom

Today, Saudi Arabia has the energy and ambition of a startup: it’s trying to build the plane while flying it. This presents challenges though.

There is tension between the main incentive offered to companies for setting up a regional HQ—a ten-year exemption on quotas for hiring a certain percentage of Saudis for jobs—and the overall goals of the plan to create more jobs for Saudi citizens. As AEI Saudi Deputy CEO Mickey Stewart puts it: “AEI are both advocates and practitioners of the government’s strategic policy of Saudization (Saudi jobs for Saudi people). While there is some incredible local talent, the pace and scale of transformation means demand versus supply of talent remains a challenge for the immediate future.”

The UAE’s population of roughly ten million is nearly 90 percent expats. Saudi Arabia is not seeking to emulate the UAE in this regard. In fact, it cannot afford to because the country needs jobs for its citizens.

Key details, such as how company taxes will be assessed, will be announced soon, according to government officials. This could alleviate concerns about taxation in more than one jurisdiction. Saudi Arabia also plans to permit foreigners to buy commercial, residential, and agricultural real estate, going beyond a 2021 reform that allowed non-Saudi legal residents to buy property with some conditions.

The cost of living in Saudi Arabia is another challenging factor. Housing, water, electricity, gas, and other fuels rose over 6 percent in 2022, with housing costs in some of Riyadh’s most desirable areas rising as much as 40 percent.

As American Chamber of Commerce KSA Women in Business Committee Chairwoman Jamila ElDajani told me: “Living in Saudi Arabia can be affordable, but to get like for like as you would elsewhere in the region, it can be costly. School, utilities, gas, clothes—costs have increased significantly in the last few years, and options can be limited. With that said, this reflects the amount of opportunity available to entrepreneurs and foreign investors, as they can address the rise in demand for projects that improve quality of life. For those who have a long-term outlook, there couldn’t be a better time to be setting up a business in the kingdom.”

In 2020, Saudi Arabia tripled its VAT tax from 5 percent to 15 percent, which Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman said was temporary. However, the Saudis I spoke to are skeptical about the VAT being reduced. Saudi Arabia has also reduced its domestic subsidies on electricity, gas, and water, with consumers feeling this year’s price increases of 54 percent, 333 percent, and 2,307 percent, respectively, as compared to 2015 prices.

Saudi Arabia is also working to open more private schools in Riyadh to support the demand caused by expats moving into the kingdom. These new schools are part of the International School Attraction Program—a partnership between the Ministry of Investment and the Ministry of Education that “aims to contribute to the transformation of the capital into one of the world’s most competitive and livable cities by 2030.” I hear mixed reviews about schools from expats living in Riyadh: some say the quality of the schools and the staffing levels are not yet adequate while others think the situation is no different than any other major city like London or New York where parents may struggle to find the right fit for their children.

There are also risks that hold some companies back from investing in the kingdom. In Saudi Arabia, the government’s Vision 2030-related efforts are improving many people’s daily lives. However, as Council on Foreign Relations Senior Fellow Steven Cook put it recently: “This is the case even though reform is entirely from above, activists demanding change from below are dealt with harshly, and societal surveillance has intensified.”

Business deals are proliferating and are likely to continue

Despite the challenges associated with the Regional HQ program and with doing business in Saudi Arabia, the reforms underway are attracting companies to the kingdom:

In March of this year, Saudi Arabia announced a $37 billion deal with Boeing to sell airplanes to Saudia Airlines and the new Riyadh Airlines.
HSBC is on a hiring spree and wants to increase global banking and markets headcount in the kingdom by ten to fifteen percent.
Cigna has plans to expand.
Accenture won a major digital consulting contract with Aramco.
Oracle has announced plans to invest $1.5 billion.
China is reportedly considering moving Huawei’s MENA HQ to Saudi Arabia.

More big deals can be expected if the kingdom continues to accelerate its development, but Saudi Arabia must continue pro-business reforms to attract and retain top companies. The Saudi government should also continue to invest in education reform and re-skilling efforts to ensure that the next generation of Saudis are ready for future jobs.

If Saudi Arabia is successful, it should be able to end its Regional HQ requirement in the next five years. By then, most foreign companies will already have or desire a strong presence in the largest regional market, especially if the downsides to living and working there continue to decrease. The regional HQ mandate seeks to accelerate this shift because Saudi Arabia has no time to waste in its sprint to achieve its ambitious Vision 2030 goals.

Stefanie Hausheer Ali is a director at the international strategic advisory firm Rice, Hadley, Gates & Manuel LLC.

The information in this article represents the views and opinions of the author and does not necessarily represent the views or opinions of Rice, Hadley, Gates & Manuel LLC.

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How monarchies end

Stephen Grand — Tue, 06 Jun 2023 16:00:14 +0000

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The whole world is in revolt. Soon there will be only five Kings left—the King of England, the King of Spades, The King of Clubs, the King of Hearts, and the King of Diamonds.”

King Farouk of Egypt, 1948

In a new Scowcroft Middle East Security Initiative issue brief, “How Monarchies End”, Atlantic Council’s Nonresident Senior Fellow Stephen R. Grand flips the analytical script on the spate of notable publications covering “how democracies die.”

Grand examines what happens when autocratic rule corrodes and what pushes it to ultimately crumble. Under what circumstances do kings and queens, emperors and caliphs, cease to rule — either because their throne is transformed into a more ceremonial post or because they lose power entirely? For the eight remaining Arab monarchs, the downfall of their former global peers offer critical insights and parallels.

The issue brief examines these topics and provides strategies for managing challenges to power, as well as a series of lessons for Arab monarchs to consider.

About the author

Stephen R. Grand

Nonresident Senior Fellow
Rafik Hariri Center & Middle East Programs

Executive Director, Network for Dialogue
Instituto Affari Internazionali & PAX

Grand was director of the Project on US Relations with the Islamic World (housed within the Center for Middle East Policy at Brookings), where he wrote the book Understanding Tahrir Square: What Transitions Else- where Can Teach Us about the Prospects for Arab Democracy (2014). Other prior positions include director of the Middle East Strategy Group at the Aspen Institute, director of programs at the German Marshall Fund, professional staff member for the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, and founding executive director of the Civic Education Project. He has also served as a visiting or adjunct professor at Georgia State University (current), Utrecht University, the Vrije Universiteit in Amsterdam, Erasmus University in Rotterdam, American University’s School of International Service and Syracuse University’s Maxwell School of Citizenship and Public Affairs.

Scowcroft Middle East Security Initiative

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MENASource May 19, 2023

Experts react: Assad gets warm reception at Arab summit. Where does that leave the US and its allies?

By Qutaiba Idlbi, Gissou Nia, Michel Duclos, Emadeddin Badi

Atlantic Council experts react to Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad’s attendance at the Arab League summit in Jeddah and explain its significance below.

Human Rights Middle East

MENASource May 10, 2023

Saudi Arabia should consider the ‘Just Do It’ strategy for normalizing ties with Israel

By Richard LeBaron

Acting on one’s terms when pursuing national interests is always a better strategy. Saudi Arabia is completely capable of dealing with Israel on its own.

Israel Middle East

New Atlanticist Apr 21, 2023

Is Saudi-Iran reconciliation threatening the future of Israeli normalization?

By Sarah Zaaimi

The recent rapprochement between Saudi Arabia and Iran could signal a sea change in Arab-Iranian relations and pose practical hindrances to Arab-Israeli normalization.

Iran Middle East

The post How monarchies end appeared first on Atlantic Council.

Halaimzai & Theros in PeaceRep: Establishing the Afghanistan Research Network

Atlantic Council — Mon, 29 May 2023 14:20:25 +0000

original source

Sahar Halaimzai and Marika Theros recently established The Afghanistan Research Network (ARN) as a first step to preserve, sustain and amplify Afghan expertise and knowledge, and to provide analysis that can inform creative actions in the short-term while helping shape future prospects for a more stable and pluralistic Afghanistan in the long-term. The Afghanistan Research Network aims to preserve Afghan expertise, support civic capacities and informed dialogue, and strengthen Afghan-driven policy advice to international practitioners.

Sahar Halaimzai is a non-resident senior fellow at the South Asia Center at the Atlantic Council. She also serves as an Associate Fellow with the Conflict and Civicness Research Group at LSE, and Deputy Director of the Civic Engagement Project (CEP), working at the intersection of action-oriented research, policy and civic engagement in difficult environments.

Marika Theros is a non-resident senior fellow at the South Asia Center at the Atlantic Council and the Institute for State Effectiveness. She also serves as a Policy Fellow with the Conflict and Civicness Research Group at LSE, focusing on Afghan peace processes, and the director of the CEP.

Part of our approach focuses on the process of convening and linking together a diverse group of Afghan experts and activists, creating a space for informed dialogues across a range of Afghan actors to deliberate on key issues and principles and engage in collective problem solving and action, and thus, help to enhance Afghan capacity to reduce tensions and develop a shared vision for the future.
Sahar Halaimzai and Marika Theros

SouthAsiaSource Dec 6, 2022

A reframed engagement with Afghanistan

By Annie Pforzheimer

Some form of engagement is important to ensure that Afghanistan’s people are not forgotten and can sustainably recover from the economic shocks of drought, COVID-19, and lost international assistance associated with the NATO presence.

Afghanistan Human Rights

SouthAsiaSource Oct 20, 2022

The lionesses of Kabul & Tehran in Khorasan

By Davood Moradian

Afghan and Iranian women continue to be denied their basic human rights, and this shared struggle is built on an overlapping Iranian-Afghan history and civilizational space known as the Iranian plateau.

Afghanistan Human Rights

Report Sep 27, 2022

Afghanistan under the Taliban: Regional recalibrations, challenges, and ways forward

By Hameed Hakimi

Despite the spectacular and unprecedented events following the Taliban’s takeover of Afghanistan in August 2021, the global spotlight steadily shifted away from the country.

Afghanistan Economy & Business

More about our expert

Fellow

Sahar Halaimzai

Nonresident Senior Fellow

South Asia Center

Civil Society Human Rights

Fellow

Marika Theros

Nonresident Senior Fellow

South Asia Center

Security & Defense Politics & Diplomacy

The post Halaimzai & Theros in PeaceRep: Establishing the Afghanistan Research Network appeared first on Atlantic Council.

There’s a gendered brain drain in MENA. It’s because women are unrecognized and underestimated.

Britt Gronemeyer — Fri, 05 May 2023 13:24:31 +0000

It’s no secret that the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region is facing the consequences of a widespread brain drain—a rapid migration flow by highly-skilled and educated people—to the Global North. However, the gendered nature of this phenomenon is often overlooked. The feminization of migration flowing out of MENA can be attributed to the limited career opportunities available to women at home. If this trend continues to be unrecognized and unaddressed, it can have major consequences for the regional economy and stall development.

This female-oriented brain drain is an under-researched and underrecognized phenomenon seriously impacting the contemporary Middle East and North Africa. Part of this is due to the lack of relevant data and a widespread international tendency to underestimate the potential of women’s participation in the workforce. However, the existing data on women’s education, participation in the labor market, and migration patterns demonstrates a correlation and indicates a disproportionate desire for women to seek career opportunities elsewhere.

As women gain access to education, their involvement in the workforce lags. The average female-to-male tertiary education ratio is 108 percent, with more women obtaining university degrees. Yet, the World Bank has reported that the labor force participation rate for women is 19 percent compared to the 71 percent rate for men. The increasing number of women and girls who are provided access to education closely aligns with the increasing number of women who are emigrating from the Middle East. Many of them are migrating independently for career advancement and educational opportunities.

This correlation is evident in Egypt, where half of the doctors—the majority of whom are women—have left the country to pursue career opportunities in the healthcare field. Women are also more likely to remain abroad over their male due to gender disparities in the labor markets back home. Not only are numbers high in countries such as Syria and Yemen, which are currently facing widespread and violent conflict, but countries such as Jordan and Morocco, which should otherwise have high female employment rates and low brain drain rates, remain some of the worst in the world for female economic participation.

Causes for female brain drain

Although women’s education is increasing rapidly, there are many gendered factors that both prevent women from entering the workforce and deter them from remaining in it. Women are often hesitant to pursue career ambitions or are pushed out of their careers due to workplace harassment, discriminatory employment practices, a dearth of safe transportation options, and social norms. Additionally, women have to take on the majority of childcare responsibilities without a range of public childcare options available to ccompensate for the disproportionate burden.

Women also face low wages, meaning that they expect to receive minimal returns on the heavy investment they made to pursue their careers. This is exacerbated by the fact that women are often the last to be hired and the first to be fired—a phenomenon that increased dramatically due to the COVID-19 pandemic. If they do manage to obtain a job or keep it, they have fewer opportunities to advance in their careers once they enter the workforce. This glass ceiling for women in MENA has often been attributed to traditional gender roles and discriminatory practices.

Why women matter

It is well known that women’s economic participation improves and promotes the overall economic development of the region. If female brain drain continues to accelerate, the entire region will face the consequences, including economic stagnation and the social ostracization of an underutilized demographic. A 2022 PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) study found that improving the female employment rate to meet the current male employment rate could increase the region’s GDP by up to 57 percent, which translates to $2 trillion. Egypt, Jordan, and Lebanon are expected to benefit the most from improving female employment rates. Additionally, improving female representation in positions of power and diplomacy has been proven to encourage more sustainable peace and increased democratization in the region. For these reasons, it would benefit all parties involved to take action against women’s brain drain in MENA.

This can involve deliberate steps to increase economic opportunities for women and foster a more inclusive, female-oriented workplace, such as quota-based initiatives and female-oriented legislation. Legislation would include protections for women against workplace harassment, assistance in childcare responsibilities, and equal payment.

The efficacy of gender-based labor legislation is evident in Gulf countries. While Saudi Arabia suffered a major gendered brain drain in the early twentieth century, women’s participation in the economy has grown significantly, rising to a record 37 percent in 2022 due to gender reforms implemented in the prior five years and the Vision 2030 economic diversification plan. These measures included quota-based initiatives that aimed to increase women’s participation to 30 percent, a ban on gender discrimination in the workplace and discriminatory hiring or firing practices, and the criminalization of sexual harassment. These types of measures must be implemented across the Middle East in order to even the playing field for women in the workforce.

The PwC’s 2022 survey found that the factors enabling women to go into work include relevant workplace policies as well as the ability to work remotely, access to transport, flexible hours, and access to jobs that match their skills. Policymakers must keep these factors at the forefront to compel women to contribute to the labor force. Additional solutions to this problem could include female-oriented grants or scholarships. Finally, the current social norms prohibiting women from career aspirations must be challenged. That taboo is more than a detriment to women—it is a problem for us all. If steps like these are not taken, women will continue to depart MENA at an increasing rate.

Britt Gronemeyer is a Young Global Professional at the Atlantic Council’s Rafik Hariri Center and Middle East Programs.

The post There’s a gendered brain drain in MENA. It’s because women are unrecognized and underestimated. appeared first on Atlantic Council.

Tackling food insecurity in Africa will require securing women’s rights. Here are two ways to start.

James Storen — Thu, 20 Apr 2023 18:47:40 +0000

Large parts of Africa are currently facing record levels of hunger, and the trend is heading in a more worrying direction. West and Central Africa are seeing increasing food insecurity year after year, and tens of thousands of people across Burkina Faso, Mali, and Niger are expected to experience “catastrophic” hunger in the coming months.

The situation is, in part, being made worse by climate change, which is increasing temperatures and changing weather patterns, compounding the hardship already caused by droughts. According to the International Monetary Fund, a third of the world’s droughts occur in Sub-Saharan Africa; meanwhile, according to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, the Horn of Africa is experiencing the longest and most severe drought on record. These conditions are weakening food systems across Sub-Saharan Africa, an area in which agriculture, forestry, and fishing make up 17.2 percent of the gross domestic product—and substantially more in countries like Sierra Leone and Chad.

But there’s more to this food insecurity trend than climate change; Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine has caused uncertainty in the global food market, disrupting the production and trade of key commodities. Russia and Ukraine are significant suppliers of oil, wheat, and maize, and disruptions to the supply chain, combined with local conflicts in some countries, have caused inflation to soar, with food prices increasing as much as 55.6 percent in the Horn of Africa.

Fighting these rising levels of food insecurity requires a whole-of-nation approach. But countries in these food-insecure regions aren’t doing enough to harness the economic and agricultural potential of half their populations: women. For example, discriminatory laws that hamper women’s access to land and financial services are still in place in some countries. In order to fight food insecurity in full force, these countries must ensure that women are equipped with the exact same resources as men: both land itself and the decision-making power to determine how to use that land in the most productive way possible. Policymakers in these food-insecure countries should take the following actions:

Equalize inheritance rights

Some countries in these food-insecure regions have made significant strides recently in passing reforms that impact women’s lives in some respects—but they have faltered in passing meaningful reforms related to improving access to assets and entrepreneurship opportunities for women.

According to the Center for Global Development, agriculture accounts for 56 percent of employment in Sub-Saharan Africa, and women account for 57 percent of agricultural workers. The informal sector accounts for 50 to 80 percent of economic activity in Sub-Saharan Africa—activity that includes the sale of food. And like the agricultural sector, the informal sector is a major employer of women: In Africa, 89.7 percent of employed women work in the informal sector. Yet despite the roles that women play in these sectors, only 30 percent of women own land in Sub-Saharan Africa.

The discrepancy in land ownership extends in part from inheritance laws. In some of these food-insecure countries, inheritance plays the primary role in determining land ownership. Some inheritance laws across the region are—or were initially—patriarchal, favoring men in the division of property. There have been some signs of progress in protecting women’s rights to inherit property; for example, in Uganda, lawmakers recently amended the Succession Act to ensure equal inheritance rights between men and women.

However, Uganda’s Succession Act was the first inheritance reform implemented in Sub-Saharan Africa since Mali’s in 2011, according to the World Bank, demonstrating the slow pace of progress. More countries must follow suit by implementing their own amendments or fresh, new laws on inheritance rights.

Support women’s entrepreneurship

Owning land goes hand-in-hand with access to financial services. In countries across these food-insecure regions of Africa, farmers must have land titles in order to access the credit necessary to increase agricultural productivity by hiring workers, purchasing animals or farming equipment, and covering transportation and storage costs of their goods. Credit supports entrepreneurship, which promotes innovation and the accumulation of wealth—both of which are integral to fighting food insecurity in the region. However, just as women’s rights to own land are hindered in some countries, their rights to enterprise are sometimes hindered as well.

According to the World Bank, 71 percent of countries in Sub-Saharan Africa do not have laws that prohibit financial institutions from discriminating based on gender, and women often face more stringent loan arrangements than men when they do access credit. Furthermore, according to the International Monetary Fund, in Sub-Saharan Africa, just 37 percent of women own bank accounts compared to 48 percent of men. If a woman must rely on a man to open a bank account, take out a loan, or register a business, she cannot fully exercise her rights as an entrepreneur to hire workers or freely determine the agricultural methods she uses with the hopes of increasing output.

All countries in these food-insecure regions of Africa should criminalize gender-based discrimination with regard to credit. Allowing women an equal opportunity to receive loans encourages entrepreneurship, leading to more production and competition in the agricultural market. Benin’s Order No. 2349-5—which was implemented in 2022 and prohibits credit, banking, and decentralized financial systems from using discriminatory practices in granting access to credit—can serve as a model for other countries.

Putting the law into practice

Laws are only part of the solution. Guaranteeing equal access to land and credit requires systemic change. Localities and financial institutions need to make a concerted effort to ensure that women are aware of their rights and encourage them to embrace the opportunities to own land or become entrepreneurs.

Activists and government officials should work with local leaders to hold seminars for women, outlining their rights to own land and offering to process land titles. In the private sector, financial institutions can create campaigns specifically marketed towards women, publishing advertisements in print, social, and broadcast media that encourage women to apply for credit.

By taking concrete steps to ensure that women have equal access to land and entrepreneurship, countries can empower their full populations, bringing major benefits for the economy, agricultural productivity, and food security.

James Storen is the program assistant at the Atlantic Council’s Freedom and Prosperity Center.

The post Tackling food insecurity in Africa will require securing women’s rights. Here are two ways to start. appeared first on Atlantic Council.

Nawaz in Dawn: For Pakistan to prosper, it must invest in its children

Atlantic Council — Thu, 13 Apr 2023 20:40:00 +0000

original source

The post Nawaz in Dawn: For Pakistan to prosper, it must invest in its children appeared first on Atlantic Council.

In Syria, the earthquake ‘did what the Assad regime and Russians wanted to do to us all along’

Arwa Damon — Thu, 09 Feb 2023 14:40:05 +0000

As I write this, I have images juxtaposed in my mind on top of the photos and videos that are coming out now. They are the images of past tragedies: children’s dust-covered and blood-streaked faces; mothers crying silently; and rescue teams desperately digging through rubble—often with their bare hands.

Like an evil creature from the most horrific of nightmares, the deadly 7.8-magnitude earthquake on February 6 destroyed hundreds of miles of homes and lives in southern Turkey and decimated a population that was already in many ways decimated in Syria.

I know the areas impacted by the earthquake well. The southeastern Turkish city of Gaziantep is where my charity, International Network for Aid Relief & Assistance (INARA), has its Turkey office based, and is where all our staff and beneficiaries live. In my years as a CNN senior international correspondent, that border zone is where I spent weeks on end covering everything from refugees flooding across, to the Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham (ISIS)’s takeovers of areas in Syria, to the relentless bombing of the miserable Syrian rebel-held swath of Idlib.

Turkey, well equipped to deal with the aftermath of natural disasters, has mobilized its emergency teams and military. On the ground, international rescue teams continue to arrive from the United States, Ukraine, Lebanon, Japan, and more, as many countries pledge their support for the victims in Turkey and Syria. However, whether the level of international response will be enough or not is yet to be seen. The earthquake has already killed more than 19,000 people. The scale of the crisis is incredibly vast. Turks and Syrians in Turkey have posted countless messages on social media about the lack of rescue efforts in certain areas, and people I know have messaged that their friends are still trapped under the rubble.

While aid increasingly flows into Turkey from around the world by air, land, and sea, areas on the other side of the border in Syria’s rebel-controlled areas are seeing none of that. Syrians impacted by the earthquake in northwest Syria have already endured a twelve-year war, hunger, cold, and a pandemic. They have long felt and, in fact, been abandoned by the international community. Since the earthquake rocked the region, non-governmental organizations (NGOs) have been pleading to international agencies and the world’s governments to provide much-needed support to implement effective search and rescue operations in the vital first seventy-two hours of the crisis.

In a continuation of what has become a daily reality throughout the last twelve years, NGOs have to beg and plead for funding for Syria, but never come close to hitting their targets. On the ground, the Syrian Civil Defense, also known as the White Helmets—experts in saving lives in the aftermath of bombings—has been leading the search and rescue efforts. However, this level of destruction all at once eclipses their capacity.

The White Helmets and other volunteer groups are suffering from a lack of everything that they could possibly need, including a shortage of diesel to run their heavy machinery, a lack of shelters for those now out in the cold and snow, and a lack of winterization kits. While local organizations rush to deliver humanitarian assistance—a drop in the bucket of what is needed—there has yet to be a single official rescue team dispatched by governments across one particular border into Syria. In fact, there has not been anything going across that border at all.

Despite having several functioning border crossings between Turkey and northwest Syria, there is only one lone border crossing that has been authorized by the United Nations (UN) Security Council to deliver UN aid to rebel-held Idlib and the 4.1 million people who live there, many of whom are originally from elsewhere, having fled bombings by the Bashar al-Assad regime, Russia, and Iran multiple times. The border crossing’s existence has always been heavily politicized, with the threat of a Russian veto looming every six to twelve months as the Assad government in Damascus continues to insist that all aid to Syria should come through the capital. Right now, that border crossing is not functional. The UN has said that, while the crossing itself is intact, the roads leading to it are either closed or damaged—all of which leaves this rebel-held region at the mercy of its meager resources and a government that wants to wipe its population off the map.

The Assad government-controlled areas, like Aleppo and Lattakia, have also been impacted in devastating fashion. Hundreds have lost their lives there, since there is a severe lack of infrastructure or ability to launch rescue operations despite being under Assad regime control. However, aid has arrived in Damascus from countries like Iraq, Iran, and Russia.

In theory, Damascus could be an entryway to reach all Syrians in need, but that’s hardly about to happen, given that access to humanitarian aid has become one of the biggest geopolitical cards. German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock called on Russia and all international actors to put pressure on the Assad regime to allow aid to reach everyone in the country. This is tragically laughable, since the international voices that did not work to stop the Assad government from bombing its people are hardly going to be effective in getting the regime to feed and keep its people warm.

To quote a Syrian friend in the hours after the earthquake struck: “It did what the Assad regime and Russians wanted to do to us all along.”

Arwa Damon is a nonresident senior fellow at the Atlantic Council’s Rafik Hariri Center for the Middle East and a former senior international correspondent at CNN.

The post In Syria, the earthquake ‘did what the Assad regime and Russians wanted to do to us all along’ appeared first on Atlantic Council.

How a health attache can elevate global health diplomacy

South Asia Center — Thu, 26 Jan 2023 15:59:58 +0000

COVID-19 highlighted the flaws and inequalities in global public health systems as well as transboundary cooperation. As the world emerges from the pandemic, it is a critical time for health policymakers, diplomats, foreign governments, inter-country organizations, and practitioners to innovate and fill the gaps in the system.

In his recently published issue brief Health attaches are the missing link in global diplomacy, South Asia Center non-resident senior fellow Dr. Edmond Fernandes argues that health attaches are the missing piece in diplomacy to strengthen global health infrastructure. He asserts that the system would benefit from having trained medical experts as health attaches to be the first line of communication between countries on the subject of global public health.

To launch the issue brief, the South Asia Center convened a panel of experts including academics and practitioners along with the author to assess the issue while reflecting on the wider need to prioritize global health diplomacy.

This program was recorded on January 17, 2023.

Featuring

Dr. Edmond Fernandes
Non-Resident Senior Fellow
Atlantic Council’s South Asia Center

Amb. Mustapha Jawara
Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary to India with Accreditation to Sri Lanka, the Maldives, and Bangladesh
Ministry of Foreign Affairs, The Gambia

Dr. Rebecca Katz
Professor and Director of the Center for Global Health Science and Security
Georgetown University

Dr. Syed Muntasir Mamun
Chief Innovation Officer & Director General, International Trade, Investment & Technology, ICT
Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Bangladesh

Moderated by

Dr. Amita Vyas
Non-Resident Senior Fellow
Atlantic Council’s South Asia Center

The South Asia Center serves as the Atlantic Council’s focal point for work on the region as well as relations between these countries, neighboring regions, Europe, and the United States.

Learn more

Issue Brief Dec 5, 2022

Health attaches are the missing link in global diplomacy

By Dr. Edmond Fernandes

Given the globalized nature of the modern world, with frequent travel and people living outside their home countries for extended periods for a variety of reasons, standardizing a healthcare liaison from one’s home government would be a crucial step in internationalizing public health diplomacy.

Coronavirus Human Rights

New Atlanticist Sep 8, 2022

How South Asian countries can protect their migrant workers abroad

By Elaine Zhang

India, Pakistan, and Bangladesh have a role to play in creating safer and more prosperous conditions for their citizens working abroad.

Human Rights Inclusive Growth

SouthAsiaSource Jun 27, 2022

COVID-19 and tourism in the Himalayan & Indian Ocean countries of South Asia

By South Asia Center

While in 2019 tourism was among the fastest growing sectors in South Asia, the pandemic resulted in billions of dollars in losses across the region. To understand these developments, the South Asia Center brought together a panel of experts to discuss COVID-19 and the future of tourism in the Himalayan and Indian Ocean Countries of South Asia.

Climate Change & Climate Action Coronavirus

Southasiasource blog

The post How a health attache can elevate global health diplomacy appeared first on Atlantic Council.

This is a make-or-break year for US-Caribbean relations

Wazim Mowla — Tue, 24 Jan 2023 15:46:43 +0000

Bahamian Prime Minister and Caribbean Community (CARICOM) Chair Philip Davis’s trip to Washington last week shows that, because the United States recently “reengaged” with the Caribbean, 2023 could be transformative for US-Caribbean cooperation. But for that to happen, the United States must change its Caribbean strategy by focusing on making good on its promises, letting the Caribbean lead, and updating security partnerships.

The United States has historically been the Caribbean’s preferred ally, mainly due to proximity. The movement of goods, people, and services to, from, and within the Caribbean often involves the United States. But despite the historical strength of the relationship, there remains a simmering frustration among Caribbean leaders about the United States’ empty and unfulfilled promises and an absence of consistent attention from US officials, which have kept the US-Caribbean relationship from truly deepening. The Caribbean has always seen the potential benefits of its relationship with the United States, but the same cannot be said the other way around.

Last year did see the United States making critical investments in its partnership with the Caribbean. In June, on the sidelines of the Summit of the Americas, US Vice President Kamala Harris announced the US-Caribbean Partnership to Address the Climate Crisis 2030 (PACC 2030)—a new framework created to support climate and energy resilience in the Caribbean. The next day, US President Joe Biden met with Caribbean leaders, and the convening was praised by many across the region. And in a show of the region’s appetite to work with the United States, five Caribbean leaders met with Harris in September to discuss improving future cooperation; at the meeting, the United States announced new commitments to support the region’s energy, food, and financial security.

Last year the United States was in listening mode, and US statements and policies reflected as much. But 2023 promises to be the year in which the United States can finally satisfy some of the Caribbean’s needs and calm its frustrations. Today, there is confidence in the Caribbean that the United States understands the region’s challenges and priorities. Caribbean governments are looking for action, and it will be important that the United States delivers in what is expected to be a pivotal year for the relationship.

With the challenges the region faces, the Caribbean no longer has time to wait on the United States for action—and the United States can’t keep putting it off. Davis, speaking at the Atlantic Council on Tuesday, explained that if the United States fails to pay attention, “someone else will pay the attention.” For example, while China’s influence in the Caribbean has diminished, large projects and new concessional loans are beginning to pop up again, such as a $192 million concessional loan to Guyana to finance a road project and a new agreement with Suriname to expand city surveillance. At the same time, many Caribbean governments have broken from the zero-sum US-China competition narrative that pervades Washington and are building bridges with others including India, the African Union, and the United Arab Emirates.

Furthermore, any further delays mean that potential policy shifts may have a vanishingly short shelf life, as the 2024 presidential election approaches. US policy toward the Caribbean has seen more change than continuity, as each administration brings its own different approach.

What should the United States focus on in 2023?

The United States must understand that showing up is only half the battle. Calls from Caribbean leaders demanding that the United States pay more attention to the region after decades of neglect have translated into more US officials showing up at Caribbean-wide meetings and has resulted in more government and private-sector visits. This should continue but it should not be considered sufficient for the US-Caribbean relationship, which requires policy implementation. Continuing to show up with little to show for it will only create more frustration among Caribbean leaders in the medium to long term.

In 2023, the United States should focus on three key areas:

The United States should fulfill its PACC 2030 promises. PACC 2030 requires a full interagency effort, so the United States should ensure the Treasury, State Department, and vice president’s office are aligned on how to move forward with this massive undertaking. US officials should work with Congress on legislation that enshrines PACC 2030 for the long term. Lawmakers should also allocate funding to each of PACC 2030’s four pillars—development finance, clean-energy projects, local capacity-building, and deepening collaboration.

Second, the United States should let the Caribbean lead in areas for which it has in-house expertise and support the Caribbean’s positions in multilateral organizations. Most Caribbean countries are dependent on imports for energy and food, making the supply squeezes caused by Russia’s war in Ukraine particularly devastating for the region. While US help is needed, regional leaders are pushing forward on their own solutions. CARICOM’s plan to reduce the region’s food-import bill by 25 percent by 2025 is one such example. Here, the United States does not need a food-security policy for the region but instead should provide technical expertise and financing for Caribbean-led solutions.

US advocacy for Caribbean and small-state priorities in multilateral meetings that include other wealthy and powerful actors, such as the Group of Twenty (G20) and international financial institutions, can move the needle on solutions to these countries’ economic challenges. International support is needed in tackling the Caribbean’s struggles with debt relief, financial de-risking (the loss of correspondent banking relations with overseas banks), and poor access to concessional financing. For the United States, there are inherent benefits because slow Caribbean economic growth drives migration; plus, stronger economies can help preserve the strength of the region’s democracies.

Finally, the United States should address the region’s growing security concerns. Rightfully, climate, energy, and financial resilience have all featured prominently in the Biden administration’s Caribbean policies, but this has also meant that security challenges have lost prominence. Crime, violence, and gang activity have skyrocketed across the region over the past year. Trinidad and Tobago’s homicide rate in 2022 reached its highest level in more than a decade, and a rise in gang activity pushed Jamaica to institute a state of emergency. And per capita, Saint Lucia now ranks in the top 5 of highest homicide rates in the hemisphere.

This increase has been fueled in part by small-arms trafficking, with illicit small arms being imported into the Caribbean from the United States. Caribbean islands have limited security forces with numerous unmanned ports of entry, making the region a hotbed for small arms trafficking. Increased US-Caribbean security cooperation is needed. But first, US policies and projects—such as the Caribbean Basin Security Initiative (CBSI)—should be updated to reflect the region’s current security concerns. The CBSI barely touches on illicit small arms, for example; the United States should work this year with Congress and the Department of Defense to refocus its current security efforts.

After the progress of 2022, Caribbean leaders expect action instead of just more promises. The region knows that to survive climate change, rising food inflation, and its vulnerability to global economic shocks, it’ll need to leverage a US partnership that is backed by technical and financial resources. It adds up to a make-or-break year for US-Caribbean relations. As the United States begins to show attention to the Caribbean and regional leaders continue to welcome more US support, the timing has never been better to see real action. Without it, Caribbean nations could seek out more willing partners.

Wazim Mowla is the associate director of the Caribbean Initiative at the Adrienne Arsht Latin America Center.

The post This is a make-or-break year for US-Caribbean relations appeared first on Atlantic Council.

Bahamian prime minister urges action on climate change, financial inclusion, and regional cooperation

Nick Fouriezos — Wed, 18 Jan 2023 21:54:08 +0000

After three years of economic stress heightened by COVID-19 and international conflict, The Bahamas and the rest of the Caribbean are ready to move toward a future of energy security, economic development, and greater regional integration according to Philip Davis, prime minister of The Bahamas and chair of the Caribbean Community (CARICOM).

To get there, though, they’ll need other nations to provide more help than they have in the past, said Davis. “We are gratified that the United States has reengaged with us,” remarked Davis, referring to the United States as “kith and kin.”

Speaking on Tuesday at an Atlantic Council Front Page event, Davis was hopeful following a meeting with US Vice President Kamala Harris in Washington, DC.

Still, the Bahamian leader did not mince his words when speaking of the challenges the Caribbean faces, as climate change continues to increase the frequency of deadly hurricanes and global instability continues to drive some of the highest energy and food prices in the Western Hemisphere.

Read on for more highlights from his remarks and conversation with Jason Marczak, senior director of the Adrienne Arsht Latin America Center at the Atlantic Council.

“Climate change must be more than a buzzword”

“Small-island and developing states throughout the Caribbean must come to terms with the full extent of our vulnerability,” Davis said in light of the rising threat that climate change poses to the region. He cited the particularly grim challenge facing Dominica, an island nation in the Lesser Antilles, which is still recovering nearly five years after Hurricane Maria hit. Davis said that the hurricane inflicted so much damage that 50 percent of the country’s gross domestic product essentially blew away in a single night—a fate more Caribbean countries could face if climate change continues unabated.
As hurricanes and rising water levels further threaten Caribbean islands, it is becoming more urgent to fully fund climate initiatives. “What we need is more access to climate-change-specific funding to mitigate the damage being inflicted each day,” Davis said.
On working toward a switch to renewable energy: “We must first acknowledge that this is not a one size fits all discussion,” Davis said. The issues facing oil-rich countries, such as Trinidad and Tobago, are vastly different from those of his own country, Davis added, where the pivot to solar energy is more immediately necessary as energy costs soar.

More banks, more security

Since 2015, access to global finance has quickly worsened for many Caribbean countries and businesses as many international banks and financial institutions operating in the region have chosen to de-integrate and de-bank, cutting off their services from the region. Countries whose economic development depends on remittances, such as Jamaica and Haiti, or tourism, such as The Bahamas and those in the Eastern Caribbean, have been hit particularly hard, Davis explained.
“Sixty percent of unbanked adults in the region cite cost as a barrier to financial services,” Davis said, stressing the need to give Caribbean citizens access to financial services. “In the Bahamas, on less populated islands, people have been left without a single commercial bank.” He highlighted the work of the Atlantic Council Caribbean Initiative’s Financial Inclusion Task Force, calling it “a conduit for solving these persistent issues.”
Caribbean citizens are feeling the effects of global crises in the form of worsening financial access, high electricity prices, and food insecurity. “CARICOM suggests that as much as 57 percent of the English-speaking Caribbean faces food-security issues,” Davis said. Together, Davis said, CARICOM’s “work can save lives and livelihoods” as “we have an opportunity to make historic advancements in regional energy security, food security, and financial inclusion.”

A partner to the north

Davis was happy to be able to meet “one on one, face to face” with Harris, hoping that Washington and Nassau will continue to strengthen relations after a period of relative silence from the White House. “Nature abhors a vacuum,” Davis said, “and if attention is not paid, someone else will pay the attention.”
The Bahamas can also be a partner to the United States on regional security issues. “We are on the migratory path to the United States, and many don’t get there. They stay in The Bahamas,” Davis said, while referencing a recent wave of Haitian migrants making their way to the United States in the wake of severe political instability in Haiti.

Nick Fouriezos is an Atlanta-based writer with bylines from every US state and six continents. Follow him on Twitter @nick4iezos.

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How allied Sweden and Finland can secure Northern Europe

Anna Wieslander, Eric Adamson, Jesper Lehto — Fri, 06 Jan 2023 14:00:00 +0000

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Introduction

NATO is approaching its ninth round of enlargement. The accession of Sweden and Finland—two solid democracies and defenders of the international-rules based order—into the Alliance will strengthen the core of the transatlantic community. Their NATO membership opens up new opportunities to bolster regional deterrence and defense in Northern Europe, increase transatlantic burden sharing, and secure the Alliance as a whole in ways not previously possible.

This issue brief sets the stage by suggesting that the Alliance use the accession of Sweden and Finland to create an ambitious deterrence-by-denial “bubble” over Northern Europe. Such a strategy does not merely include military capabilities but must be underpinned by civil robustness and resilience that stretch across NATO territory. Operationally, allies in Northern Europe should prepare to assume greater responsibility as first responders in case of a severe security situation, below or at the level of Article 5. For this to succeed, political cooperation and agenda setting must intensify among Northern European allies.

In 2014, Northern Europe became a region of high tension at the forefront of global geopolitical competition, as a consequence of Russia’s illegal annexation of Crimea and its war in eastern Ukraine. In parallel, China started engaging in the region in search of both economic and political leverage, not least in the Arctic. In the June 2019 Atlantic Council issue brief Securing Northern Europe: Toward a Comprehensive Approach, we argued against the tendency to address the Baltic Sea, the North Atlantic, and the Arctic as separate regions, and instead proposed to view them as “one militarily and politically strategic area.”¹ This perspective has increasingly become mainstream, as illustrated in the military assessment that the Swedish Armed Forces submitted to the government in November 2022. The 2019 issue brief explored the reasons behind such a proposition and advocated that Northern European states should develop a comprehensive approach that would help them simultaneously counter a revisionist Russia and the risks associated with decreased US engagement in Europe. Northern Europe, in this approach, encompasses Denmark, Norway, Iceland, Sweden, Finland, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Germany, and the United Kingdom (UK). With Sweden and Finland joining NATO, the prospects for successful political and military regional integration in line with this comprehensive approach have increased substantially.

This report first sets the broader scene by describing how NATO is adapting to a world marked by great-power competition. It assesses the shifting nature of US engagement toward European allies. It then proceeds to describe how the accession of Sweden and Finland into NATO can serve as an opportunity for the Alliance to strengthen security structures, building on the perspective of Northern Europe as one geostrategic area, politically and militarily. Finally, the issue brief summarizes policy recommendations for actors who wish to promote peace and security in the region and beyond, using NATO as the main vehicle. Proposals are made along three dimensions.

Militarily, NATO should bolster its capabilities and aim to build an ambitious deterrence-by-denial bubble for Northern Europe, thereby securing and stabilizing an area at the forefront of global power competition. Such a bubble would also contribute to greater burden sharing in the Alliance, as it would primarily rely on regional resources.
NATO allies must underpin the deterrence-by-denial bubble with individual and joint measures to strengthen robustness and resilience across allied territory, using a comprehensive approach. Further cooperation between NATO and the European union (EU) is key in this regard.
Politically, more efforts must be made toward joint agenda setting and initiatives among Northern European allies, in order to succeed with the military ambitions and ensure the sustainability of NATO’s 360-degree approach.

What kind of NATO will Sweden and Finland join?

Sweden and Finland were invited to join NATO at the Madrid Summit on June 29, 2022. They will enter an Alliance in transition, from handling a world marked by cooperation to navigating a security environment characterized by confrontation. In response, NATO will significantly strengthen its deterrence and defense postures in Europe, especially along its Eastern flank. In addition, NATO will need to deal with China for the first time in its history. This, in turn, has implications for burden sharing and the long-term engagement of the United States, raising the bar for European allies to sustain US interest for a strong transatlantic community.

Despite military setbacks in Ukraine, Russia has proven both willingness and capacity to engage in a full-scale regional war. That is why it poses the “most significant and direct threat to Allies’ security and to peace and stability in the Euro-Atlantic area” for the foreseeable future.² To reduce the risk of being drawn into the war, NATO is seeking to even the playing field by bolstering its military posture. Only from a position of strength can Europe’s security architecture be rebuilt.

In the short term, NATO has already boosted its deterrence in response to Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine. NATO’s eastern flank has received nearly a tenfold increase in troops; multinational battlegroups have doubled from four to eight and grown to brigade size; NATO aims to create a pool of eight hundred thousand troops, of which three hundred thousand would be high-readiness; and the United States will establish a permanent army headquarters in Poland.³

In the longer term, as described in the new strategic concept, NATO will strive toward a deterrence-by-denial posture in order to “deny any potential adversary any possible opportunities for aggression.”⁴ To this end, NATO has introduced a new force model, which will resource the coming generation of military plans. The plans will be more regional in scope, connecting forces to designated countries and tasks. Exercises will be developed to prepare for high-intensity and multi-domain operations, and to ensure reinforcement accordingly. Division-level structures will be established for the enhanced Forward Presence (eFP) on the eastern flank. The strategic concept calls for forward defense with an in-place, multidomain (air, sea, land, cyber, and space), combat-ready force with prepositioned equipment and enhanced command-and-control structures. Allies should be able to provide rapid reinforcement on short, or no, notice. For Northern Europe, with Sweden and Finland as new allies, this approach will open up unprecedented possibilities for defense and operational planning, which should be matched by ambitious defense and resilience investments.

Alongside Russia, China is emerging as a major challenge to the Alliance, but in a different manner. The first instance in which NATO officially addressed China was the 2019 London Declaration, which recognized China’s influence and international presence as both an opportunity and a challenge.⁵ The June 2021 Summit in Brussels spoke in more stringent terms, calling China a “destabilizing force and systemic challenge, whose actions threaten the rules-based international order.”⁶ The 2022 strategic concept is specific in China’s strategy to use “economic leverage to create strategic dependencies” and increase its influence to “subvert the rules-based international order.”⁷ Both NATO and the United States now frame China as a multidomain challenge, employing a broad range of political, economic, and military tools to undermine allies’ interests, security, and values. Washington has been the primary driver for NATO to deal with the geopolitical challenges and confrontation between the West and China, and NATO’s rhetoric on China has increasingly matched that of the United States. Thus, China’s inclusion in the NATO Strategic Concept for the first time is a policy victory for the United States.

NATO avoids overstretch by limiting itself to addressing Chinese threats as they relate to Euro-Atlantic security. NATO defense planning does not include the Indo-Pacific, neither when it comes to capabilities nor to operations (at least not yet, some NATO officials would add). Indo-Pacific issues will instead be addressed by NATO through intensified dialogue and cooperation with partners in the region. For now, NATO’s return to its core mission of European deterrence and defense is clear—a return to which the United States is fully committed, at least in the near term.

The shifting US engagement in Europe

A fundamental part of the 2022 US National Security Strategy (NSS) and National Defense Strategy (NDS) policy is to work closer with allies. Recognizing the decreasing US power relative to other rising global actors, Washington understands it can no longer determine the conditions of world politics alone. In the decade that will set the “terms of geopolitical competition between the major powers” and “contest for the future of our world” between democracies vs autocracies, the United States seeks to invest in its allies, while setting high expectations for them in competing against adversaries.⁸

The emphasis on working with allies brings NATO back to the core for the United States, but in a different way than before. European allies must engage alongside the United States in world affairs. The NSS states that the United States’ agenda with European allies is transatlantic in its foundation, but global in ambition. This means engaging European allies on a broad spectrum of policy areas, from trade and investment to combatting corruption and climate change. This engagement, which rests on shared democratic values, aims to take place across several multilateral formats. NATO is one of them.

The United States is, therefore, investing in the transatlantic link, while “count[ing] on our Allies to continue assuming greater responsibility.”⁹ From the US perspective, Russia poses an immediate threat to the international system, but only China has the means and intent to reshape the international order. The United States, thus, makes clear that it is “prioritizing the [China] challenge in the Indo-Pacific, then the Russia challenge in Europe,” as Russia is viewed as a waning power over the medium to long term.¹⁰

Implications for Northern Europe

Russia’s size, power, and geographic proximity to the Baltic and Nordic states mean that it can never be dismissed as a dominant, and potentially aggressive, actor in the region. To prevent conflict from spilling over into wider Europe, regional deterrence is necessary and serves to secure the whole transatlantic area.

The power asymmetry between Russia and Northern European states has created a dependency on the United States as the guarantor of regional security, based not only on its extended deterrence. The United States is expected to lead and respond quickly with conventional forces in a crisis. NATO commitments tie the United States to the region. Hence, it never completely leaves it, but it does not fully focus on it either, as the NSS and the NDS make clear. Its attention is dependent on the severity and urgency of any threat toward its allies. While the United States is focused on Russia in the short term, diminishing US engagement in Europe over the long term carries significant consequences for security in the region.

As emphasized in the 2019 issue brief, the US pivot to Asia has implications for Northern Europe, which heavily relies on the transatlantic link for its security. Smaller European states may find themselves in a situation where the United States is “either politically unwilling to come to its assistance, or militarily unable to do so due to strained capabilities.”¹¹ In the event of a crisis or war in the region, European allies would then need to be first responders on both a national and collective level. As the United States is focusing on the China challenge, the case for a robust deterrence-by-denial structure for Northern Europe becomes even stronger, serving to avoid a situation in which European allies would have to fight in a contested environment against a major nuclear adversary without the presence of the United States.

Create a deterrence-by-denial bubble over Northern Europe

For Northern Europe, a key issue is the Russian ability to implement anti-access/area denial (A2/AD) zones in Kaliningrad and the Arctic through a combination of air- and maritime-defense systems, attack aircraft, midrange mobile missile systems, anti-submarine warfare capabilities, new classes of submarines equipped with long-range land-attack missiles, and cyber- and electronic-warfare capabilities.¹² In 2015, NATO acknowledged the challenge, and the Supreme Allied Commander Europe (SACEUR) at the time, General Philip Breedlove, referred to the zones as “bubbles.”Sydney Freedberg, “Russians in Syria Building A2/AD ’Bubble’ Over Region: Breedlove,”¹³ The Russian aim would be to limit freedom of movement in peacetime, reduce situational awareness and strategic anticipation in crisis, and prevent deployment of NATO troops and hinder reinforcements in times of conflict. The A2/AD zone in Kaliningrad affects NATO operations in the Baltic Sea and reinforcements to the Baltic states.¹⁴ The A2/AD zone also affects Sweden and Finland. Russia would have an advantage in the early deployment of air-defense systems on the islands of Gotland or Åland, strengthening its capacity to deny NATO access to airspace over the Baltic Sea. In the Artic, Russia has reestablished its multilayer “bastion of defense.”¹⁵ A crucial staging point for Russian operations in the North Atlantic is the Kola peninsula, which hosts a significant portion of Russian second-strike capability. In crisis or wartime, Russia would likely want to expand its strategic buffer zone around its military assets, such as its nuclear Northern Fleet, pushing into or hindering mobility on Swedish and Finnish territory on the Cap of the North.

Some analysts have questioned the Russian ability to create impenetrable bubbles.¹⁶ Regardless, NATO has been too passive, not taking sufficient advantage of its strengths to assure capacity to operate within its own territory. So far, NATO’s response has been to increase presence in peacetime in the air and the waters affected, and to invest in capabilities that could “break the bubble” in case shooting started. This needs to change, as the aim expressed in the strategic concept is to “deny any potential adversary any possible opportunities for aggression.”¹⁷ NATO should reflect on the fact that Russia uses its A2/AD strategy as part of its comprehensive approach to deterrence. If NATO could do the same, a new form of strategic balance could be established, which would serve to stabilize and prevent military conflict from breaking out.

With Sweden and Finland as allies, NATO can establish a robust deterrence-by-denial posture in a once contested and fragmented region, enhancing the security of all allies. The opportunities must effectively be capitalized upon. The Russian invasion of Ukraine and the defeats its army has experienced have exposed its weakness. Russia’s preoccupation with the war should be used as an opportunity for NATO to build stronger and more efficient deterrence, stabilizing and paving the way for a more secure environment ahead. With a future position of strength, a new era of détente could be possible in a post-war context.

The current security situation provides opportunities to connect the dots and fill the gaps to shape a solid deterrence-by-denial bubble for Northern Europe. Key components for such a structure include

air and missile defense;
airspace dominance;
subwater dominance;
intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (ISR); and
readiness through operations and exercises.

1. Air and missile defense

A crucial step for NATO is to build a solid air and missile structure for the whole region. For the Baltic states, their lack of air defense has long been a recognized major military shortfall. At the Madrid Summit, the defense ministers of Estonia and Latvia signed a letter of intent for joint procurement of medium-range anti-aircraft systems. The Baltic states, Norway, Finland, the UK, and eight other allies have joined the 2022 German “European Sky Shield Initiative,” which aims to strengthen European short-, medium-, and long-range air-defense capabilities through coordinated and joint procurement.¹⁸ Possible components of the project are: German IRIS-T short-rage defense, the US Patriot medium-range system, and the Israeli-US Arrow-3 long-range ballistic-missile-defense system. The aim is to be interoperable and, thus, strengthen NATO’s Integrated Air and Missile Defense.

As Finland joined the initiative, its representatives emphasized the NATO integration dimension, stating that “there will not be parallel systems.”¹⁹ For Sweden, joining the initiative should only be a matter of time, as Sweden already operates IRIS and the US Patriot system, alongside Germany. Poland is in the process of deploying the Patriot system as well, which creates opportunities for medium-range missile coverage across the Baltic Sea. The Swedish Armed Forces have recommended taking immediate steps to develop a common and integrated air- and missile-defense system (IAMD) with NATO allies. If it does so, air-defense coverage along NATO’s northeastern flank will be significantly enhanced.

2. Airspace dominance

The airspace over the Scandinavian peninsula is a strategic asset that brings essential advantages to the party that controls it in case of a conflict in the region. Both Sweden and Finland possess strong air forces of fourth- and fifth generation fighters—Sweden with its own produced JAS Gripen system and Finland soon introducing F-35s, as do Norway and Denmark. In all, with Sweden and Finland in NATO, the Nordic countries would have approximately two hundred and ten state-of-the-art combat aircraft, which are a powerful tool to prevent and respond to hostile actions—if the jet fighters are able to quickly operate together and across national territories. For the broader region, the UK, Poland, and Germany also operate F-35s, altogether shaping an agile, potent, and interoperable Northern European presence in the sky.

Sweden and Finland have already intensified cooperation with NATO allied nations in the air domain. Under the Cross Border Training framework, established by Norway, Sweden, and Finland in 2009, with Denmark joining in 2021, the Nordic Air Forces jointly fly training missions on a near-weekly basis.²⁰ Cross Border Training evolved to establish the Arctic Challenge Exercise in 2013, one of Europe’s largest live air-power exercises, held every two years.²¹ Participating nations in the exercises include Germany, the Netherlands, the UK, and the United States, with support from the NATO Airborne Warning and Control System (AWACS).

Denmark, Norway, Sweden, and Finland should shape a joint Nordic air force of combat aircraft that can operate seamlessly across national territories in the Nordics. Norway’s top air chief has proposed the establishment of a Nordic Air Operations Center when Sweden and Finland join the Alliance.²² Such an operations center would provide for using the force in a holistic, joint manner. However, it is important that such a force is not developed merely as a tool to protect the Nordics, but is an asset for the whole of Northern Europe as well as the Alliance in its 360-degree approach to security. In addition, such a center needs to be integrated into NATO’s command-and-control structure in a manner that does not create a limited “NATO within NATO” in the North, but makes operations possible across the Baltic Sea, Arctic, and North Atlantic.

The deterrence value of a Nordic air force further increases if the aircraft carry long-range weaponry. While Norway and Finland can provide such capabilities, Sweden lacks credible long-range offensive capabilities.²³ Finland’s F-35s and approved use of US AGM-158 JASSM air-to-surface missiles, which form a core part of its long-range strike capabilities, will substantially contribute to the region’s deterrence posture.²⁴ Thus, Sweden should prioritize such acquisition for the JAS Gripen, in line with the Swedish Armed Forces’ latest set of recommendations.

3. Subwater dominance

With Sweden and Finland in the Alliance, the Baltic Sea will resemble a “NATO lake,” with Kaliningrad and St. Petersburg as exceptions. Sweden has the longest coastline in the Baltic Sea, and its widespread archipelago provides a special operational environment, as do the shallow brown waters of the Baltic Sea. Among the Northern European states, the UK, Norway, Poland, and Germany operate submarines, but mainly with a focus on blue-water operations in the North Atlantic.

As Russian submarine presence in the Baltic Sea has increased in recent years and become a hotspot for sabotage, NATO has doubled its maritime presence.²⁵ As modern submarines serve as movable ISR systems, Sweden’s accession to NATO opens up new possibilities to safeguard the Baltic Sea and allied territory. Sweden’s soon-to-be expanded submarine fleet with two modern Saab A26 can contribute.²⁶

Sweden, with tailormade capabilities for the Baltic Sea, should take a leading role in establishing a NATO Submarine and Seabed Monitoring Mission to safeguard the subwaters in the Baltics by monitoring Russian underwater activities. Sweden could be joined by submarines from Germany, Poland, and the UK in this endeavor. The territorial waters off the Baltic states’ coasts, where the maritime conditions provide a suitable environment for Russian covert underwater operations, should be a priority.

4. Intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance

NATO’s joint intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (JISR) is critical for providing “decision-makers and action-takers with a better situational awareness of the conditions on the ground, in the air, at sea, in space and in the cyber domain.”²⁷ As the line between peace and war has become increasingly blurry through Russian malign activity—including propaganda, disinformation, cyberattacks, border disruption, energy subversion, and airspace violation—the ability to have the upper hand in ISR can make all the difference for successful deterrence and defense. This is further underlined in the region by Russia’s geographic proximity and demonstrated proficiency at snap exercises, which mean that NATO cannot afford a delay in response.

NATO’s owned and operated platforms are mainly the Alliance Ground Surveillance (AGS) and AWACS, which provide situational awareness for the air domain. These capabilities are significantly reinforced by national systems provided by allies. The newly procured P-8s operated by the UK and Norway to increase surveillance over the Northern parts of allied territory are one important contribution. Sweden and Finland will bring extensive ISR capabilities both to the Baltic Sea and the vast area of the Arctic: in space, in the air, on the ground, and at sea. Sweden will also provide subwater ISR. This will substantially increase the Alliance situational awareness in Northern Europe. It is essential that these capabilities are interoperable with the JISR structure, in order to contribute to multiple surveillance and reconnaissance activities.

In some areas, Sweden and Finland have started to cooperate more closely on ISR, using NATO standards as the common baseline.²⁸ In the maritime domain, Swedish and Finnish navies have worked together closely within the Swedish-Finnish Naval Task Group (SFNTG), Sea Surveillance Cooperation Finland and Sweden (SUCFIS), and Swedish-Finnish Amphibious Task Unit (SFATU).²⁹ These joint units were established to improve maritime situational awareness and deepen cooperation between amphibious forces in the Baltic Sea. Such existing information structures can contribute to NATO’s situational awareness in the region. There is also successful shared Nordic air surveillance during peacetime through Nordic Cooperation for Air Surveillance Information Exchange (NORECAS), which should be connected to the JISR system as well.

Identified capability gaps in the Baltic region include airborne ISR and unmanned underwater vehicles (UUvs), which would augment the Alliance’s anti-submarine warfare capabilities. Swedish and Finnish accession to NATO could provide an opportunity to work jointly to address these gaps, preferably through joint procurement.

In addition, Sweden and Finland will bring valid perspectives and expertise on the Russian threat, which is a constant intelligence focus for both countries. As with the Baltic states, Sweden and Finland possess unique insights and understanding of the threat, based on geographical closeness and frequent engagement with Russian malign activity. Intelligence analysts within the NATO structure are another identified gap that should be addressed as Sweden and Finland join the Alliance, as they can contribute with such competence.³⁰

5. Readiness through operations and exercises

NATO has several ongoing operations in the region: air policing, which is guarding the airspace over Iceland and the Baltic states; eFP in the Baltic states and Poland; and NATO’s standing naval forces (SNF), which frequently patrol the waters in the North Atlantic and the Baltic Sea. The operations play a central part of deterrence, as the troop presence signals readiness to deter, commitment to defend, and solidarity within the Alliance as participating forces comes from all parts of NATO, not only from the region. They also serve as instrument to maintain and develop interoperability.

Sweden and Finland have both indicated their readiness to contribute to air policing, the standing maritime forces, and eFP. They should conduct air policing over both the Baltic states and Iceland, as well as in other parts of the Alliance, if required.

Since the regional context is growing in NATO, with its new force model connecting forces to designated countries and tasks, it is plausible that Sweden contributes troops to the Baltic states on a permanent rotational basis. These should be solid contributions, preferably up to battalion size in peacetime, with preparedness up to brigade size in case the division level is activated. That means that Sweden would need to substantially increase its ambitions for the development of its army.

As a response to Russia’s war in Ukraine, NATO has expanded eFP, with multilateral battle groups to Hungary, Romania, Bulgaria, and Slovakia. Sweden and Finland should contribute to eFPs outside of the region from time to time—for instance, in Romania—to illustrate commitment to Alliance solidarity, and further strengthen interoperability and understanding of threat assessments in accordance with the 360-degree approach.

The following initiatives would serve to further solidify the deterrence-by-denial bubble.

Nato use of images: https://www.nato.int/cps/en/natohq/68162.htm

Finland, with its 1,340-kilometer border with Russia, the longest in NATO, should initiate having an eFP on its territory. Doing so would be consistent with other NATO members bordering Russia, creating a coherent eFP structure along the eastern flank. Since summer 2022, there have been eFPs in Slovakia, Hungary, Romania, and Bulgaria, in addition to the existing ones in the Baltic states and Poland. An eFP in Finland would clearly signal that Finland has shifted its defense posture from national to collective defense, including the ultimate guarantee of US extended deterrence. Russia would be left with the strategic dilemma to climb the escalation ladder in Finland, as opposed to NATO weighing responses post factum.
Sweden’s geography calls for a different contribution to NATO’s deterrence posture. The Swedish Armed Forces recommend that Sweden establish itself as a basing area for allied ground, air, and naval forces. That would include preposition of material, and infrastructure for transport, basing, command and control, and protection. Doing so would allow the Baltic states to quickly be reinforced during crisis or war.
NATO should establish a submarine and seabed monitoring mission, led by Sweden, to safeguard the subwaters in the Baltics.

NATO already has an intense and advanced exercise pattern throughout the region, in which Sweden and Finland as close partners already participate frequently. As they shift from partners to allies, further exercise opportunities open up not least in the Arctic—an area that requires increased NATO presence due to rising tensions, as Secretary Jens Stoltenberg has emphasized. NATO should focus more on the Arctic by indulging in advanced cold-weather exercises hosted by Arctic allies, and encourage Sweden and Finland to provide High-North expertise to the Alliance.

Another key area for strengthened deterrence and defense is to exercise the political decision-making process as Sweden and Finland enter the Alliance, with a particular focus on JISR. There is always a delicate balancing act between operational security and transparency in order to create political consensus. For deterrence to work, prompt and efficient response to any crisis will be crucial. This is a daunting challenge within NATO, and Sweden and Finland quickly need to adapt and learn a new strategic culture.

Strengthen robustness and resilience across the region

NATO allies must underpin the deterrence-by-denial bubble by individual and joint measures to strengthen robustness and resilience across allied territory through a comprehensive approach. Further NATO-EU cooperation is key in this regard.

The importance of national and Alliance-wide resilience is underlined by NATO in the new strategic concept, against the backdrop of hybrid threats, emerging technologies, and cross-border challenges such as pandemics and climate change. Sweden and Finland have a strong track record in the field, given their total-defense structures that involves all citizens in case of a major crisis or war. However, the comprehensive approach must not be limited by national borders, but serve to strengthen regional resilience and robustness. As Sweden and Finland join NATO, the expanded scope of allied territory in Northern Europe both creates vulnerabilities and opens up opportunities in north-south and east-west dimensions. Key areas that support deterrence by denial are critical infrastructure, logistic flows, and military mobility, where the EU membership of Sweden and Finland could pave the way for further investments by joint funding.

In response to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the EU Strategic Compass calls to enhance the military-mobility resilience of both the EU and NATO.³¹ Already, the EU is accelerating investments in the Action Plan on Military Mobility, as well as making new commitments to harmonize cross-border procedures.³² The European Commission has also announced additional and adapted grants that support civilian-military dual-use mobility.³³ Between 2021 and 2027, 1.69 billion euros of a 25.8-billion-euro Connecting Europe Facility for Transport (CEF) budget is earmarked for military-mobility projects.³⁴ In the 2021 call for proposals, Finland was awarded funding for electrifying a railway link to Sweden and preparing a rail junction for military use.³⁵ Sweden—along with Finland, Norway, Germany, the United States, Canada, the Baltic states, and, most recently, the UK—is already part of the Permanent Structured Cooperation (PESCO) military-mobility project, which aims to enable the unhindered movement of military personnel and equipment within the EU.

Whereas NATO’s access to reinforcing the High-North and Baltics was previously restricted to a thin sliver of northern Norway and the Suwalki Gap, Swedish motorways, railways, and airports provide substantial access to receive reinforcements and act as staging areas during times of crisis and war. Troops placed in Germany, for example, have substantially improved mobility in reinforcing the region, with the ability to transport via Denmark and the Öresund Bridge and use Sweden as a staging area to reinforce the Baltic states. Sweden also provides both Norway and Finland with strategic depth when conducting military operations.

The port of Gothenburg, the Nordic region’s largest port, provides Sweden, Norway, and Finland critical access to shipping lanes in the Atlantic Ocean. It is a central hub for supply chains and commodity flows not only to Sweden, but to Norway, Finland, and the Baltic states. If access to the Baltic Sea is closed in the narrow Danish Straits, Gothenburg and overland routes provide direct access to the entire Nordic region. Swedish infrastructure provides critical links between continental Europe and the High-North and Baltic states.

The Nordics should capitalize on the EU dual-use mobility investments and projects to enhance the region’s infrastructural resilience and mobility. Opportunities to do so are only growing. In November 2022, the EU Commission put forth the Military Mobility Action Plan 2.0. The plan “addresses the need to further improve the capacity of transport infrastructure to handle the weight, size and scale of military movement,” continues to streamline divergent national procedures, and “adds a new preparedness and resilience pillar.”³⁶ The overall strategic approach is to “enable swift, efficient, and unimpeded movement of potentially large-scale forces” within EU and NATO frameworks.³⁷ The Mobility Action Plan seek not only to reinforce cooperation with NATO, but to promote connectivity and dialogue among regional partners.

The Baltic Sea connects Sweden not only to the three Baltic states, but to all of the Three Seas states (Austria, Bulgaria, Estonia, Croatia, Lithuania, Latvia, Poland, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia, the Czech Republic, and Hungary). The Three Seas Initiative aims to develop a north-south corridor along the EU’s easternmost flank, connecting the Baltic, Adriatic, and Black Seas through various infrastructure projects (ninety-one transport, energy, and digital projects in total).³⁸ Around 25 percent of project funding comes from the EU CEF budget, with another 25 percent coming from national budgets.³⁹ Sweden and Finland should join the initiative. Sweden and Finland’s inclusion in the initiative would not only provide substantial additional funding, but would fully connect the Baltic to the Adriatic and Black Seas, making one, resilient geopolitical flank.

Intensify joint agenda setting and initiatives

Politically, more efforts must be made toward joint agenda setting and initiatives among Northern European allies, in order to succeed with the military ambitions and ensure the sustainability of NATO’s 360-degree approach. The accession of Sweden and Finland into NATO opens up possibilities to strengthen political cooperation in three main constellations: the Nordic, the Nordic-Baltic, and the broader Northern European community. For each of these circles, there are existing forums of cooperation that can be used as platforms to develop a more forward-leaning and vocal posture: Nordic Defense Cooperation (NORDEFCO), the Nordic-Baltic 8 (NB8) and US Enhanced Partnership in Northern Europe (E-PINE), and the Northern Group.

1. A Nordic vision through NORDEFCO

In 2009, the five Nordic countries founded the Nordic Defense Cooperation in order to “strengthen the participating nations’ national defense, explore common synergies and facilitate efficient common solutions.”⁴⁰ Capabilities cooperation within NORDEFCO has been wide ranging, including coordinating joint training operations in NATO’s 2018 Trident juncture and the Arctic Challenge cross-border exercises.⁴¹ Particularly successful have been improvements in land and air ISR. However, other ambitious proposals within NORDEFCO, such as joint procurement, have a track recording of not translating into reality.

With Sweden and Finland’s entry into NATO, remaining barriers to operational military planning, mutual information sharing, and joint forces will be removed. The Nordics can rely upon each other in all areas, including security of supply, access to territory to provide operational depth, and troop commitments in case of war—issues that have prevented deeper cooperation in the past.

NORDEFCO’s most recent political guidance, Vision 2025, becomes all the more realizable. By 2025, NORDEFCO aims to have “minimal restrictions on movement and storage of military units and equipment”; established logistical cooperation where possible; “improved regional and common situational awareness in peace, crisis, and conflict” across domains; enhanced transatlantic relations through increased training, exercises, and cooperation with other European partners; strengthened dialogue with the Baltic states; and potential utilization of the European Defence Fund to develop Nordic total-defense capabilities.⁴²

The vision comes with a range of possibilities to pursue initiatives in the EU and NATO that would call attention to the region, and ensure that it benefits from common funding and resources. That could include PESCO projects aimed at military mobility and logistics, joint procurement within ISR, and innovation projects based on emerging technologies. Both Sweden and Finland have been keen to emphasize the importance of the Nordic dimension in preparing for NATO membership. However, the Nordics must pay attention to avoid being too introverted in their deepened cooperation, and risking abandonment within the Alliance. In order to anchor Nordic collaboration within a larger regional context and create win-win opportunities for other allies, dialogue between with NORDEFCO, the Baltic states, and Poland should intensify.

2. Across the Baltic Sea—Strengthening the Nordic-Baltic dimension

Politically in NATO, the Nordic-Baltic 8—which includes Iceland, Norway, Denmark, Sweden, Finland, Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania—can be adapted to play an agenda-setting role. Established in 2000, the format, with a rotating chair, has addressed a wide range of political issues. Civilian issues have taken precedence over security policy, but there is precedence for the Nordics raising the profile of Baltic defense projects. This includes the Baltic Battalion supported by Denmark, the Baltic Defense College supported by Sweden, and the Baltic Air Surveillance supported by Norway.⁴³ However, outside ad hoc bilateral initiatives, the Baltic states have been reluctant to develop defense policies with Sweden and Finland as non-NATO members. With all eight nations now in NATO, the NB8 should strive to speak with one voice in addressing the security needs of the region.

In the EU, six of eight Nordic-Baltic states now participate in the European Security and Defense Policy (ESDP) after Denmark’s turnaround in spring 2022. The EU also provides a forum to put focus on the region, and the capabilities needed for its protection.

The NB8 group has direct access to the United States through the US Enhanced Partnership in Northern Europe.⁴⁴ The forum is guided by three principles: building on successful multilateral engagement; creating resilient societies through strengthening democratic institutions; and exporting success to neighbors. These principles guide E-PINE’s approach to cooperative security within NATO and other multilateral forums like the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE).

The E-PINE should be used to increase US awareness and understanding of security concerns in the region, and to initiate joint projects that can strengthen resilience as part of deterrence and defense. E-PINE could also serve as a common vehicle to generate close transatlantic cooperation on the reconstruction of Ukraine after the war. When launched in 1997, E-PINE had the foremost goal of integrating the Baltic states into the transatlantic community of democracies. These experiences could be revived and applied in post-war Ukraine. The US National Security Strategy specifically supports the economic recovery of Ukraine and integration into the European Union. The vibrant democracies within E-PINE can once again forge new neighborly connections to promote the democratic, economic, and security integration of Ukraine into the transatlantic community.

3. Northern Group—Merging a Northern European outlook

The Northern Group is the most concrete expression of a military-political forum in Northern Europe. Founded in November 2010 on a UK initiative, it consists of the five Nordic states, the Baltics, Germany, Poland, and the Netherlands.⁴⁵ The Northern Group was created to provide a new and broader framework to tighten regional partnerships, regardless of NATO and/or EU membership, by working together on issues of common interest. Meeting about twice a year at the defense-minister level, the Northern Group has served as an informal setting to discuss positions ahead of NATO summits, exchange information and align positions on the security situation in Northern Europe, and push for greater regional security cooperation.⁴⁶

The Northern Group is a format that can be further developed to make sure that NATO’s strategic discussions include Northern European perspectives. For the smaller Nordic and Baltic states, the Northern Group serves to focus the attention of greater powers like the UK and Germany on Northern Europe. As Germany enters its Zeitenwende, making major defense investments and adapting its strategic culture, it is crucial that Germany also recognizes itself as a player in Northern Europe. Poland, situated by the Baltic Sea but traditionally focused eastward, is equally important to engage, as its role in Europe is increasing due to heavy investments in defense.

Summary of recommendations

This issue brief sets the stage by suggesting that the Alliance use the accession of Sweden and Finland to create an ambitious deterrence-by-denial bubble over Northern Europe. Such a strategy does not merely include military capabilities but must be underpinned by civil robustness and resilience that stretches across NATO territory. Operationally, allies in Northern Europe should prepare to assume greater responsibility as first responders in case of a severe security situation, below or at the level of Article 5. In order to be successful in this regard, political cooperation and agenda setting must intensify among Northern European allies.

1. Create a deterrence-by-denial bubble over Northern Europe

With Sweden and Finland as allies, NATO can establish a robust deterrence-by-denial posture in a once contested and fragmented region, enhancing the security of all allies.
Russia’s preoccupation with the war in Ukraine should be used as an opportunity for NATO to build stronger and more efficient deterrence, stabilizing and paving the way for a more secure environment ahead.

a) Air and missile defense

A crucial step for NATO is to build a solid air and missile structure for the whole region.
Investing in the European Sky Shield Initiative—joined by Germany, the Baltic states, Norway, Finland, and the UK—is key for shaping such a structure.
Sweden should urgently join the initiative and pave the way for a network approach to the Patriot system, also operated by Germany and Poland, which creates opportunities for solid medium-range missile coverage across the Baltic Sea.

b) Airspace dominance

Create a joint Nordic Air Force of Swedish, Finnish, Norwegian, and Danish combat aircraft that can operate seamlessly across national territories in the Nordics.
Increase the deterrence value of such a Nordic air force by adding long-range weaponry to the Swedish combat aircraft, similar to the capabilities of Norway and Finland.
Establish a Nordic Air Operations Center when Sweden and Finland join the Alliance. Such an operations center would provide for using the force in a holistic, joint manner.
Avoid creating a limited “NATO within NATO” in the Nordics by ensuring that the Nordic Air Force functions as an asset for the whole of Northern Europe, as well as the Alliance in its 360-degree approach to security.

c) Subwater dominance

Sweden, with tailormade capabilities for the Baltic Sea, should take a leading role in establishing a NATO Submarine and Seabed Monitoring Mission to safeguard the subwaters in the Baltics.
Sweden could be joined in this endeavor by submarines from Germany, Poland, and the UK.
The territorial waters off the Baltic states’ coasts, where the maritime conditions provide a suitable environment for Russian covert underwater operations, should be a priority.

d) Intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance

Sweden and Finland will bring extensive ISR capabilities to both the Baltic Sea and the vast area of the Arctic: in space, in the air, on the ground, and at sea. Sweden will also provide subwater ISR. These capabilities must urgently become interoperable with the JISR structure.
Identified capability gaps in the Baltic region includes airborne ISR and unmanned underwater vehicles. Swedish and Finnish accession to NATO is an opportunity to address these gaps, preferably through joint procurement.
Sweden and Finland should contribute with intelligence analysts specialized on Russia within the NATO structure.

e) Readiness through operations and exercises

Finland should initiate an eFP on its territory, as all other allies closest to Russia have, creating a coherent eastern flank. Bringing a multilateral force to Finland would clearly indicate Alliance commitment to Article 5, and would send a strong deterrence signal to Russia.
Sweden should contribute troops to the eFP in the Baltic states, and if established, in Finland, on a permanent rotational basis. These should be solid contributions, preferably up to battalion size in peacetime, with preparedness up to brigade size in case the division level is activated. That means that Sweden would need to substantially increase its ambitions for the development of its army.
Sweden and Finland should, from time to time, contribute to eFPs outside of the region—for instance, in Romania—to illustrate commitment to Alliance solidarity in accordance with the 360-degree approach.
Sweden should establish itself as a basing area for allied ground, air, and naval forces. Doing so would allow the Baltic states to be reinforced quickly during crisis or war.
NATO should focus on the Arctic by indulging in advanced cold-weather exercises hosted by Arctic allies, and encourage Sweden and Finland to provide High-North expertise to the Alliance.
NATO needs to exercise the political decision-making process as Sweden and Finland enter the Alliance, with a particular focus on joint ISR.

2. Strengthen robustness and resilience across the region

NATO allies must underpin the deterrence-by-denial bubble by individual and joint measures to strengthen robustness and resilience across allied territory through a comprehensive approach. Further NATO-EU cooperation is key in this regard.
Key areas that support deterrence by denial are critical infrastructure, logistic flows, and military mobility, in which case the EU membership of Sweden and Finland could pave the way for further investments by joint funding.
The Nordics should capitalize on the EU dual-use mobility investments and projects to enhance the region’s infrastructural resilience and mobility, with a priority on the port of Gothenburg.
Sweden and Finland should join the Three Seas Initiative, to provide substantial additional funding and fully connect the Baltic to the Adriatic and Black Seas, making one, resilient geopolitical flank.

3. Intensify joint agenda setting and initiatives

The Nordic countries can use NORDEFCO’s political guidance Vision 2025 to pursue initiatives in the EU and NATO that would call attention to the region and ensure that it benefits from common funding and resources. That could include PESCO projects aimed at military mobility and logistics, joint procurement within ISR, and innovation projects based on emerging technologies.
The Nordics must beware of being too introverted in their deepened cooperation and risking abandonment within the Alliance. In order to anchor Nordic collaboration within a larger regional context and create win-win opportunities for other allies, dialogue between with NORDEFCO, the Baltic states, and Poland should intensify.
With all eight nations now in NATO, the NB8 should strive to speak with one voice in addressing the security needs of the region.
E-PINE should be used to increase US awareness and understanding of security concerns in the region, and to initiate joint projects that can strengthen resilience as part of deterrence and defense.
E-PINE should serve as a common vehicle to generate close transatlantic cooperation on the reconstruction of Ukraine after the war.
The Northern Group should serve as a forum for alignment on positions on the security situation in Northern Europe, and Russia’s war in Ukraine, to ensure that NATO’s strategic discussions include these perspectives.
The Nordic and Baltic states should use the Northern Group to focus the UK, Germany, and Poland on their roles as security providers in Northern Europe, and to make sure that their investments in defense spending and capability development cover the Northern dimension.

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Issue Brief Sep 20, 2019

Securing Northern Europe: Toward a comprehensive approach

By Anna Wieslander and Elin Schiffer

As Northern Europe finds itself on the front line of systemic great-power competition it has the consider three main challenges: an assertive Russia, changing dynamics in the transatlantic link and the development of a European defense. This present a unique window of opportunity to develop a comprehensive regional approach, bringing together the Baltic Sea, the North Atlantic and the Arctic.

Europe & Eurasia NATO

Apr 20, 2022

Voices from the North

This 4-part podcast series in collaboration with the US Embassy Stockholm explores issues affecting the Arctic.

Report Mar 30, 2022

All security is local: Arctic defense policies and domain awareness

By David Auerswald

This report maps Arctic allies’ and partners’ defense strategies and domain awareness capabilities to make recommendations for enhancing Arctic security.

Defense Policy Defense Technologies

1 Anna Wieslander and Elin Schiffer, Securing Northern Europe: Toward a Comprehensive Approach, Atlantic Council, September 20, 2019, 2, https://www.atlanticcouncil.org/in-depth-research-reports/issue-brief/securing-northern-europe-toward-a-comprehensive-approach/.

2 “NATO 2022 Strategic Concept,” NATO, June 29, 2022, 4, https://www.nato.int/strategic-concept/.

3 “NATO’s Military Presence in the East of the Alliance,” NATO, last updated December 7, 2022, https://www.nato.int/cps/en/natohq/topics_136388.htm; Matti Pesu and Tuomas Iso-Markku, “Finland as a NATO Ally: First Insights into Finnish Alliance Policy,” Finnish Institute of International Affairs, December 2022, https://www.fiia.fi/en/publication/finland-as-a-nato-ally; Andrea Shalal and Inti Landauro, “Biden Bolsters Long-Term U.S. Military Presence in Europe,” Reuters, June 29, 2022, https://www.reuters.com/world/us/biden-says-us-changing-force-posture-europe-based-threat-2022-06-29/.

4 “NATO 2022 Strategic Concept,” 6.

5 “London Declaration,” NATO, December 4, 2019, https://www.nato.int/cps/en/natohq/official_texts_171584.htm.

6 “Brussels Summit Communique,” NATO, June 14, 2021, https://www.nato.int/cps/en/natohq/news_185000.htm.

7 “NATO 2022 Strategic Concept,” 5.

8 “National Security Strategy,” White House, October 12, 2022, https://www.whitehouse.gov/wp-content/uploads/2022/10/Biden-Harris-Administrations-National-Security-Strategy-10.2022.pdf.

9 Ibid., 39.

10 Fact Sheet: 2022 National Defense Strategy,” US Department of Defense, March 28, 2022, https://media.defense.gov/2022/Mar/28/2002964702/-1/-1/1/NDS-FACT-SHEET.PDF.

11 Wieslander and Schiffer, Securing Northern Europe, 5.

12 Aziz Erdogan, “Russian A2AD Strategy and Its Implications for NATO,” Beyond the Horizon, December 6, 2018, https://behorizon.org/russian-a2ad-strategy-and-its-implications-for-nato/.

13 Breaking Defense, September 28, 2015, https://breakingdefense.com/2015/09/russians-in-syria-building-a2ad-bubble-over-region-breedlove/.

14 David A. Shlapak and Michael W. Johnson, “Reinforcing Deterrence on NATO’s Eastern Flank: Wargaming the Defense of the Baltics,” RAND, 2016, https://www.rand.org/pubs/research_reports/RR1253.html.

15 Mathieu Boulègue, The Militarization of Russian Polar Politics, Chatham House, June 6, 2022, https://www.chathamhouse.org/2022/06/militarization-russian-polar-politics/02-european-arctic-kola-bastion-and-high-north.

16 Robert Dalsjö, Christofer Berglund, and Michael Jonsson, “Bursting the Bubble? Russian A2/AD in the Baltic Sea Region: Capabilities, Countermeasures, and Implications,” Swedish Defence Research Agency, March 3, 2019, https://www.foi.se/rapportsammanfattning?reportNo=FOI-R–4651–SE; Myths and Misconceptions around Russian Military Intent, Chatham House, July 14, 2022, https://www.chathamhouse.org/2022/06/myths-and-misconceptions-around-russian-military-intent/myth-5-russia-creates-impenetrable.

17 “NATO 2022 Strategic Concept.”

18 “14 NATO Allies and Finland Agree to Boost European Air Defence Capabilities,” NATO, last updated October 13, 2022, https://www.nato.int/cps/en/natohq/news_208103.htm.

19 Pekka Vanttien, “Finland, Not Sweden, Joins NATO Shield Initiative,” Euractiv, October 14, 2022, https://www.euractiv.com/section/all/short_news/finland-not-sweden-joins-nato-missile-shield-initiative/.

20 “Nordic Partners and Allies Cooperate in Cross Border Training,” NATO Allied Air Command, 2019, https://ac.nato.int/archive/2019/nordic-partners-and-allies-cooperate-in-cross-border-training-.

21 “Arctic Challenge Exercise,” Norwegian Armed Forces, June 3, 2021, https://www.forsvaret.no/en/exercises-and-operations/exercises/arctic-challenge-exercise.

22 Valerie Insinna, “Norwegian Air Chief Wants ‘Nordic Air Operations Center’ if Sweden, Finland Join NATO,” Breaking Defense, July 8, 2022, https://breakingdefense.com/2022/07/norwegian-air-chief-wants-nordic-air-operations-center-if-sweden-finland-join-nato/.

23 “Försvarets Avhållande Förmåga—Bortglömd Huvuduppgift?” Swedish Defence Research Agency, February 25, 2014, https://www.foi.se/nyheter-och-press/nyheter/2014-02-25-forsvarets-avhallande-formaga—bortglomd-huvuduppgift.html.

24 Charly Salonius–Pasternak, “Not Just Another Arms Deal: The Security Policy Implications of the United States Selling Advanced Missiles to Finland,” Finnish Institute of International Affairs, September 2012, https://www.fiia.fi/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/bp112.pdf; Eoin Micheál McNamara and Charly Salonius-Pasternak, “F-35s for Finland: Bolstering Deterrence and the Transatlantic Link,” RUSI, February 1, 2022, https://rusi.org/explore-our-research/publications/commentary/f-35s-finland-bolstering-deterrence-and-transatlantic-link.

25 Thomas Nielsen, “First Baltic Sea Voyage for Russia’s 4th Generation Multi-Purpose Sub,” Barents Observer, July 19, 2022, https://thebarentsobserver.com/en/security/2022/07/first-baltic-sea-voyage-russias-4th-generation-multi-purpose-sub; H I Sutton, “Powerful Russian Submarine Seen Entering Baltic Sea,” Forbes, July 10, 2022, https://www.forbes.com/sites/hisutton/2020/07/10/powerful-russian-submarine-seen-entering-baltic-sea/?sh=4a86695142c5; Robbie Gramer, “NATO Doubles Naval Presence in Baltic, North Seas After Pipeline Sabotage,” Foreign Policy, October 11, 2022, https://foreignpolicy.com/2022/10/11/baltic-nato-russia-navy-nord-stream-sabotage/.

26 “Submarines,” SAAB, last visited December 19, 2022, https://www.saab.com/products/naval/submarines.

27 “Joint Intelligence, Surveillance and Reconnaissance,” NATO, last updated June 23, 2022, https://www.nato.int/cps/en/natohq/topics_111830.htm.

28 Admiral Mark E. Ferguson, III, USN (Ret.) and Air Marshal Sir Christopher Harper, RAF (Ret.), Over the Horizon: NATO Joint Intelligence, Surveillance, and Reconnaissance in the Baltic Sea Region, Atlantic Council, November 2019, https://www.atlanticcouncil.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/Over-the-Horizon_Report.pdf.

29 Mikko Villikari, “Finnish–Swedish Naval Co-operation”, University of Turku, May 29, 2019, https://sites.utu.fi/bre/finnish-swedish-naval-co-operation/.

30 Ferguson and Harper, Over the Horizon.

31 “A Strategic Compass for Security and Defence,” European Union External Action Service, March 2022, https://www.eeas.europa.eu/sites/default/files/documents/strategic_compass_en3_web.pdf.

32 “EU Transport Infrastructure: Speeding-Up Investments in Dual Civil/Defence Use and Energy Efficiency,” European Commission Directorate-General for Mobility and Transport, April 8, 2022, https://transport.ec.europa.eu/news/eu-transport-infrastructure-speeding-investments-dual-civildefence-use-and-energy-efficiency-2022-04-08_en; “Action Plan on Military Mobility: EU Takes Steps Towards a Defence Union,” European Commission, March 28, 2018, https://ec.europa.eu/commission/presscorner/detail/en/IP_18_2521.

33 “Transport Infrastructure: Projects Receive EUR 425 Million in EU Funding to Boost Green Mobility and to Adapt the Network for Dual Civil/Defence Use,” European Commission, European Climate, Infrastructure and Environment Executive Agency, April 8, 2022, https://cinea.ec.europa.eu/news-events/news/transport-infrastructure-projects-receive-eur-425-million-eu-funding-boost-green-mobility-and-adapt-2022-04-08_en.

34 “Connecting Europe Facility for Transport,” European Commission, last visited December 19, 2022, https://cinea.ec.europa.eu/programmes/connecting-europe-facility/transport-infrastructure_en.

35 “CEF Transport Calls for Proposals 2021—Military Mobility Envelope,” European Commission, last visited December 19, 2022, https://cinea.ec.europa.eu/system/files/2022-04/Military%20Mobility%20-%20funded%20projects.pdf; Esther Geerts, ”EU Digs out Millions to Prepare Rail for Military Use,” RailFreight.com, last visited December 19, 2022, https://www.railfreight.com/railfreight/2022/04/14/eu-digs-out-millions-to-prepare-rail-for-military-operations/?gdpr=deny.

36 “Military Mobility: EU Proposes Actions to Allow Armed Forces to Move Faster and Better across Borders,” European Commission, November 10, 2022, https://ec.europa.eu/commission/presscorner/detail/en/ip_22_6583.

37 Ibid.

38 “Priority Projects,” Three Seas Initiative, last visited December 19, 2022, https://3seas.eu/about/progressreport.

39 “Status Report of 2022,” Three Seas Initiative, last visited December 19, 2022, https://projects.3seas.eu/report.

40 “Memorandum of Understanding between the Ministry of Defence of the Kingdom of Denmark and the Ministry of Defence of the Republic of Finland and the Ministry for Foreign Affairs of Iceland and the Ministry of Defence of the Kingdom of Norway and the Government of the Kingdom of Sweden on Nordic Defence Cooperation,” NORDEFCO, November 4, 2009, https://www.nordefco.org/Files/nordefco-mou.pdf.

41 Pauli Järvenpää, “NORDEFCO: Love in a Cold Climate?” International Centre for Defence and Security Estonia, April 3, 2017, https://icds.ee/en/nordefco-love-in-a-cold-climate/.

42 “Nordic Defence Cooperation Vision 2025,” NORDEFCO, October 13, 2018, https://www.nordefco.org/Files/nordefco-vision-2025-signed.pdf.

43 John Andreas Olson, “Security in Northern Europe: Deterrence, Defence and Dialogue,” Royal United Services Institute, October 25, 2018, https://rusi.org/explore-our-research/publications/whitehall-papers/security-northern-europe-deterrence-defence-and-dialogue.

44 “Enhanced Partnership in Northern Europé (E-PINE),” US Department of State, Bureau of European and Eurasian Affairs, last visited December 19, 2022, https://www.state.gov/enhanced-partnership-in-northern-europe-e-pine/.

45 Rt Hon Liam Fox MP, “Defence Secretary Launches New Forum of Northern European Countries,” UK Ministry of Defence, November 10, 2010, https://www.gov.uk/government/news/defence-secretary-launches-new-forum-of-northern-european-countries.

46 “Standing Together for Stability in Northern Europe,” Norwegian Ministry of Defence, November 13, 2014, https://www.regjeringen.no/en/historical-archive/solbergs-government/Ministries/fd/News/2014/Standing-together-for-stability-in-Northern-Europe/id2340434/; Rt Hon Sir Michael Fallon, “Defence Secretary meets with Nordic-Baltic defence ministers,” UK Ministry of Defence, November 12, 2014, https://www.gov.uk/government/news/defence-secretary-meets-with-nordic-baltic-defence-ministers; “Joint Statement by the Ministers of Defence of the Northern Group November 2022,” Swedish Ministry of Defence, November 23, 2022, https://www.government.se/statements/2022/11/joint-statement-by-the-ministers-of-defence-of-the-northern-group-23-november-2022/; Alexandra Brzozowski and Alicia Prager, “Northern Group Aims to Step up Regional Cooperation,” Euractiv, June 26, 2019, https://www.euractiv.com/section/defence-and-security/news/northern-group-aims-to-step-up-regional-security-cooperation/.

The post How allied Sweden and Finland can secure Northern Europe appeared first on Atlantic Council.

Pakistan’s foreign minister pitches more global aid and investment—and ‘less chaos’

Nick Fouriezos — Wed, 21 Dec 2022 16:16:49 +0000

Watch the full event

Public Event Tue, December 20, 2022 • 4:00 pm ET

A conversation with Foreign Minister of Pakistan Bilawal Bhutto Zardari

AN #ACFRONTPAGE EVENT – The South Asia Center hosted a conversation on the Pakistani government’s foreign policy goals, opportunities for deepening the Pakistan-US relationship, and Pakistan’s plan to address the climate crisis and resulting economic challenges.

Climate Change & Climate Action Economy & Business Pakistan Politics & Diplomacy

The role Pakistan plays in the international scene may depend on how the global community responds to its growing litany of challenges, as the South Asian nation grapples with heightened political and economic insecurity, as well as the aftermath of a historically devastating monsoon season.

“The way in which we engage with each of these issues, the solutions we find for them, and our ability to implement those solutions will decide the direction of Pakistan’s policy in the coming decade, two decades… and it will decide the direction of Pakistan’s foreign policy in the times to come,” said Foreign Minister Bilawal Bhutto Zardari on Tuesday at an Atlantic Council Front Page event in Washington.

Pakistan’s youngest ever foreign minister— the thirty-four-year-old whose mother was prime minister and father was president assumed the post in April under the new government of Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif—spoke at length about the mounting challenges his nation is facing and his vision for rallying the international community to address them. Read on for more highlights from his remarks and conversation with Uzair Younus, director of the Pakistan Initiative at the Council’s South Asia Center.

Coping with climate disaster

“We experienced this year what can only be described as a climate catastrophe of biblical proportions,” Bhutto Zardari said of the monsoons that raged over Pakistan from June until the end of September, affecting thirty-three million people, roughly one in seven Pakistanis. By the time the rains had stopped, one third of Pakistan’s land mass—an area roughly the size of Colorado—was underwater, with damages topping thirty billion dollars.
Nations could see serious geopolitical consequences if Pakistan’s already teetering institutions worsen. “If we get this wrong, this is a crisis situation waiting to explode in our faces,” Bhutto Zardari said, even as he acknowledged that asking for humanitarian relief funds was a challenge given the fiscal constraints on economic powers because of COVID-19, inflation, and Russia’s war against Ukraine.
However, Bhutto Zardari hoped nations would rally to help Pakistani citizens now and use it as a test case for building resilience against future climate disasters, wherever they should next arise. “Granted it will take time, but once we address their needs and we rebuild, we can do so in a manner that they are better off than they were before,” Bhutto Zardari said.

More than security

In the past decade, Bhutto Zardari said that 90 percent of US-Pakistan conversations were focused around counterterrorism. Now the agenda has broadened to include everything from climate to agriculture to health care. “We have a far more comprehensive itinerary around which we are engaging,” he said.
Still, particularly after the Taliban takeover of Afghanistan last year, security remains a critical discussion. Bhutto Zardari said he would try to work with the Taliban, particularly when it comes to striking back against the Tehreek-i-Taliban Pakistan terrorist organization. “We can’t change what happened in the past” in Afghanistan, Bhutto Zardari said. “What we can do is be serious about what we’re going to do going forward. Are we going to learn from our mistakes?” The answer, he added, will define “the safety and stability of our region.”
Bhutto Zardari recently visited Singapore and Indonesia, the latter of which is the world’s largest Muslim nation yet doesn’t even have a direct flight to Pakistan. He imagines Pakistan could become a hub between Southeast Asian and Central Asian nations. “In order to get there, I need to get my house in order,” he said.
“Of course, it’s far more appetizing, the less chaos we have,” Bhutto Zardari said, adding that there are “definitely” still questions about Pakistan’s political and economic stability. “But that doesn’t mean we’re not trying to address it. Questions? Yes. But does it mean shutting the door? No.”

His investment pitch

Pakistan hopes to expand and deepen its financial arrangements with a broader group of partners, particularly after it was removed in October from the “gray list” for terrorism financing operated by the global watchdog Financial Action Task Force—although this week’s hostage crisis hasn’t helped assuage Pakistan’s reputation for insecurity. “The main selling point we have is that we can become a logistical and trade hub… it’s the geographical location,” Bhutto Zardari said.
The challenges facing Pakistan represent a major risk for businesses, but that risk also is a key part of Bhutto Zardari’s message to investors as he believes the country will be a story of opportunity within a decade or two. “My pitch to everyone is get in now, while you can—when everyone doesn’t see that opportunity—so you can maximize your benefit later.”
Google has opened an office in Pakistan, and Meta has invested in fiber optic cable infrastructure. Bhutto Zardari noted that Facebook accepts rupees and could pursue a monetization model that rewards content creators in Pakistan. However, existing “data protection” policies—including Pakistan’s Prevention of Electronic Crimes Act of 2016—have kept tech companies from fully investing in the country, with Bhutto Zardari revealing that Pakistan leads the world in requests to remove content on Facebook.

Nick Fouriezos is a writer with more than a decade of journalism experience around the globe.

Watch the full event

The post Pakistan’s foreign minister pitches more global aid and investment—and ‘less chaos’ appeared first on Atlantic Council.

Agachi interviewed by Politico on the biggest unexpected threats to the United States

Anca Agachi — Wed, 14 Dec 2022 09:30:00 +0000

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Staff

Anca Agachi

Associate Director

Scowcroft Center for Strategy and Security Transatlantic Security Initiative

Africa Conflict

The Transatlantic Security Initiative, in the Scowcroft Center for Strategy and Security, shapes and influences the debate on the greatest security challenges facing the North Atlantic Alliance and its key partners.

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The post Agachi interviewed by Politico on the biggest unexpected threats to the United States appeared first on Atlantic Council.

The big success and bigger failure of COP27

Atlantic Council — Mon, 21 Nov 2022 14:12:54 +0000

GET UP TO SPEED

The Global South won, but did the climate? Negotiators at the UN climate-change conference known as COP27 extended their stay in Sharm el Sheikh, Egypt to hammer out a final agreement that will create a loss and damage fund to compensate developing countries harmed by climate change. But the deal barely addresses other urgent topics such as reducing greenhouse-gas emissions, even as the consequences of climate change become clearer by the day. Have negotiators done enough to help save the planet and the people on it? What other surprises cropped up at COP? Our experts, who were on the ground in Sharm el Sheikh, are here to weigh in.

TODAY’S EXPERT REACTION COURTESY OF

Kathy Baughman McLeod (@KBMcLeodFLA): Senior vice president and director of the Adrienne Arsht-Rockefeller Foundation Resilience Center
Jorge Gastelumendi (@Gasteluj): Director of global policy at the Adrienne Arsht-Rockefeller Foundation Resilience Center and former climate negotiator for the government of Peru
Landon Derentz (@Landon_Derentz): Senior director of the Global Energy Center and former director for energy on the US National Security Council and National Economic Council

A damaging loss?

While the creation of the loss and damage fund was “immensely welcome,” Kathy tells us, the lack of new emissions-reduction commitments by the countries gathered at COP27 represents an “utter failure” that is “devastating to plans to keep global heating to no more than 1.5 degrees Celsius” above pre-industrial levels, as pledged in the 2015 Paris Agreement.
Jorge says ”current major emitters” such as China, India, Brazil, and Indonesia are let off the hook by the lack of those commitments—and by the fact that, as developing nations, they won’t have to contribute to the loss and damage fund, “which could have been one other leverage point to” make them cut emissions. As a result, countries like these are poised to replace developed countries as the primary cause of climate-related loss and damage.
The structure of the loss and damage fund “also lacks a clear focus on the most vulnerable, which poses fundamental questions about the future use of the funds by recipient countries,” Jorge notes.

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Fossil flip-flop

Kathy attributes much of the conference’s failures to attack global warming to the fact that “the fossil-fuel industry is still so deeply influential over country delegations,” with more than six hundred fossil fuel-tied delegates in attendance according to the advocacy group Global Witness.
Vladimir Putin had a say too: Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has contributed to a near-term global energy crisis that at times has sidelined long-term climate concerns. The COP results “did not match the level of urgency many in the climate community were hoping for,” Landon tells us, because “climate action appears to have an energy-security problem.”
Fossil-fuel geopolitics also helped deliver the Global South’s big win. “Europe’s present hunt for conventional oil and gas resources in Africa and Latin America,” a major break from the West’s recent anti-fossil fuel stance, may have “served to disarm” long-running Western efforts to block a loss and damage fund, Landon says.
That’s because this year’s mad hydrocarbon dash is forcing Western countries “to grapple with the consequences of failing to move more swiftly to abate global emissions,” Landon adds.

Adapt or die

For real progress, Kathy says, you have to look beyond the negotiators: “NGOs and civil society, young and indigenous activists, philanthropy and the private sector (particularly the finance and insurance sectors), and mayors and governors played their largest role yet in driving new solutions for climate mitigation and adaptation.”
One example, as Jorge points out, is the Sharm el Sheikh Adaptation Agenda (SAA), a commitment from non-state actors to build climate resilience for four billion of the world’s most vulnerable people. The Resilience Center team helped secure a commitment in the SAA to mobilize some three thousand insurance companies to finance climate-adaptation projects. “In short, we managed to elevate a business-led effort into a global policy platform,” Jorge adds.
Next year’s COP will be a short hop away in the United Arab Emirates, and Kathy says the agenda “will need to focus on adaptation and resilience, and taking the next steps in detail on the loss and damage facility.” But once again, she adds, the formal negotiations will only be part of the story: “I expect action by the non-state actor community, especially around finance, to outpace the official process.”

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The world ‘must be built with tolerance, respect’ says Indonesian president at Global Food Security Forum

Atlantic Council — Fri, 18 Nov 2022 18:39:36 +0000

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Highlights from the Global Food Security Forum

A gathering of leaders across government, industry, and civil society to assess food security as a global challenge and offer bold solutions for strengthening food systems, securing supply chains, and fighting world hunger. This Forum is co-hosted with the Gaurav and Sharon Srivastava Family Foundation, the Ministry of Defense of the Republic of Indonesia, and the Coordinating Ministry of Maritime Affairs and Investment of the Republic of Indonesia and takes place on the sidelines of the G20 summit in Bali.

Economy & Business Resilience & Society

Event transcript

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FREDERICK KEMPE: Some of you in the audience know me: This is not only the first day in my life I’ve worn batik; it is the first time that any president of the Atlantic Council in our sixty-year history has worn batik, and so we do that in your country and in honor of you.

Starting as a businessman and mayor in your home city, Surakarta in 2005, President Jokowi entered politics with the aim to work for the people. He devoted himself to eradicating poverty, reducing crime, paying spontaneous visits to poor neighborhoods and marketplaces, always ready to hear people’s voices from up close. Your refusal to accept salary for public work and your competence in transforming the city into a vibrant tourist destination won the population of Surakarta’s heart, and you were re-elected as mayor in 2010 with more than 90 percent of the vote.

Your determination to serve continued throughout your career, and you became the governor of Jakarta, and then the president of Indonesia in 2014. You were the first Indonesian president without a military or elite political background, and your victory symbolized the victory of democracy—the victory of democracy in this country of over 17,000 islands, 300 ethnic groups, and 273 million people and counting.

We will all witness your leadership here at the G20, as you bring countries together at a particularly difficult moment in the world community, in solving the most pressing challenges today in health, climate change, economic recessions, and geopolitical tensions that have us all on edge—to recover together and to recover stronger.

To make this G20 summit a success, it needs a chair of extraordinary talent and capability and heart; and someone who enjoys the trust of all parties involved. And you started becoming chair of the G20 far before you came here and launched this week; We’ve been watching your travels, we’ve been watching your meetings.

President Widodo is not just a man of the people of Indonesia, he’s also become a global citizen who embodies the spirit of global cooperation, a catalyst for collective prosperity and peace, and that is why the Atlantic Council and its jury voted to honor you with our highest honor. It’s now my pleasure to present the [2022] Atlantic Council Distinguished Global Citizen Award. President Joko Widodo of Indonesia, a man of the people, a global leader, a global citizen president.

PRESIDENT JOKO WIDODO: First of all, I would like to extend my highest appreciation for this award, the Global Citizen Award, from the Atlantic Council. I have never thought earlier that I would receive this award. So far what I’ve done… I’m doing my best. I’m working and doing my best with full responsibility, to uphold the values of humanity. Living in Indonesia, consisting of more than 17,000 islands, hundreds of ethnic groups, 162 local languages, Indonesia upholds the values of tolerance, peace, unity, and cooperation.

As a leader, I love visiting villages, I love visiting rural areas, and I also love visiting traditional markets. And since I was a child, I was taught being humble, to live modestly. And I’ve seen some people living in village or rural areas living in difficult situations, and therefore, I keep trying to do my best for the interests of common people and also for the interest of the state. The world should be built with tolerance, respect toward each other. The presidency of Indonesia in [the] G20 this year, and also we have [received] the [chairmanship] of ASEAN starting from next year. Ladies and gentlemen, once again, I would like to thank you for this Global Citizen Award that has been awarded to me. This will continually motivate me and also the government of the Republic of Indonesia to hold our responsibilities as part of the solution for the global world.

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Global Food Security Forum day two: How countries should address the food crisis in the short term

Atlantic Council — Sun, 13 Nov 2022 23:33:40 +0000

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Highlights from the Global Food Security Forum

Economy & Business Resilience & Society

Event transcript

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GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: Thank you, ladies and gentlemen. Let’s see, I want to make sure you can hear me OK. So, look, we’re going to have a panel that’s—this is going to be a pragmatic panel. We’re going to talk about what has to be done, what has to be done now, and what we’re going to as best we can demand that the G20 address.

So, without further ado, I would like to bring in the other members of the panel.

We’ll start with His Excellency the Minister of Agriculture, Republic of Indonesia, Mr.—or, His Excellency Syahrul Yasin Limpo. Mr. Minister, welcome. Please.

Next will be Ambassador David Merrill, former US ambassador to Indonesia. Long career in the US Agency of International Development. Next, please.

Next will be the Honorable Kira Rudik, who is the vice president of the Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europe, people’s deputy of Ukraine. Welcome, Kira.

And on the screen with us we should have—yes, we have—Dr. Seth Meyer, the chief economist, the—probably one of the most—foremost experts in the world on agricultural economics and technology. And, Seth, we’re delighted to have you with us. Thank you. I’m sorry you’re not here in person. And we’re looking at you continuously, but don’t let that make you nervous. We’re going to watch you the whole time.

OK, let’s get right to it. So I want to start with the deputy from Ukraine. And, Kira, I want to ask you this. You know, we were talking about this being a crisis. So we’re in a crisis. This war is not over. Of course, we’re happy that Ukraine has recovered Kherson, but we don’t know what’s going to happen next. So the odds are that we’re going to have another disrupted planting season in Ukraine, and Ukraine’s one of the breadbaskets. What can you tell us that we should ask the world to do for the farmers of Ukraine right now to give us the greatest output of grain for the world?

KIRA RUDIK: Hello. Thank you so much for having me. It’s a pleasure being here.

So when we are talking about the next harvest season and how to make sure that we prepare for it the best and most effective way, we should look at it with a business approach. So in business, when you are in crisis, the first thing is you need to fixate the losses. So right now we need to make sure that there is no more destruction or at least it’s minimized. So, for that, we need air force protection systems. And we are asking our allies—United States, European countries, United Kingdom, all countries from all over the world—to provide us with air force protection systems to protect infrastructure from further destruction. This is the first one.

Second one is, of course, de-mining. The de-mining efforts need to happen right now. They are happening, but at a very small scale because, basically, all the lands that are supposed to be agricultural lands right now partially or fully are mined. And they are not going to be able to be used to plant the harvest.

Third thing, of course, we need to fix infrastructure and use these five months before the next planting season to fix the infrastructure. As of right now, 40 percent of energy infrastructure in Ukraine is destroyed. So when the cities are experiencing electrical outages, when there is no running water, it will be very hard to continue on the commitment that we have in terms of the agriculture. So we need from the international community support on going through the winter and also fixing the infrastructure.

Fourth thing is commitment on the fuel. We understand that right now Ukraine is purchasing fuel and this, of course, has an impact on the price of the harvest on the grains, on all the products. So we need to make plans and commitments for the next year for the fuel and for the price of it. And of course, it’s a painful subject for everybody.

And the last but not the least, and a critically important point, is the grain deal. The grain deal is a temporary agreement between the United Nations, Ukraine, Russia, and Turkey that the ports where the grains are exported from are being not neutral, but the ships can go in and out easily. So the price of the harvest depends on the price of the insurance that the companies have to put on the ships that are going in and out of the warzone, basically. So having a written commitment or the general commitment so it will seem safely or look safely or be more safe for the companies to ship the grains in and out of Ukraine would decrease the price of insurance and the price of transportation.

As of—as for Ukrainian people, we want the war to be over. We are a technological and agricultural country. We want to make sure that we continue being a breadbasket for the whole world. This is one of our missions. This is what we want to do. And I can tell you part of my family are farmers. It’s sacred. It’s almost religious for us to be able to provide life, to create life instead of death. And this is critically important, and this is why we are fighting so hard to win the war, to end the war, and to make sure that we return to the safe operation where we are able to build prosperity for everyone and contradict all the crises.

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: Kira, thank you very much. You’ve given us some very clear guidelines, and we’ll make sure those get reflected in what we pass on to the White House and also to the—to the G20 here.

And I’d like to turn next to Minister Limpo. Minister, General Prabowo gave us this incredible presentation today that shows this progress that’s been made in Indonesia. There must be many countries all over the world who look at the example of Indonesia and say: We could do this. We would like to do this. I know we have representatives here from several African countries, and I’m sure they will be anxious to listen to your experience and your guidelines on how was this accomplished. The rice, the palm oil, the technology with cassava, how was this done? What is Indonesia doing that’s bringing it to the forefront in this way?

MINISTER SYAHRUL YASIN LIMPO: Yeah. Thank you, General.

Distinguished resource persons, ladies and gentlemen, from discussions which we have had and for the last one year, we have heard the huge challenges and issues that we are facing concerning climate change, wars, and also the impact of COVID-19 pandemic. We have talked about this in many forums.

And talking about food, food is the most strategic issue. And this issue requires the attention of states, nations, and the global citizens, as well as peace and public order. We might be able to delay other issues, but we can’t delay the issue of food. Food issue is the most essential, the most fundamental, and it has multidimensional aspects. Therefore, our president, Mr. Joko Widodo, has determined that food is a top priority, and it shall be discussed in detail.

In our countries, we look at our provinces, regencies, and sub-regencies, and also the states. And then we look at the regions. And we divide our areas in Indonesia into production regions. In two, three areas, we are dividing our areas in Indonesia into areas that have surplus in stocks, regions which have limited stocks, and which may get in trouble in a crisis if a crisis strikes. And there are also areas which have shortages. Likewise, in the global level there are countries facing shortages of food, and there are also countries having limited stocks, and there are also countries having abundant stocks. Therefore, in facing this global crisis, the food crisis, what we may do, among others, like what we do in Indonesia under the leadership of our president, is mitigate and adapt ourselves with issues including climate change, including the global supply chain, and food logistic aspects. This should be anticipated, and proper adaptation should be made by all food producers as well.

Second of all, subnational cooperation. Subnational cooperation should be promoted and regulated by the state. No subnational region should restrict its trade, fulfilling its own need only, or even close itself because it may affect the trade ecosystem as a whole. And this pattern is the same with the global pattern. We need to look at the flow of food to where it needs. We should look at the flow of supply chain, from which area does it flow.

And in Indonesia, we have dealt with food crisis. For the past three years, we have had a surplus in food reserve, especially rice, which we have used to deal with shortages in wheat because there is a problem with supply from India, Russia, and Ukraine. Therefore, we must prepare measures to substitute the wheat in the event of wheat shortage issues. So we prepare our sago, our cassava, and our sorghum to prepare for any shortages. Currently, there is no problem. This year, we are OK. We don’t have issues with wheat. But what about next year? What about the regulation? And will the regular shipping of this commodity return to normal? And what if the stocks are concentrated in a particular area? If this happens, what we need to do is to substitute such commodities.

We also have issues with cattle, which we have imported 1.2 million cattle. Therefore, in the event of shortage, what we need to do is to prepare our land, chicken, and ax supply. What I meant is handling this food crisis is a must. And there is no single country that has an ability to restrict itself because this will result in a global issue.

And as for cooperation, in the G20 agricultural ministerial meeting last time in Bali there were three points.

First, promoting the agricultural and food system that is resilient and sustainable, which includes the incorporation of technology, food variety, cooperation, and collaboration in science.

Second, promoting open, just, predictable, transparent, non-discriminative trade to ensure affordability and availability of food. Food is human rights, and therefore there shall be no country in G20 itself to restrict its trade or to protect its internal interests only because we are part of the global community of G20. And this is what we have agreed upon in the G20 agricultural ministerial meeting.

Third of all, we have had an agreement that for all countries with the agreement in Washington with G20 finance ministers and agricultural ministers, all countries should put food on the top priority. It should be on top. Therefore, we are talking about the global context—or the countries that have issues of food shortages. We need to take measures. We have to know the issues and also the target and also the methodology that we are using in dealing with and helping those nations that are facing food shortages.

We are having a surplus of 10.2 million tons of rice. Our president has prepared an adequate reserve for certain countries to help them, including African countries. The point is whenever a country has a surplus or has been able to exceed the national needs, they should plan for using the excess they have for global interests. Therefore, to me, the global cooperation should be enhanced [to include] how to monitor follow-up actions in the level of implementation in fulfilling the needs. Therefore, our strategy in Indonesia, we need to look at regions having emergency needs, including countries having conflicts, yeah, like happening between Russia and Ukraine.

What is our step? Are there any temporary measures? In Indonesia, we have prepared two years, yeah, to prepare ourselves in the event of issues. We are the fourth-largest country after China, India, and the US, followed by Pakistan. Therefore, we need to ensure that in, for example, the past two years, we didn’t have any acute food shortage issues. Then cooperation for a permanent system indicates that food security becomes important and there shall be no countries harming the trade ecosystem which we have built so far.

I think that’s all. Thank you.

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: Well, thank you. Thank you very much, Mr. Minister. I know that there will be many countries studying what Indonesia’s doing, and we’re going to come back with some follow-up questions on that shortly.

Now I’d like to turn to Dr. Meyer, who’s with us on the screen. And Dr. Meyer, I’ve been bragging at this conference about some of the US innovations in agriculture and especially about improvements in things like bushels per acre of corn, and also talking about the role of agricultural extension services that the various states have and the Department of Agriculture. So when you look at the food security issue in the world, how do you see—what do you see as the right things for the United States to do? What would you be recommending right now if we could put you in front of the G20 in person and have all those heads of state lined up and you’d be able to tell them, one two, three, I want this done? What would you tell them?

SETH MEYER: Yeah. So I think the first place to start is in the US we’ve been incredibly productive in terms of growth in US agricultural production. You know, when I look to say, you know, what should we be doing around the world, when we look at the application of technology in the United States and what we’ve done to improve productivity, I think we did this, you know, from a three-point approach in the United States now. Which is, you know, we want not just to execute and pull every single bushel out of every acre if that’s not environmentally sustainable; or, we don’t want to apply technologies or activities which don’t make producers money.

So, again, you know, we think about this in terms of sustainable productivity growth in the United States. It’s got to make money for the farmer. It’s got to produce food that is affordable for consumers. It’s got to be environmentally sustainable. This isn’t something that you can produce for a few years and then you do damage to your system or the climate and you can’t continue to produce. So, you know, I think the US sees itself as being a reliable producer on the global market.

One of my other hats that I’ll put on here quick is the G20 has an initiative, the Ag Market Information System, and one of the—AMIS. One of the principles of AMIS is, you know, providing market information and avoiding unnecessary disruptions in the global market. So when I say the US being a reliable supplier, part of that is not putting export controls on. Part of that’s not putting export controls on, being a reliable supplier, and providing it to the rest of the world.

And in the US, you know, when we take our look at technology and sustainable productivity gains in the United States, there’s also a big interest in the United States in sharing that technology, sharing the adaptation practices from our climate hubs in the United States and taking that internationally. The secretary of agriculture mentioned that at COP27 today. So taking the lessons we’ve learned.

You’re right about our domestic Extension Service, but we’re pushing that to the next level. We’re pushing that into our Climate-Smart Commodities programs, where we’re going to—you know, we’ve put in $3 billion to experiment how to produce commodities in an environmentally friendly way, that producers can extract money and income from and yet meets the demands that the consumers want for these sustainable goods.

So, you know, what’s our principle in the United States? I think it’s to be—continue to be productive, to be productive in a sustainable way, and to share all those experiences about how we’ve done it with the rest of the world, as well, too. Because we can do lots of things in the United States, but we’re not going to achieve this goal of global food security without sharing this information which is very specific to countries’ own situations. So we’ll share our experiences with the rest of the world. I think that’s how we do it.

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: Well, thank you very much, Dr. Meyer. And we got a couple follow-up questions for you here if we’ve got time on some of the specific technologies we’re doing on carbon sequestration and other things, and maybe even on intellectual property.

So at this point I’d like to turn to Ambassador David Merrill, former ambassador here in Indonesia. And David, you must be really impressed by the progress Indonesia has made—it’s remarkable—in your time and experience here.

DAVID MERRILL: There’s no question about it.

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: But I want to ask you, we haven’t talked that much about international institutions.

DAVID MERRILL: That’s right.

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: So when you think about, as we’re looking at the G20 here, and we’ve got the minister’s experience in Indonesia—

DAVID MERRILL: Sure.

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK:—we’ve got the immediate guidance from the member of parliament in Ukraine, we’ve got the willingness of the United States to share, but what about these international organizations like FAO and World Food Programme? Are they really tuned up to help us move forward?

DAVID MERRILL: Yes.

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: Or do we need to do more with them?

DAVID MERRILL: Yes. General Clark, thanks for that question.

I just am struck by the poignancy of this moment. I mean, here we are sitting in Bali just ahead of the G20. We are mainly NGOs. We are some government officials. We don’t know what form the G20 communique or statement or any other document on food security will take, at least I don’t know. I don’t think any of us know. But we have an obligation to use the NGO channel to address the G20 and give them our ideas.

Now, one of them is on what international institutions can do. There are the MDBs, the World Food Programme, the FAO, even the WTO. USAID has done a lot of work over the years. Other government aid agencies have done a lot. So they can work on national and local distribution schemes. They can work on internationally coordinated food emergency reserves, which I haven’t heard being done yet. They can work with NGOs and private charities.

The idea is, as you have said, to coordinate the mobilization of adequate finance, repurpose—there’s about $800 billion a year of agricultural support going through multilateral and bilateral agencies, maybe just multilateral alone. That can be taken a look at. It could be repurposed for the needs of this particular food crisis. Balance of payments and budget support. Debt relief. Adequate IFI financing, even expanded. Emergency food reserves. So that’s one.

And we want to refrain from trade restrictions on fertilizer trade that would make things worse.

We want to guarantee the affordable supplies of staple foods—physical supplies, access via trade, access via income and livelihood support, social protection programs.

And I’ll wind up with later a possible G20 forum for food security dialogue that would continue after the current G20. It doesn’t have to be another international institution. It can be a place for things related to food security to be discussed under the aegis, perhaps, of Indonesia.

The improving supplies and distribution of fertilizers is key. There are trade barriers. There are subsidy schemes that have to be revisited; redoubled efforts to improve the efficiency of fertilizer use to help farmers do more with less, to save costs, to reduce nutrient loss to the environment. There needs to be improved productivity of smallholders growing staple food crops, closing the yield gaps. There’s a gentleman from Israel here who’s using micro water injections to improve food productivity. It doesn’t even have to be fertilizer; it could be fertilizer plus no-fertilizer technology. So the resilience and sustainability of food production, there’s a lot that can be done.

And as General Prabowo said and as the Chinese say, out of crisis comes opportunity. So here’s a dilly of a crisis, but it’s also a big opportunity. And we can even change the—make at least some changes in the world’s system for dealing with this as a result of this crisis: improving the nutritional quality of diets, progress for women and children, increased use of micronutrients.

What about agricultural research? We’ve been doing that for 40 years. Taking a look at the agricultural research that’s being done, see what improvements can be made, make crops more resilient to climate change, more sustainable, higher yields on less land.

Now, it wasn’t too long ago—it was only in April or maybe March—that the G20 itself was grappling with did it even need to be concerned with the Ukraine food crisis. They said, hey, this is a political crisis. This is for other agencies of the UN. And most of us went around saying, no, this is an economic crisis. OK, it started with politics. It started with war. But if people are starving to death, isn’t that a concern of the G20? Fortunately, it took only about two, three weeks for the G20 to say that’s exactly right. So the G20 can make equally impressive leaps in the next couple weeks and years.

Now, the one thing that we have talked about is the creation of a G20 forum for food security, trying to bypass the resistance that we would encounter for setting up yet another international institution. Don’t need to. Indonesia’s in a great position because of its posture on the world stage and because it’s leading the G20 to serve as a I don’t want to say clearinghouse necessarily, but a forum for discussion of ideas on food security.

And Indonesia has a very good track record on food security. If you go back to 2008, there was a severe rice crisis and Indonesia was one of the primary—probably the primary leader on solving the regional and global rice crisis in 2008. Indonesia’s going to be chairing ASEAN. So let’s let Indonesia within ASEAN at least deal with the rice part of food security, which it’s already shown it can do a good job.

So, in sum, I think we should write up the recommendations of this conference in some form with some people designated and get them post haste to the people in the G20 that are deciding whether to have some kind of statement and what that statement should be. It’s the least we can do to make our input. That’s my suggestion.

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: Well, thank you very much, Ambassador. Those are some really great ideas and we’ll try to incorporate them.

OK. So we’ve got about 10 minutes. I’m going to try to do a couple of let’s call them lightning rounds and then I’m going to come back to the minister to ask another follow-up question. So the first lightning round I want to ask each of our panelists this question. When we look at classical economics, we talk about land, labor, and capital. And in agriculture, of course, there’s agricultural land, there’s the farm labor, there’s the mechanization of labor which has helped us tremendously, but capital—the world is awash in capital. We had no idea 50 years ago that capital would be so plentiful in the world. What can capital do—financial firms, investment firms, firms that want to talk about how to improve mankind? I deal with these firms in London all the time. I hear it in New York. What is our specific ask of the financial community in dealing with this world food crisis?

And I’d like to start and ask—I mean, you don’t—you may not have an answer to this, but if you do I’d like—I’d like you to come up and tell me what you think about it. And let’s talk about the Ukraine crisis first. What can the international capital leaders do? They’ve got billions of dollars of resources. What are they going to do with it to help us right now in Ukraine?

KIRA RUDIK: First of all, to secure the investments into agriculture for the next year. I think all of us, we realize that generally there has been a huge flow back of the investment into Ukraine, and this is understandable because of the war. So we need that to come back.

On all the investment forums with all the investors/bankers, we are saying we all remember the lessons of the war: The one who is coming first will get the big—the big buck. And so this is why it’s time to invest right now. The risks are high, but the output will also be extremely high. This is how fortunes are made. So this is why, if the argument of the risks and the output would not work, we will just ask saying do it as a humanitarian way, invest into Ukraine right now into agricultural sector.

Then we are coming back again to cleaning up the mines because this is—the de-mining efforts are critical right now and will require tremendous investment. Just for everyone to understand, de-mining is basically going through every field and checking and processing the certain level of the ground. So it’s just like another agricultural work, basically, and it’s an incredibly important and hard and complicated process that needs to happen. But the output of it will be extremely productive because it will give us back the very fertile land.

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: OK. So I’m going to—I’m going to jump in. I’m going to say I’ve got two suggestions, OK, and you tell me if you like them, you take them back to Ukraine, we’ll go to Dr. Meyer and he’ll push them through US Department of Agriculture and get them up there.

One is farmers in Iowa have done amazing things with putting tile underneath their farmland. They have rich, deep, dark earth just like Ukraine does. It promotes drainage so you can get into the land sooner, you can take out the pockets that hold water, you can have uniform crop. Suppose we gave Ukrainian farmers no-interest loans to improve their land in that way so that they would get more productivity per hectare?

Number two, there’s been a lot of destruction and theft of agricultural equipment in Ukraine. Suppose Ukrainian farmers got no-interest loans to replace that agricultural equipment. Would that be helpful? If you like that—

KIRA RUDIK: Yeah, I do like that.

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: OK, good.

KIRA RUDIK: It’s a fantastic suggestion.

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: Dr. Meyer, can we do that?

SETH MEYER: Well, and we’re already doing some of that—

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: All right.

SETH MEYER:—when it comes to the US government support for farmers.

So I’ll even take a step back. My Iranian—my Ukrainian colleague’s talking about infrastructure and delivery of grain. I’ll even take a step back and say we’re figuring out ways to try and help the agricultural producers to be able to afford simple things like cash flow, getting that crop planted, getting the crop stored as they work on their infrastructure. So things like temporary storage, the big silo bag. So instead of having a large barn, you have a very long, long, long plastic tube, essentially, where you’re storing grain temporarily. I think there are things that need to be done on the ground in Ukraine now for these producers to cash flow for this next crop, put that winter wheat in the ground or plant spring crop.

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: That sounds good. Remember, I’m focusing on finance. Put the money in. Get the farmers the money they need at no-interest loans. They can improve productivity.

Now let me turn to the minister. Sir, I want to ask you this question. I know you’ve had a lot of foreign direct investment in agriculture in Indonesia, these palm-oil plantations and other things. But what more can the international financial community do to promote sustainable agriculture in Indonesia? What could we do to—what do we need to advertise?

And you’re the pacesetter for so many tropical environments. What do we need the bankers in London and New York to know about your needs for finance?

MINISTER SYAHRUL YASIN LIMPO:Agriculture does not only concern food. It also involves employment and a fundamental economic system to support industries, including pharmaceuticals industry. So, when it comes to agriculture, there are opportunities for investment in the agricultural cultivation stage as well as post-harvest, and there are also opportunities in agricultural industries. And the third one is the marketing of agricultural products. So there are three agendas, three segments which can be tapped into in investment. And we, on the order of our president, are working on this.

Agriculture must be the answer. And this year, after three years since Indonesia’s agriculture has been the mainstay of the Indonesian economy, other sectors have been hit hard by COVID-19, but our agriculture went up by 16.42 percent. Our global exports rose to 38.2 percent. And this is a sign that agriculture has not been much affected by the conditions and weather, except for war because we need fertilizers. Sodium and phosphate fertilizers are in Ukraine and Russia, and this is a challenge for the whole world.

Therefore, where is the investment? The investment can be made in the three areas, General. And talking about agriculture, we are a tropical country consisting of 17,000 islands. There are areas which can be invested for this in coastal and marine areas. And there are already investments that can be made. We produce a lot of tuna, up to 18 million tons a year. We can grow crops on the coastal areas, as well, with the technology that was presented by our American colleague. We have crops that are resilient against water-related challenges, can survive in swamps and can survive in salty seawater. Indonesia has many hills and mountains, and we still have enough land available to invest.

Currently, the president of Indonesia, Mr. Joko Widodo, is trying to focus several areas to be made into Food Estates called integrated farms where the large land consists of plantations, animal husbandry, and even freshwater fish cultivation, as well as horticulture. All of this requires technology, requires experts, and requires machines in order to become a product that the world needs. Therefore, agricultural products, after reaching the industrial stage, will be part that we are waiting for.

We have enough land for sugar factories. We have sugar in Indonesia in large quantities, but we still import some of it. So which bank is willing to invest?

Finally, agriculture needs capital, and this is one of President Joko’s successes in preparing a large enough budget to be accessed by small farmers in the form of people’s business loans. Its value is approximately a hundred trillion. Our farmers two years ago used these funds, around 55 trillion. The NPL was only 0.03 percent. Our farmers are honest and don’t want to be in debt.

Last year, we used 85 trillion people’s business credit funds based on government policies. It is not a subsidy, but a loan with low interest. With low interest, this can be good working capital to use. And the NPL is 0.6 percent, and that is in agricultural cultivation stage. Now, in post-harvest it’s on how micro, small, and medium enterprises can access agriculture loans.

Therefore, finally, there are five points that has become our focus from these investment funds.

First, they encourage the opening and creation of agricultural businesses, both small, medium, and large investments. I have given the example of sugar. We have sago palms in an area of 5 million hectares, and this can be used as flour, which can substitute wheat. If there is a bank that wants to invest, we will show you the place.

Second, we support young entrepreneurs to become Millennial farmers in agriculture. We focus on giving access to young farmers who want to try. We have trained more than 300 farmers using people’s business credit funds of approximately 2 trillion rupiahs. The acceleration is very fast because the younger ones have a faster network, strong motivation, and WhatsApp groups. And this works quite well.

Third, provide assistance for agricultural businesses for export. For exports, we assist them. Therefore, we bridge between buyers from one country and buyers from other countries. And the G20 must be able to bridge the assistance from the United States and what we can facilitate with the current conditions. Conducting training and assistance in the development of agricultural businesses requires experts. Even an entrepreneurial system is needed for our agriculture because our agriculture involves global matters. Our oil production is large. But does everything have to be with big industries? No, the president wants this to be done by people’s industry, and this requires capital to be facilitated so that the products can be exported to the global market at a lower price. Then, of course, we enhance our national products so that they are competitive compared to those of other countries.

I think agriculture is the answer to the global crisis and the world economic crisis in the future. If we can maintain our agriculture properly, it will be very much helpful, as everyone needs agriculture.

Thank you.

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: Great lessons. Great lessons. That’s great.

So, look, we’re trying to do a lightning round here and I’m going to get struck by lightning if I don’t move this thing alone. So I’d like to open up this next question to anybody who wants to do it. But in the military, we always have dreams about what technology we might have in the future. You know, we’ve always thought better communications, higher resolution imagery, those kinds of things. If you’re in the—thinking about the food problem in the world, what do we need to think about in the way of technology? What’s the—what’s the opportunity that we just need to put the resources on to really move us forward to the next level? How do we do it? Anybody. Who wants to take it? David? Seth, want to take it here from the—what do you say from the United States about it?

DAVID MERRILL: It’s a combination of international institutions and the private sector. I believe there still is an international institute on wheat research. I think it’s called CIMMYT. I have no idea what it’s been doing, but it better be doing something right now. So that’s one.

The other was the idea that Minister Prabowo said about getting private investment started. He’s doing a good job. So are others. And I think that’s equally worthy, if not more worthy, than the government programs.

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: Dr. Meyer, what do you say? If you could have your silver bullet here to fix this, what would it be?

SETH MEYER: I think it would be two very different things.

So, on the pure science and technology side, we’re making huge advancements in things like gene editing. So taking genes within the plant—not introducing new genes; just turning things off and on or letting the plant express genes which are already there. So impressive technology to help us do more with less, you know, ways to avoid putting—you know, rationalize better things like fertilizer use, which is both good for producers in terms of lowering cost and good for the environment.

But then I think that there are some other, you know, not cutting-edge science that really has potential for food security. And that is translating a lot of this technology and practices—some of them used by US producers—into smallholder farms or even let’s talk about the ability of women to gain capital and their productivity gaps. And even steps here where we could bring, you know, women, make them as productive. And it’s not because they’re not productive; it’s access to capital and technology. There is a huge gap that could help us close in productivity. Simply providing technology and capital to women farmers would do a tremendous amount for food security. So I think we’ve got amazing science we can apply, but we got to bring that science down to producers to fix those productivity gaps around the world.

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: Well, thank you.

Now, look, here’s what we’ve done in the last 35 or 40 minutes up here. We’ve looked at the immediate crisis in Ukraine. We’ve come up with some concrete suggestions that have to be done right away. We’ve taken Indonesia as the example of a tropical country that has done marvelous work and has so many lessons to share with the world, and we congratulate Indonesia for this. We’ve listed the international institutions and a number of changes that can be made. We’ve talked about international finance. We’ve talked about the future of technology and the role of the United States still as a leading agricultural country to develop that technology, share it, and push it out. I think it’s—this is a time to come out of the crisis and look to the future with hope.

Thank you all. Let’s give our panel a big hand here. Thank you.

Watch the panel

MATTHEW KROENIG: Well, thank you, General Clark and our panelists, for a really rich discussion. I enjoyed that. I hope you did as well.

My name is Matthew Kroenig. I’m the acting director of the Scowcroft Center for Strategy and Security at the Atlantic Council. We’re leading the Atlantic Council’s food security work as part of our mission of developing sustainable nonpartisan strategies for addressing the most important security challenges facing the United States and its allies, including food security.

So we’ve had a terrific discussion this morning. As you’ve probably noticed, we’re running a little bit behind on our schedule. And so my team and I have updated the schedule. We’re on track to finish on time at three p.m.

What we’re going to do now is go ahead and take a break for lunch. I know some of you have been out there already, but now we’ll take a break, 30 minutes. So be back here at 1:30 and we’ll continue our discussion at that time.

And as you’re going away to lunch, it’s my pleasure to introduce a video from Congressman Pat Ryan of New York’s 19^th District. So as you’re going to lunch, enjoying your lunch, you can listen to this message from Congressman Ryan. Ryan is on the House Armed Services Committee, so he understands very well the links between food security and national security. So enjoy the video, enjoy your lunch, and we’ll see you back here in 30 minutes. Thank you.

REPRESENTATIVE PATRICK RYAN (D-NY): Good morning, everyone. Congressman Pat Ryan here. I want to start with a thank you to the Atlantic Council for organizing this forum, and a special thank you to Gaurav and your family foundation for hosting and convening such a timely and important conversation.

This is a topic that doesn’t always get its due, but I will say it plainly to begin: Food security is important not only for its humanitarian consequences, but also because it is inextricably connected to national security. We’ve seen this in Russia’s illegal and reprehensible war in Ukraine, but also in conflicts around the world from Nigeria and Syria to where I served in Iraq. And there is a direct linkage between food insecurity and these hostilities. In the former example, food security was a literal weapon of war used to inflict economic and human casualties. And of course, in the latter examples it deteriorates civil situations within countries and fosters environments ripe for extremism, for terrorism.

And this is a topic where I have direct frontline experience, having served two combat tours in Iraq as an Army intelligence officer. What I saw and what I really remember was a people driven to war with their own neighbors really by a lack of access to the basic necessities of everyday life: food, water, shelter—and what may come as a surprise to many of you, oil. People often overlook the complex but critical interdependence of global food systems with energy markets, even in countries like Iraq that sit on huge crude oil deposits. Proper refining capacity, shipping routes, supply lines are just as important as farming itself, and we have to make sure our solutions address this dynamic.

Right now I have the honor of serving the eighth-most rural—of 435, the eighth-most rural district in the United States; also the region that raised FDR, who tried to put the world on a path to food security almost 80 years ago. And even here we struggle with access to modern agricultural techniques. We have our own supply-line struggles.

So with both of those experiences in mind—both combat and my own community—I’ve come to Congress with an immediate focus on food security. We have to ensure that the United States is a strong voice and a strong leader in strengthening food systems, improving agricultural productivity. And we cannot underestimate the importance of energy markets in this puzzle.

What’s encouraging to me, what I’m happy to report, is that this is one of the last remaining bipartisan endeavors. Look no further than the recent Global Food Security Reauthorization Act, providing billions of dollars every year for the federal government to partner with food-insecure countries to get on a path to self-sustainability. Because of this legislation’s Feed the Future program, 5.2 million more families no longer suffer from hunger. And this is a bill that’s been led by my Democratic and Republican colleagues in both houses in true bipartisan fashion. I see this as an issue that can and should transcend a lot of the traditional economic and military alliances. It’s an opportunity for real cooperation that brings everyone to the table.

Ultimately, I am so excited to work with everyone gathered here today as we combat world hunger, as we bolster our supply chains, and increase security and safety across the globe. Thank you so much.

Watch the keynote

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Global Food Security day two: The role of tempe and cassava in a food-secure future

Atlantic Council — Sun, 13 Nov 2022 16:30:09 +0000

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Flagship Event Sat, November 12, 2022 • 12:00 am ET

Highlights from the Global Food Security Forum

Economy & Business Resilience & Society

Event transcript

Uncorrected transcript: Check against delivery

AMADEUS DRIANDO AHNAN-WINARNO: Greetings. How many of you know tempe? How many of you like tempe? How many of you believe that tempe could be a potential solution to global food security problems?

I’m Driando, co-founder of the Indonesian Tempe Movement. Please allow me to walk you through why I absolutely believe that that is the case as a food scientist and technologist. I’ll make three points: why we should look into tempe in the first place, what the science says about tempe, and what the future holds for tempe.

I look into science of tempe because of three personal emotional reasons.

Cancer is running in my family. My grandpa had to perform a surgery to remove the breast cancer tumor of his own mom at his own garage. That’s why he switched to food science.

And looking into cancer is deeply related to malnutrition/overnutrition. But there’s also this other side of malnutrition, which is undernutrition, that unfortunately hits very hard to the eastern part of Indonesia, including my friends.

But not only health concern; environmental concern also hit me quite hard. I live not too far away from, unfortunately, the world’s number-one most polluted river in the world, Citarum. It got me thinking: What could we do to preserve and conserve the environment? And could we even make high-quality food if you don’t take care of the environment?

And that’s why, with the mission of the Indonesian Tempe Movement that my grandpa, my mom, and I created eight years ago as food scientists, we want to give people more access to nutritious, sustainable, and affordable food. We believe that people don’t have to be rich to live, like, a healthy and more sustainable life. And what makes us truly believe that this is the case is because of science.

So, scientifically, compared to beef in terms of nutrition, tempe contains similar amounts of energy, protein, and iron; significantly higher levels of fiber and calcium; and significantly lower levels of salt and saturated fat. Sustainability-wise, tempe could produce the same amount of protein compared to beef with four times less energy and 12 times less emission to be emitted to the atmosphere. In terms of affordability, tempe could be eight times cheaper than beef for the same amount of protein in Indonesia.

But what many people don’t know yet is that tempe is not just this food made using fermented soybean originated in Indonesia 300 years ago. Tempe is a fermentation process that we can apply to so many—almost every grain not legume bean around the world. Here I have mombin tempe, kidney bean tempe, black bean tempe, almond bean tempe. It’s a process. And not only these raw ingredients; my grandpa used to eat tempe made using tofu industry byproduct, okara, in the form of tempe gembus because he couldn’t afford the whole bean tempe. It was fancy.

And I wonder, like, how many of you wonder how the tempe fermentation works. For today, I have this tempe fermenting necklace to show you how easy tempe fermentation is. So the idea is that you want to make the baby mushroom rise up as happy. You want to serve them with tender and warm foods. You want to mate them with a food and to get them into the bedrooms. The bedrooms could be leaves, could be plastic bags, could be petri dish if you work in the lab. And in just two days you’ve got your own naturally nutritious food.

So if you look at this simple but sophisticated process, we’re just looking at the tip of the iceberg of the whole movement. After eight years of running the movement, I’ve seen beautiful, beautiful new kinds of tempe from all around the world. We’re talking about white bean tempe burger from Brazil, buckwheat tempe soba noodle from Japan, fava bean tempe wat in Ethiopia, bambara nut tempe fries from Tanzania, vegan meat made using lupin bean tempe in Europe.

Now, to end my talk, one thing that I learned from the movement is that the naturally nutritious foods that we have now were not just inventions of the past. The naturally nutritious food revolution is happening now, and I believe the tempe fermentation is a big part of it. But also, tempe is just one out of so many foods in which the R&D process has done by our ancestors years ago that are waiting for us to dig into as treasures, as the future foods that we need to feed the people, to feed us, to feed the planet in most sustainable ways possible. Thank you very much.

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ANNOUNCER: Please welcome to the stage Professor in Faculty of Agricultural Technology, University of Jember, Dr. Achmad Subagio.

ACHMAD SUBAGIO: Thank you. First of all, I would like to thank the committee to provide time for me for presentations, small presentations.

What I would like to introduce is about cassava. Maybe you know about these papers. You know also about toilet papers. You know also about biodegradable plastics. You know also about our fabric. All of these thing contain of cassava. Maybe we don’t know about that one.

But we believe that cassava right now is in our living time. All of our goods contain of cassava. That’s why I always promote cassava, because of that plant actually is very, very effective photosynthesis, two time more corn and also better than the other crops, including wheat.

And as you know, that right now, Indonesia, we have populations, as Mr. Prabowo said before, that about 273 million of people. That’s a lot of mouth and they need food. And of course, when we calculate, we need about 32 million ton of rice—that is only rice, not carbohydrate. When we calculate the carbohydrate, it’s about 45 million ton. That’s a huge amount of carbohydrate.

So when we calculate that one, of course our land is not enough when we only plant rice, because rice need a lot of waters, need a lot of fertilizers, and other thing. Not so many land can be planted by using rice, but cassava, we can grow cassava very well in sub-optimal land. We can grow cassava only if the water is about three or four months. That’s more than enough.

So, ladies and gentlemen, what I think is that we have to try to increase the cassava, the use of cassava, and of course the production of cassava. And for the consumptions, there is some problem that always people say that cassava is food for the poor people, always like that. But through our technology right now, we can provide very, very good materials from cassava. We can mix with many kind of ingredient and to be very, very good food. And this is the reality.

I think for 10 years more we need to grow about 5 million hectares of cassava because to that one we can provide a lot of food for the peoples and also feed, and also we can grow something like—we can develop something like we call bioindustries, including monosodium glutamate, sorbitols, lecithin, everything is come from cassava, because cassava can provide stats, and from stats we can provide sugar, and from sugar we can provide energies for a lot of function of bioindustries.

So this my point. And again, I encourage all peoples let’s do cassava. Thanks a lot.

Watch the keynote

ANNOUNCER: Please welcome back to the stage Gaurav Srivastava.

GAURAV SRIVASTAVA: Thank you. It’s been a long day.

Excellencies, members, sponsors, supporters, and my dear friends, the incomparable author, poet, civil right activist Maya Angelou remained a beacon of enduring hope even in her darkest of days, her eloquent voice and practical truths as relevant today as the moment she first shared them. Angelou said: “During bad circumstances, which is the human inheritance, you must decide not to be reduced. You have your humanity, and you must not allow anything to reduce that. We are obliged to know we are global citizens. Disasters remind us we are world citizens, whether we like it or not.”

It is really important to remember that while it is important to think about global issues, it is also important to address issues at home. It is important to worry about issues that are happening in Indonesia. It is important to remember that there is still a family at home. In the morning, during the speech of the minister of defense, he had poignantly mentioned that he needs to feed 5 million newborn Indonesians. This is a really important subject. But it is also important to remember that there is a hungry child at home, and for a mother and father it is most important to feed that child.

The issues that we talk about today, these are political issues. They are not only—but they are issues that require collaboration between industry, between business and policymakers. And that is important to keep in mind as we leave this room today.

As citizens of this Earth we are more interconnected than ever before, linked as social beings, innovators, artisans, and dreamers bound by a birthright as old as time: an inherent claim to inviolable human rights to freedom, dignity, and equality. As members prepare for this week’s and arguably the most critical G20 summit, they will consider the grave complications of our times. They will reflect on the important strides we have made, the disappointment and setbacks we have endured. They will commit themselves and their colleagues to an even greater investment in universal responsibility and to the safety and sanctity of our one human family. It is important to remember that it is one human family, but at the end of the day it is about the children at home. It is a legacy that we all have to preserve. It is important to think about issues on a global scale, but important to remember that it starts at your home.

As always, the United States of America stands ready to lead this charge both at home and abroad, delivering aid, promoting economic growth, enacting comprehensive health and food security initiatives. We will continue to fight hunger, malnutrition, and the senseless atrocities that have stolen the innocent lives of so many. We will heed Mother Nature’s warning, abating her tears with strong and steady push towards a timely transition to clean and renewable energy while responsibly acknowledging the interwoven, intricate, and dependent relationship between modern agriculture and oil, working diligently on a stopgap measure that will feed hungry, reward our collaborators discourage our detractors, and most importantly maintain national security.

I am so incredibly heartened by the invaluable insight and generous support conceived at and throughout this forum over the last two days. I share these blessings with my incomparable wife, Sharon, and with the brightest guiding lights of my heart and soul, my children. I implore you all to continue the quest for more answers and better solutions toward realizing global food security. We know all successes begin on the smallest of levels. The best ideas are cultivated when foundation and governments build partnership with the neighborhoods that need assistance, embracing community leaders as an irreplaceable pillar of this endeavor.

After my conversation with Fred from the Atlantic Council, I am also pleased to announce that we plan to hold our second security conference on the sidelines of the G20 in India, hopefully. I hope you will join us all again as we gather to reflect on the strides that have been made, the humanistic grounds that have been gained with your support and the implementation of actions gleaned from the dialogue we have shared at this forum. I have the greatest confidence that the momentum we have earned will be plentiful. Remember, there is nothing more human than morality.

Now, ladies and gentlemen, class is dismissed. We all have some very important homework to do. I would remember to keep one thing in mind, that we started this event with let there be bread.

Now I would like to invite the president of the Atlantic Council, Mr. Fred Kempe. Thank you for coming. God bless.

FREDERICK KEMPE: What a wonderful day. What a wonderful two days. And I have a few people to thank and a couple of things to say, but I will be brief.

So Bakur Kvezereli, the CEO of Ztractor, talked about two loud wakeup calls, COVID and the war, that have made us pay attention to food security in a way that we hadn’t. We do face the greatest food security crisis in modern history, says the World Food Programme. My own view is we should never let a crisis go to waste, so we are at work here not letting that crisis go to waste.

And then Max Peterson on the last panel talked about how, with food security, failure is—Max Peterson from AWS, a great strategic partner of the Atlantic Council, talked about how when it comes to food security failure is not an option.

So thank you, Gaurav, for your powerful final remarks, and to Gaurav and Sharon so much for being not just co-hosts of this forum but really giving it the vision, lending your friendship, and your generosity. So thank you so much. And please, everybody, thank them.

To speakers and audience members who joined us throughout the course of the conference, thank you for your valued insight and ideas.

I want to thank General Clark, Minister Prabowo, and his ministry; Minister Luhut and his ministry.

Pak Hashim, thank you so much for all your partnership through this.

We’ve heard from so many important global voices—perspectives from the Global North, the Global South, government, industry, civil society, brilliant students, seasoned experts.

I also want to thank people who are a little bit more behind the scenes and you didn’t see them as much on the stage: Matt Kroenig and his Scowcroft Center team; Iveta Kruma and her production team; Vicente, overseeing so much—or, Vicente Garcia, one of the great brilliant leaders of the Atlantic Council overseeing so much of the entire project, bringing it all together; our friends from Nouvelle Productions, and you’re going to see more from them tonight at the concert; from Edelman; from Viva Creative. Other sponsors: EMP, Unity, Harvest Commodities, Abt Associates, Arsari Group. Our media partners: CNN Indonesia, Kompas TV.

What’s clear for me from the last two days is how many of us in this room and joining online stand united in our commitment to combating food insecurity and hunger and serving as catalysts for change of the G20 and beyond. But too often, the private sector, the public sector, people all over the world don’t galvanize in this kind of setting, and I’m glad we were able to do that.

As we’ve seen and heard, food security remains a complex and multisectoral political, economic, scientific, and security challenge. Peter Engelke, who with Jeff Cimmino was leading the intellectual work that was behind this conference, will distill what we’ve learned over the last two days, put it in recommendations to the G20 and beyond, and you’ll be able to read that on our website tomorrow or the next day, Peter? Pretty soon? We’ll turn it around as quickly as we can.

What we know and what we heard from Gaurav is that the—at its core, the food security crisis and issue is a humanitarian one. It’s about that basic need for sustenance, food and water, and how they are met with dignity. We saw that powerful chart in the powerful keynote address of Minister Prabowo. And I’ll just remember FWE—food, water, energy—and the interlinkages of the three.

This is about building more sustainable food systems to better protect the planet we live on, the planet that nourishes us all. It’s about taking care of one another across communities and countries while we still have the chance. And as I said this morning, this inaugural edition—and Gaurav and I are able to reach decisions relatively quickly, and so we are going to go ahead and we’re planning on going ahead in India next year. But this inaugural edition of the Atlantic Council Global Food Security Forum marks the beginning of what we hope will be the Atlantic Council’s leadership in the global food security space alongside the Srivastava Foundation. And I look forward to continuing to convene similar forums along the G20 each year starting from India next year. That would be our hope and our plan.

I also look forward to engaging with our Indonesian partners and you all on our shared goals. This is our first major convening in Indonesia. It will not be our last. And we look forward to working with your country of 273 million people, the third-largest democracy, fourth-largest population. Just an incredible country where the US bilateral relationship will grow deeper and deeper. And as we heard from your minister this morning, this link right back to the days of your independence needs to be refreshed, deepened, and expanded.

I do want to thank again the Indonesian Ministry of Defense and Coordinating Ministry of Maritime Affairs and Investment once again for co-hosting this forum for us. To show up with that kind of partners on the margins as an official sideline event of the G20, what a wonderful way to enter this wonderful country.

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US special envoy for global food security: Time to ‘hunker down’ because this crisis ‘is going to persist for some time’

Atlantic Council — Sun, 13 Nov 2022 16:17:19 +0000

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Flagship Event Sat, November 12, 2022 • 12:00 am ET

Highlights from the Global Food Security Forum

Economy & Business Resilience & Society

Event transcript

Uncorrected transcript: Check against delivery

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: And welcome back from lunch. Now we’re going to have some more information here and some more greetings from our friends in the United States, so I’m here to present them to you.

So first you’re going to hear from Dr. Cary Fowler. Cary is the special envoy for global food security at the US Department of State. He is right now at COP27, so he’s going to join us this way. Now, he’s been a food security leader both in government and in the nonprofit space as former executive director of the Global Crop Diversity Trust. In his current role with State Department, he coordinates regional, bilateral, and multilateral US diplomatic engagement on food security systems and nutrition. So he’s our top guy in State Department in the United States looking at this food security issue. We’re going to hear from Cary Fowler.

And then you’re going to hear from Ambassador Cindy McCain. Cindy is the US permanent representative to the US Mission to the UN Agencies in Rome. In her role, Ambassador McCain represents the US at Rome-based United Nations food agencies and around the world, really, all the effort that the UN is making to combat global hunger and expand food access to those in need.

So I hope you’ll enjoy their presentations, and we’ll be following that, then, with another panel. We want to fold their ideas into what we’re taking to the G20. OK, let’s roll it. Let’s hear from Cary Fowler

CARY FOWLER: Thank you for this opportunity to visit with you for a few minutes today.

I know all of you are aware of the frighteningly high numbers of food-insecure people in the world—that’s 828 million—of the 50 million who are facing starvation in 45 countries around the world.

And we all know that this food crisis that we’re in the midst of is caused by multiple factors. It’s caused by climate change. We’re having a severe drought in the Horn of Africa as we speak. It’s caused by COVID, which is disrupting supply chains. And also by conflict. Most of the people in the world that are food-insecure today are living in zones and countries that are experiencing conflict.

But we’re also finding that fertilizer prices are high, fuel prices are high. There have been trade restrictions that some countries have imposed. All of these factors are contributing to the kind of crisis that we have today, and that makes this particular world food crisis a unique one.

In the past, such global crises have typically been caused by one or two major drivers. This one has four or five; just count. And that means a couple of things. It means that it’s going to be difficult to come to grips with and to solve this particular crisis because we can’t just fix one aspect, one problem; we’re going to have to address all of them. And that’s a complicated business, as you well know. And it doesn’t come easily, doesn’t come cheaply, and it doesn’t come quickly.

And that’s the other point that I want to make, and that is that this food crisis, I’m sorry to say, is going to persist for some time. We’re looking at 2023 being a pretty difficult year. And I think we all should be aware of that and we should all be planning for it.

So the message that I want to leave you with today is a pretty simple one: Let’s hunker down and realize that we need to be in—that we are in this for the long haul. We need to be, of course, looking at meeting immediate humanitarian needs, but we also need to be addressing the long-term drivers of this particular crisis so that we don’t face this year after year after year.

That’s where I believe the G20 comes in and has an important role to play. The major countries of the world really need to be coming together now to collaborate and coordinate their actions, and ensure that we start to build the kind of food systems that we want for the future to ensure that all countries in the world and all people are, indeed, food secure.

Thank you very much.

AMBASSADOR CINDY MCCAIN: Hello, everyone. I’m so glad you are here today to discuss the most important issue of our time, food security. Thank you to the Atlantic Council for hosting this important conversation.

We find ourselves in urgent times: ongoing armed conflict, especially Russia’s war of aggression in Ukraine; COVID-19 and climate change continue to strain global food systems; rising costs for food and agriculture inputs impact everyone, especially the poorest and most vulnerable around the globe. As always, America is answering the call to help, and I’m extremely proud of our response. Congress moved quickly to allocate billions of dollars in emergency food assistance. This is on top of the roughly $4 billion the US taxpayer regularly provides each year to the three UN food and agriculture agencies to provide lifesaving humanitarian aid and invest in medium- and long-term resilience.

Throughout my travels, I’ve seen the effects of conflict, increasing water scarcity, and extreme weather conditions from Kenya and Madagascar to Guatemala, Honduras, and Sri Lanka. Building resilience makes our food systems more sustainable, producing more with fewer resources. This is the challenge before us and it demands a united global front. As global leaders look for climate solutions in Egypt right now, it is clear to me that we must leverage science, technology, and innovation in agriculture to feed a growing population in a sustainable manner while generating economic opportunity.

Forums such as this are important occasions to discuss the top global concern of our time, food security. We must continue this discussion. And together, we can give a voice to the voiceless and achieve a world where no one goes to bed hungry.

Thank you.

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Global Food Security Forum day two: How Canada is taking on world hunger

Atlantic Council — Sun, 13 Nov 2022 16:15:25 +0000

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Flagship Event Sat, November 12, 2022 • 12:00 am ET

Highlights from the Global Food Security Forum

Economy & Business Resilience & Society

Event transcript

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ANNOUNCER: Please welcome to the stage founder of the Srivastava Family Foundation Sharon Srivastava.

SHARON SRIVASTAVA: Hi. Our world is riddled with inconsistency. Why do some go hungry and others have more than enough is something that I’ve thought about for as long as I can remember. Many circumstances beyond one’s control play a critical role: your postal code, your ability to get an education, your support system, your gender, your race, your economic status.

I’m Sharon Srivastava, and my husband, Gaurav, and I founded the Gaurav and Sharon Srivastava Family Foundation. It is because of my husband’s unwavering commitment and service that we’re here today. And we’re honored to have partnered with the Atlantic Council, Fred Kempe, the Ministry of Defense of the Republic of Indonesia, and the Coordinating Ministry of Maritime Affairs and Investment of the Republic of Indonesia, my dear friend Anie and her husband, Pak Hashim, on this most important forum about the state of global food security. Thank you for attending and for being part of the conversation with us.

As an American, I live in part of the world which thrives on abundance. We pride ourselves on equality and on philanthropy. But sadly, we do still have millions who go hungry every single day.

In Los Angeles, where I live with my husband and our children, we have astronomical rates of hunger. Neighborhoods have become food swamps with people unable to find accessible, affordable, and nutritious food choices. And we’re talking about one of the wealthiest cities in the wealthiest country in the world.

Nearly 30 million American children rely on their school lunch as their sole nutrient-rich meal of the day, and while great programs have been implemented to ensure that they get fed at school, one meal a day is not enough for a developing child.

When my children come home from school each day and make a dash to the fridge, I know it’s stocked with healthy options for them. But I know that for far too many mothers that’s not the case. So many mothers and fathers are forced to make the impossible choice every day of buying food or letting their kids go hungry so that they can afford other basic necessities—food or health care, food or transportation to work—and it shouldn’t be an either/or scenario.

Food insecurity is everywhere, and regardless of location, the impact on a child and a family can’t be overstated. I have seen children unable to attend school or to get an education that could help lift them and their families up out of poverty simply because they don’t have enough food to fuel their bodies and their brains. Far too many children and adults don’t know when their next meal will come.

Nearly a hundred years ago a covenant was created. The Universal Declaration of Human Rights in 1948 established food as a basic human right. It was intended to ensure that our nations protect people from hunger, from starvation. And that’s nearly 80 years ago that our nations united to speak in one voice and say food is a human right.

Yet still these impossible choices between food or other necessities are being made by parents around the world each and every day. So what are we going to do about this?

Today we are called upon to have these difficult conversations, and I implore you, as you are doing through these panels and conversations, to reflect on what we have done to help achieve food security and on what we, as a collective, must do to move forward.

And with that, it’s my distinct pleasure to now introduce Christopher MacLennan, Canada’s deputy minister of International Development, and personal representative of the prime minister for the G20 summit to the stage to offer his insights as to how Canada has been stepping up as a global food security leader and where its food and humanitarian priorities lie ahead of the G20 summit and beyond. Thank you.

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CHRISTOPHER MACLENNAN: Thank you. Thank you very much, and thank you very much to the foundation, to the Atlantic Council for inviting—actually you didn’t invite me; you invited the prime minister. My deepest apologies. I am a very poor stand-in, but the prime minister will be arriving a little bit later as we all know, in advance of the G20, the leaders summit which begins in two days.

So, as all of you know, we are facing an unprecedented global food crisis. Global food prices are at historic highs, and hunger and malnutrition have been on the rise since at least 2015. It is estimated—and I’m sure you’ve heard lots of numbers today and you will hear many more—it is estimated that 828 million people were facing hunger in 2021. A heartbreaking 345 million people now live with acute food insecurity, and 50 million are on the brink of famine.

A number of factors have led to this increase in the rate of hunger; notably conflicts, climate change, and COVID-19. All these factors have been inducing more and more vulnerability into already strained food systems and are reducing the likelihood of achieving the sustainable development goal of reaching zero hunger by 2030.

Russia’s unjustified and unprovoked invasion of Ukraine has exacerbated this crisis. The invasion has driven the cost of food, fuel, and fertilizer to record highs, which the United Nations Global Crisis Response Group is calling the largest cost-of-living crisis of the 21st century.

High food prices are affecting everyone in the world, but it’s the poorest and most vulnerable who are disproportionately affected as they spend most of their income already on food and other basic needs. This is especially true in Sub-Saharan Africa where the numbers of hungry and malnourished are growing faster than anywhere else. This food crisis is expected to worsen in the next year as agricultural productivity declines, driven largely by reduced fertilizer affordability alongside climate and conflict.

In these challenging times, we are also deeply concerned by Russia’s continued disinformation over the causes of global food insecurity and their use of energy, food, and fuel as weapons of war. It is unacceptable that Russia prevents food from reaching markets and then spreads disinformation that sanctions are to blame while, in fact, no sanctions address food, fertilizers, or foodstuffs.

As one of the breadbaskets of the world, Canada has a long history of being on the forefront of solutions to world hunger and is committed to doing its part to address the global food crisis. Today, in 2022, Canada has allocated a record amount of more than 615 million for humanitarian food and nutrition assistance. This funding is essential for saving lives and alleviating the suffering.

However, humanitarian assistance is not designed to address the root causes of hunger and malnutrition. This immediate support must be accompanied by critical investments to strengthen the resilience of global food systems in the longer term. This is why Canada provides support for agricultural development and food system transformation to developing countries, disbursing over 600 million in 2021.

Now in 2020, the Series 230 Initiative estimated that governments and donors would need to double their levels of investment in development assistance for agriculture and food systems, and spend an additional 33 billion US per year to achieve zero hunger by 2030.

As we step up to address the global food crisis, I would like to highlight a few priority areas for the government of Canada in our efforts globally. First, we need to ensure sufficient nutritious food is produced in a climate-smart way; sustainably increasing domestic production in countries where agricultural productivity has been underrealized; ensuring farmers, particularly women, have access to land, seeds, and essential inputs is fundamental to these efforts. Fertilizer—and we’ve heard a great deal about fertilizer already; I enjoyed the panel—is a vital input to many agricultural systems, and it’s at its least affordable levels since the 2008 food crisis. High prices can reduce use and undermine future harvests. We heard General Wesley Clark mention just the increases in Iowa alone on corn. Improving access to and sustainable use of fertilizers alongside sustainable soil health choices must be a priority.

Second, we need greater diversification and a better flow of goods along agrifood value chains. In the past, food systems and value chains have been designed primarily for economic efficiency. However, given all of the disruptions we are seeing—unforeseen, foreseen and increasing—they must be redesigned for resilience. This can mean diversifying import sources; diversifying the staple crops that are grown; having strong local, regional, and export-oriented value chains, or diversifying diets through expanding nutritious food options.

When shocks do arise—and they will—and we know there will be more shocks, implementing effective and coordinated responses to maintain the flow of goods is key. We’ve seen the importance of efforts like the Black Sea Grain Initiative to get grain moving out of Ukraine following Russia’s invasion. We saw these efforts reduce global food prices for all, as well as to ensure humanitarian shipments get to the poorest and the most vulnerable.

Third, we must listen to and work with our partners in the Global South. We must prioritize country-led, locally-owned, and participatory approaches to ensure that actions are informed by local realities and needs, and contribute to strengthening local capacities. I was very happy to hear General Clark, as well, mention the importance of not undercutting local markets with food—with food exports. This includes working with women, indigenous peoples, and other marginalized groups in the decision-making processes on food.

Fourth, we should do more to help directly poor and marginalized farmers maintain their operations in the face of shocks through risk-sharing tools like credit and crop insurance.

Finally, as a fundamental priority across all of these actions, we underscore the need to take gender-transformative approaches if we are to build resilience in our food systems at all. Women and girls are disproportionately affected by food insecurity and malnutrition. In fact, 60 percent of the world’s malnutrition are—malnourished are women. At the same time, women are key players as both consumers and producers of food, making up nearly half of all the world’s smallholder farmers. Canada recognizes that women are powerful agents of change and can actively contribute to advanced, climate-smart agriculture and improve food security and nutrition. This is why our Feminist International Assistance Policy aims to recognize and address the barriers that limit women’s success in agriculture and food production.

As we help build more resilient food systems, we need to take a gender-transformative approach that disrupts the current ways of working and puts those most impacted in the driver’s seat. Only then can we hope to reach zero hunger by 2030.

On a final note, I would like to thank you again for the opportunity to speak today and to share how Canada is focusing our efforts in response to the crisis. I look forward to the continuing discussions that are taking place today. I think, quite honestly, a year ago food security was not on the G20 agenda, not at all. I was at last year’s G20 in Rome. It is a fantastic sign that groups like the Atlantic Council are pulling together—with the help of the foundation, pulling together conversations like this because these types of conversations are what underpin the policy and political discussions that need to take place to respond so critically and so quickly as we’ve needed in responding to the food crisis. So thank you very much.

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ANNOUNCER: Please welcome the Coordinating Minister of Maritime and Investment Affairs of Indonesia Luhut Binsar Pandjaitan.

MINISTER LUHUT BINSAR PANDJAITAN: Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. Welcome to Bali and welcome to Global Food Security Forum. I’m glad we can gather here in Bali to discuss how can—how we can solve food security problems and create a solution to achieve food security and resilience.

Amid the current worsening condition with the pandemic, the peak of global inflation, Ukraine-Russia conflict, it affect the significant increase of food and energy prices. Crude oil prices are expected to be above $120 a barrel in the remainder of 2022. Previously, only $42 a barrel in 2020 and $70.42 a barrel in 2021. On average, in July 2022, compared to January 2022, energy like coal prices increased by 91.26 percent, natural gas by 40.5 percent, and crude oil by 25 percent. On average, in July 2022 compared to January 2022 food prices, such as corn, increased by 1.5 percent, soybean by 14.75 percent, and wheat by 7.26 percent.

[There are] several challenges in the agriculture sectors. First, global warming make the climate even more unpredictable and cause crop failure. To mitigate future courses, Indonesia enhanced national determined contribution target, national policy in departments, climate change adaption policies, and transparency frameworks in the agriculture sector. This way, it leads Indonesia back toward net-zero emission by 2060 or sooner and is able to reduce greenhouse emission from a business-as-usual scenario by 31.89 percent unconditionally and 43.20 percent by 2030.

Second, insufficient of supply chains due to the highly fragmented industry with many intermediaries producing supply-demand mismatches. Also, infrastructure has not yet been established evenly throughout the remote areas. Processing facility is also far from the farming areas.

Third, the low interest of younger generation farmers due to the cost of farming in Indonesia and the low yield. The fertilizer price is high due to an interrupted supply chain. Farming technologies and machinery are expensive compare, so Indonesia farmers still do the operation manually.

To this matter, the government of Indonesia is formulating a presidential resolution for national food security… top priority commodities such as rice, corn, soybean, shallot, tea leaf, garlic, and sugarcane. The government of Indonesia also continuously improving several key factors. First, increase the land area for these commodities. Pursuing cultivation research and development in superior seed. Forming innovation in technology and food processing. Improving the supply chain through an integrated Food Estate program and necessary infrastructure so we can cut costs and deliver a better product. Boosting the interest in farming in the younger generation and continuously enhancing formal and informal training.

In addition, we have established a Food Estate program where there will be an integrated ecosystem and a good collaboration between the government, farmer, investors… The government will provide essential infrastructure surfaces, machinery, mechanization equipment, permit, and farmer partnership with investors…. Investor will provide the working capital for the farmers based on the agreed-upon cost analysis between farmers and investors. And there will be a profit-sharing scheme between investor and farmers.

As a pilot project, we have established Food Estate in Humbang Hasundutan, North Sumatra, where approximately 12,000 hectare cultivate horticultural plants starting from potato, shallot, and garlic. We also integrate the project with science and technology park for herbal and horticulture. There will be genomic sequencing research… produce superior seed cultivation and understand herbal and horticulture profiles in Indonesia. This project is an integrated hub with the collaboration between private and international experts and companies, local and government universities, and local farmers. We hope this project can also contribute to economic development to ensure economic equality in the surrounding area as it provides a new employment opportunity and a vocation for local people. Next, we will build Food Estate in Central Sulawesi and Central Kalimantan focusing on crops such as corn, sugarcane, cocoa, and cassava.

Ladies and gentlemen, we can indeed participate in securing global food security. Start from you contributing to your community. It contributes to your country and the world. I’m sure that today all Global Food Security Forum participants will have a fruitful and productive event.

I would also like to thank to the Atlantic Council and Ministry of Defense for co-hosting this event, and I hope through this forum we can create a solution to achieve Sustainable Development Goal to end hunger, achieve food security, and improve nutrition and promote sustainable agriculture. Thank you and enjoy Bali.

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Indonesia’s minister of defense: ‘the threat of food insecurity is an existential threat to humankind’

Atlantic Council — Sun, 13 Nov 2022 16:14:53 +0000

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Flagship Event Sat, November 12, 2022 • 12:00 am ET

Highlights from the Global Food Security Forum

Economy & Business Resilience & Society

Event transcript

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FREDERICK KEMPE: Good morning to everyone. It’s so wonderful to see such a full crowd. And good morning to all of you, ladies and gentlemen, honorable guests. It’s such a pleasure to be with you all today.

Mr. Minister, it’s great to have you here. Thanks to you, Minister Prabowo. Thank you to the Defense Ministry. And thank you to the Indonesian government.

This is a multilateral gathering, this is a multinational gathering, but we decided to start in this fashion to honor our bilateral relationship within this multilateral relationship—to honor our host country and to all—with the US Air Force Band honor the country that’s visiting. But with the presidential band here, that’s a special treat for us to start in this manner.

Thank you for those joining us in person and for the thousands tuning in virtually as we kick off day two of the Atlantic Council inaugural Global Food Security Forum in Bali, Indonesia, an official sideline event of the G20 summit which is, of course, coming in just a couple of days. What a stunning venue this is, surrounded by Bali’s natural beauty, rich cultural life, and traditions, and friends and partners from across Indonesia and the world. I was able to travel a little bit around this beautiful Bali area to get to know your culture a little bit better, to visit with your people a little bit more. And it’s just been a rich experience being here, a few days ahead of this forum, so that I could acquaint myself even more closely with this extraordinary country and culture.

I want to start by extending by thanks officially to the Indonesian government. Thank you, again, to Minister Prabowo, and the Ministry of Defense. Thanks, as well, to Minister Luhut and the Coordinating Ministry of Maritime Affairs and Investment for your collaboration and for your hospitality in the lead-up to and throughout the forum.

Congratulations to Indonesia for assuming the G20 presidency this year. We wish you good luck as the summit approaches. I most profoundly want to thank Gaurav and Sharon Srivastava Foundation. Thank you, Gaurav and Sharon.

Without the two of you, without your foundation, we quite literally would not be here and be able to do this work. Gaurav and Sharon, your steadfast commitment to combatting world hunger and food insecurity rests at the heart of this forum’s mission. I can’t stress enough how much I appreciate your vision, your leadership, and your friendship.

Thank you also to our sponsors, Abt Associates, Arsari Group, EMP, and Harvest Commodities, and our media partners, CNN Indonesia and Compass Group. And finally, I want to acknowledge The Atlantic Council Scowcroft Center for Strategy and Security—so capably led by Matt Kroenig and his team—for spearheading this weekend’s programming—of course, the rest of The Atlantic Council team that’s traveled so far to make this work.

We gather today at a critical juncture for global food security. It might have taken Putin’s war in Ukraine to highlight it for us, but it was sitting there in front of us in any case. Later this week, world leaders will convene here in Bali for the G20 Summit bringing together major developed countries and emerging economies to discuss the international economic and financial landscape and identify areas ripe for multilateral engagement.

Food security is becoming a bigger and bigger one of those areas, and it cannot be separated from energy security. It can’t be separated from military security. It can’t be separated from national or international security, and that’s the point of doing this.

The United States is a food security champion. The United States is the largest international food assistance donor in the world, providing hunger relief and support to those most in need, including in response to COVID-19 pandemic and the war in Ukraine.

In September, the US convened a Global Food Security Summit with world leaders to mobilize global food security action. This is all for good reason. Threats to global food production, supply chains—distribution and access—are mounting by the day.

Near-term shocks like COVID-19 pandemic have—and the war in Ukraine have rattled global food supply chains in some of the most critical regions of the world. Ukraine, Europe’s breadbasket, earlier this year faced a Russian blockade of its Black Sea ports that halted grain exports to global detriment, and we’re lucky that that blockade is not there any longer because one third of the world’s wheat supply—one third of the wheat supply comes from Russia and Ukraine together.

In recent months, fertilizer prices have skyrocketed as the cost of raw materials and gas have gone up, and Russian fertilizer exports face serious disruptions. Food prices have continued to soar. Long-term risks of climate change, extreme weather, rising seas, and a sustained conflict pose further destabilizing threats, as acute food insecurity escalates, and hunger hotspots intensify.

The United Nations estimates that 800 million new people in the world face food insecurity coming out of the ripples from the war in Ukraine, and 300 million are in severe distress of food insecurity and hunger—300 million new.

But amid these challenges opportunities abound for progress and solutions, and that’s what we’re here for. Yesterday, as part of our first day of programming, we convened a series of closed door sessions with global food security experts from across government, business, and civil society to explore immediate and future food security trends and solutions—most of all, solutions.

We discussed the nexus between food security, energy security, and hard security, and how solutions are needed to address the overlapping vulnerabilities on these fronts. Energy crises become food crises. Conflict drives food insecurity. Food, then, becomes a weapon of war.

We stressed how important it was for the global community to recognize that food cannot be weaponized the way it has been—the way it has been recently. We discussed leveraging technologies as a critical tool for agricultural modernization and resilience, from investing in climate smart tech enterprises to educating and empowering young tech savvy farmers to make farming cool, paying particular attention to including women, who are often the backbone of farming communities.

The future of food security and sustainability requires innovation, and we spoke of streamlining access and accountability to food finance to ensure lines of credit flow to countries and people in need. Food security requires financial security at both the community and at the global level.

As the G20 showcases, there is potential for enhanced international cooperation. But governments and on these critical sets of issues cannot do it alone. Achieving food security and ending world hunger will also require robust public-private partnerships—robust public-private partnerships and wide-ranging innovation across the agricultural sector, technology, finance, and policy.

So, from identifying root causes of food insecurity and malnourishment around the world to envisioning more resilient food chains—food supply chains and agricultural technologies of tomorrow, we gather today to take this multifaceted challenge head on and, as you can hear, we got—we made some progress yesterday. We’re going to hope to make even more progress today.

Indonesia, with its dynamism, with its growing prosperity, and its food security interests is a promising place to launch our efforts. I hope you find today’s programming productive and that it will serve to inform and supplement the upcoming G20 summit agenda and sustained food security initiatives to follow.

At the end of this form we will be distilling insights from our sessions and collecting them into a memo with concrete recommendations for G20 leaders and, of course, for far beyond.

We’ll stick with this issue, galvanized by this moment, to continue working on it over the years. Our challenge to all of you—to all of you here in the room is to help us identify solutions that, together, can turn our ideas into policy action.

So now I would like to turn to a set of video keynote remarks from the Honorable Chuck Schumer, United States senator from New York, and Senate majority leader. It’s an honor that Senator Schumer took time for this. Having the Senate majority leader speak to this conference is an apt way to kick us off.

SENATOR CHARLES SCHUMER (D-NY): Hi, everyone. It’s Senator Chuck Schumer, and thank you all so much for the chance to join you at this year’s Atlantic Council Global Food Security Forum.

Now, as we all know, the past two and a half years have been some of the most disruptive in modern history—a global pandemic, a warming planet, and on top of it all the tragic bloody war in Ukraine.

These crises have produced terrible consequences around the world and, above all, it’s made an awful food shortage even worse for tens of millions of people—the poor, the elderly, far too many children.

This global food crisis is unacceptable, it’s immoral, and it is on all of us to work together to find solutions for the hungry and the food insecure. As Senate majority leader, I believe Congress has to play a role in fighting this crisis, and the issue should transcend partisan politics because it’s about basic justice for all human beings.

So we need government leaders, the private sector, and advocates working together. I pledge to you to do all I can to make sure Congress stands with you as allies in this effort.

Thanks for leading this crucial conversation because no issue is more important than making sure everyone has enough to eat so each person can grow and thrive in the 21st century.

Thank you all, thanks for what you’re doing, and my very best.

FREDERICK KEMPE: The fact that Senator Schumer sent that special message to you in the middle of our midterm elections where it was unclear whether he would remain Senate majority leader, and right now it’s still in play and we’ll know in a few days but it looks better for him than it did a couple of weeks ago. So, Senator Schumer, from here we thank you for doing this.

Now I’d like to turn over to Gaurav Srivastava, the founder of the Gaurav and Sharon Srivastava Family Foundation for his remarks. Gaurav, over to you.

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GAURAV SRIVASTAVA: Excellencies, honorable members, and representatives, ladies and gentlemen, esteemed colleagues and guests, it my great honor and privilege to stand before this distinguished assembly of brilliant minds and renowned policymakers at a time when our global community is at its most urgent need for unity, cooperation, and common purpose.

This extraordinary forum, live-streamed around the world, represents the exhilarating realization of a longstanding vision of my wife, Sharon, and I have shared passionately for many, many years. We are everlasting partners in a devoted enterprise of international hope and inspiration, co-conspirators in a fervent advocacy of comprehensive social change and universal accountability, and doting parents committed to the brightest future imaginable for our children, for your children, and for all of humanity.

Together we offer our deepest gratitude to our gracious Indonesian hosts and friends; to the minister of defense, Republic of Indonesia, Prabowo Subianto. Thank you. Coordinating minister for maritime and investment, Luhut Pandjaitan. Thank you. To Anie and Hashim Djojohadikusumo, thank you very much. You all have been instrumental in the realization of this global food security summit. Thank you and God bless.

Our sincerest appreciation is extended to Fred Kempe, Matthew Kroenig of the Atlantic Council, and the Scowcroft Center for Strategy and Security. Thank you very much. To our American policymakers and their international counterparts, and we thank the people of the world for their faith and fortitude as we reaffirm our solemn pledge to deliver both equity and equality to those who have been so woefully deprived.

A recognition of food as a human right was established nearly 80 years ago. President Roosevelt, as well as leaders of 48 other nations, convened in Hot Springs, Virginia, for the United Nations Conference of Food and Agriculture. This conference was particularly unlike the ones we are all participating in today. The outcome: a universal declaration of human rights. Within that declaration, not only is the right to food proclaimed, the right to adequate food as an essential facet to an individual and family standard of living is stated.

In the near century, since this crucial mandate and cornerstone of the FAO, 192 member nations and organizations have stood side by side, linked in a tireless battle against the insidious plague of food insecurity and all forms of malnutrition, guided by the enduring motto, Fiat Panis—Let There be Bread. Towards that moral imperative there have been meaningful strides made, critical lessons learned, transformative policy enacted, cutting-edge technology developed, and a salient goal set to end hunger by 2030.

But as history has proven time and again, we exist in a rapidly changing and unpredictable world. The processes established to successfully transport food to where it needs to go before the COVID-19 and before the invasion of Ukraine no longer work. Over the last three years, these concerted efforts and best intentions to stem the tide of global undernourishment have stalled. They continue to grow stagnant against the prevalence and extremes of climate change, the spread of protracted regional conflict, and the economic impact of the pandemic, and the carnage and chaos currently ravaging parts of Eastern Europe. The harsh truths and painful realities of these calamitous setbacks are glaring. And 828 million people worldwide will go to bed hungry tonight.

How can it be that in the United States, the wealthiest nation in the world, one in every eight children still go to bed hungry every single night? In my own home city of Los Angeles every one in five people experience food insecurity, unsure of when or from where their next meal will be. Globally, 45 million children under the age of five are suffering. They are suffering from acute malnutrition, their small bodies chronically deprived of essential nutrients stunting physical, cognitive, and social development, and making them especially vulnerable to infectious disease and drastically elevated mortality rates. They face educational limitations, behavioral problems, lifetime earnings reductions, and a perpetuation of the same vicious malnutrition cycle passed on to their own children.

The numbers are staggering, the trends and projections alarming, and the insidious endurance of this most pervasive and devastating human affliction—of which no country or region is immune—remains wholly and unconscious—consciously and utterly indefensible. Socioeconomic detriments of health explain the cycle. Poverty, race, ethnicity, gender, employment status, education, immigration status are all notable factors. The direct link between these factors and food security is undeniable. Try as some might, there can be no reasonable debate over the breadth of this humanitarian crisis, no credible arguments to be made against the merits of immediate action, no partisan interpretations, conflicting ideologies, or wavering convictions. We must all agree that no man, no woman, and no child should ever suffer through or die from hunger again.

Yet, as we all know, there is no quick fix. There is no one-size-fits-all solution. Food security is a complex puzzle of mismatched and missing pieces. The complete picture is an interconnected web of contributing factors explained by the socioeconomic determinants of health, each fraught with significant issues of their own.

Currently, the greatest world crisis hindering food security is the war in Ukraine. It has affected and impacted the globalized agricultural and energy markets at a time when supply chains were already reeling from the COVID-19 pandemic. Every day I track and appraise the innumerable impacts this war has had business of global exports. Exports of vital nutrients have been interrupted, future harvests been put in jeopardy, the energy markets sent reeling, fertilizer prices sent soaring, and the cost of wheat continuing to skyrocket. Russia and Ukraine, two world breadbaskets, major producers and exporters of vital commodities in energy, engaged in a conflict that threatens to push many millions and more into poverty and food insecurity.

Establishing food and energy security is an urgent issue affecting us now, but the future forecasts are sobering. At this rate, the dire ramification will continue to grow exponentially. The systems that we put in place and the choices we make now will determine the security of our children and our grandchildren will inherit.

Like many of you in the audience, I have tasted the horrors of war, choked on the repugnant stench of violent death and destruction. My work through my company, Unity Resources Group, has taken me to hotspots around the world where I have borne sad witness to the heroism and self-sacrifice of young men and women slaughtered in the blink of an eye before their earthly journeys had ever begun. I have seen whole families erased, three generations decimated in the wake of a contemptible missile strike on civilian targets. And I have watched helplessly as tormented mothers weep over the broken bodies of their murdered children, soaked in their blood, praying for merciful relief from a living nightmare that will never come.

I stand by you—before you today as a proud American devoted to the venerated principles of my country, valuable and human in an imperfect world. I am humbled by the education I have received, the experiences I have had, and the many blessings God has given me. I count each one with eternal gratitude, none more absolute than my ability to consistently put food on my table, to ensure the health and well-being of my beloved family, a luxury of which countless parents around the world are so cruelly deprived. I appeal and relate to you as an anxious father deeply troubled and guilt-ridden over an inexcusable legacy of widespread confusion, conflict, and chaos all of our children will likely be forced to inherit. I implore you as a member of the human race mortified by the unnecessary suffering of even a single brother or sister, furious over the goals we have missed, the priorities we have misplaced, the opportunities we have squandered, but still greatly emboldened by the prospect of providing my children, your children, and the children of the world—children of the world with the well-deserved birthright of dignity, security, and essential rights to work together collectively to propose solutions to this long-lasting issue we are facing.

To accomplish this mission to bring food and comfort to those most in need, we must delay the procrastinations, abandon the rhetoric, and accept unpopular truths as a call to action and not an excuse to passivity. In an ideal world where socioeconomic factors existed in harmony void of biases, inequities would be reduced and chronic illnesses caused by malnutrition’s many forms would be mitigated. But that beautiful dream still stands as a tall order.

At the Gaurav and Sharon Srivastava Family Foundation, we will assist in the creation of a new paradigm between food and fuel to the body and energy as the fuel to the food production system, a new perspective that will drive a propulsive shift to a nutritionally nourished world. We must understand and embrace the symbiotic relationship between food and energy, an unavoidable reality we must bear is that our current food systems are even more reliant on energy than ever before. As a foundation, we are doing our concerted part to illuminate the intersection of food and energy, adding a voice to a crucial conversation about the necessity of energy production to deliver the food to those in need.

While we all dream of a near future in which clean and renewable energy is not just a lofty ambition, about the everlasting law of the land, I implore you today to entreat to welcome the notion that lines of food production cannot exist isolated from the energy that propels the productivity. It is our human obligation to focus our efforts on the problems we are facing here and now. It is our universal imperative to take immediate action to relieve the men, women, and children who are suffering today—not tomorrow, not next week, and not in 50 years.

While our days of fossil-fuel dependence are numbered, we also agree that the immediate and complete eradication of oil reliance is still beyond our grasp. Modern agriculture runs on oil. Commercial farmers need tractors, irrigation pumps, harvesters. The fertilizers that feed the crops, the pesticides that preserve them, the packaging that protects their quality are all produced using oil. From seed to harvest, packaging to storage, containers to ship, trucks to roads, these supply chains lead to food, the focus of conservation today—food that cannot be brought to the homes of hungry families so that the mothers and fathers never have to ration their children’s food and hear the cries of their hungry child or give up their own meal so their child doesn’t have to experience the pangs of hunger. These are harsh realities.

As we diligently march towards a gradual decarbonization, fossil fuels remain our most realistic and expeditious improvisation to addressing the most advanced food system lines to ensure food security. This is the physical, literal realistic change to be able to deliver on the promise established 80 years ago on the right to adequate food.

The United States has always been looked as a shining beacon of hope, a gateway to humanity’s future founded on the unimpeachable virtues of liberty, equality, and steadfast in the ethical imperatives of welfare, justice, and dignity, and driven boldly to lead by example. By expanding the scope of our Feed the Future Initiative, our President Biden has reaffirmed our unfaltering commitment.

It is a time for all of us, as we collectively represent the world’s 20 largest economies, to work together and build on the progress we have already made. We must fearlessly continue the copious work that still lies ahead of us. It’s time to show our citizens, our foreign neighbors, our fellow man and woman that our promises are not empty, that our outrage is real and conviction is unwavering, just like the superheroes our children imagine us to be.

This forum, these conversations, and the discourse to follow today, I mark this as a compelling watershed in our struggles. But we cannot forget that at this very moment across America single parents are shopping for groceries forced by insufficient budgets to choose between fresh vegetables and lean proteins that will feed their children for two days, or boxes of far less nutritious pasta that provide for an entire week—a heartbreaking plight nobody should face—not in 2022, not ever.

These are difficult choices to be made, sobering concessions to digest, and a pragmatic roadmap to be plotted, that prioritize grace and humanity over politics and caustic saber-rattling. These are discussions we need to have today to influence that parent’s ability to not to choose between aiding short-term hunger or choosing long-term health for their family. It’s very basic.

We must devise alternative plans to keep the energy flowing, to stabilize market shocks, to mitigate a deepening energy crisis, and re-open the plentiful grain gates of Russia and Ukraine to the world. Plans conceived with redundant safety nets, oversight and adaptability, born with a spirit of pragmatic neutrality, intended as a less aggressive, non-interventionist proxy, to the imposition of price gaps that do not work.

We need a program that can be managed and maintained through clear and transparent reporting mechanisms with banking support from trustworthy institutions and multifaceted administrative superiors—a program that needs to be crystalized, that in short order will adequately feed the hungry, comfort the afflicted, and dramatically rebuke the all too comfortable warmongers and profiteers, who pose the greatest threat to peace and security on a global scale. And most importantly, we need a confident first step in the right direction—a bridge towards progress and resolution, a gleam of contagious hope that every living soul on this planet is urgently in need of.

My wife, Sharon, and I are blessed with two young children, our divine inspiration. We watch them play in wonderment, interacting harmoniously with all other children—the ones that look and speak like them, and the ones that don’t.

They are the future, our legacy, and our source of tremendous clarity and reflection. Their unconditional love and universal acceptance humbles me, and sometimes makes me embarrassed to be a grown-up.

Sharon and I firmly believe that the answers we seek are simple and infinitely achievable, we just have a history of making the journey unexplainably complex. All of us in this room and on this planet must commit to a solemn covenant, impervious to race, gender, social economic, geographical divides, an unbreakable promise to all generations that have and will come to be—that every human citizen on this Earth will soon be guaranteed the dignity and respect they inherently deserve.

On the question, where do we go from here, the inspirational leader and civil rights visionary Martin Luther King declared: our world is bruised and battered by a universal blight that knows no boundaries, an epidemic that does not discriminate, an abomination that won’t be solved without compromise, compassion, and undivided resolve.

We must steel of conviction, draw our strength from a higher power, and learn from our children that we must from now on until the very end of time. It is our only hope. Thank you. Thank you.

Now it is my distinct pleasure to introduce a true champion of defense and security, an Indonesian patriot, an emissary of global peace and unity, a bridge builder towards the abolishing of all food insecurity, and a brave line front warrior in the battle against the grave threats that undermine health, prosperity, and wreak havoc on the very fabric of society, the minister of defense, Republic of Indonesia, and my dear friend, Prabowo Subianto.

MINISTER PRABOWO SUBIANTO: Good morning, ladies and gentlemen, distinguished participants of the Global Food Security Conference organized by the Atlantic Council.

I would like to thank the organizers for inviting me to speak to give some remarks on this topic.

Since yesterday, I took note that a lot of participants coming from many parts of the world with their impressive background and expertise in the field of agriculture, food security, and, I’m sure, by the brief moments I was here, I am very confident that all the contributions, all the remarks, all the comments, the suggestions, recommendation will, of course, I understand, be compiled. And I think this will be a very valuable contribution to finding solutions for the threat of global food insecurity that is facing our planet.

Actually, I would like to thank and commend the initiators of this conference, Mr. Fred Kempe and Atlantic Council General Wesley Clark, Mr. Gaurav—I call him Mr. G. because sometimes a bit difficult to pronounce your surname. It’s also difficult to pronounce my surname. I think my surname is longer than your surname.

I would like to thank the initiators for this effort. In fact, in my opinion, the main topic of the whole G20 summit should be about food security.

In my opinion, food security or, shall we say, the threat of food insecurity is an existential threat to humankind because without food there is no civilization. There is no humankind.

Because of the experts standing here, I do not pretend or aspire to give an expert’s perspective. I will give overview—an overview of the Indonesian perspective on this issue and, perhaps, this can help contribute to our general understanding.

First of all, food, energy, and water actually is one cycle that is interrelated. To secure food we need water. Water is the essence of life, and to secure food the speakers before me have emphasized the importance of energy.

In this cycle, which in front of us has proven to be a threat—a threat of scarcity—this is compounded by more threats that compound this existential threat.

First, whether we like it or not, there is a population explosion. Maybe this is sensitive. There are part of the global elite, still very influential, still very powerful in—even in my country that do not like for us to talk about population explosion.

But if we are a real leader sometimes leaders must say unpleasant things. This is a dilemma. It’s a paradox, especially for politicians. Especially for politicians who want to get elected.

Fortunately, the Indonesian general election and the presidential election is still rather in the future.

This is the dilemma of people in leadership position. If we warn about a danger coming they accuse us of being pessimistic. My president, President [Joko Widodo] this year alone, I think, has spoken maybe 25 times more in public, warning the Indonesian people that we are facing difficult times.

Next year will be very difficult, and there are people who accuse him of spreading pessimism. And I understand maybe some people cannot accept the necessities of how do we face this population explosion.

For instance, Indonesia, our increase in population every year is 1.9 percent. That is 5 million new babies every year, 5 million new mouths—5 million, the size of Singapore. Every year in Indonesia, there is a new Singapore. You see, Indonesians, when they face adversity, they laugh. Indonesians are happy people. Sometimes we don’t know what’s ahead of us. Maybe we will—we will go somewhere happily.

What I’m saying is this: Every 10 years, a new Malaysia. What government in the world, what expert in the world can consider feeding five more—5 million more mouths a normal and an easy challenge? My friend Mr. G has said he’s very proud of feeding his family. A leader of Indonesia must think of feeding 5 million babies every year—every year. Anybody who wants to run for president of Indonesia I think should consult his psychoanalyst, I think.

The challenges in front of our government is not an easy challenge, but this is not something that we must be afraid of. As a former soldier, you know, they say former soldiers—old soldiers never die. They just fade away. General Clark has faded away today. He’s supposed to be here in front of me. But you know, many old soldiers, like myself, like General Clark, you know, old soldiers never die, they just fade away, that is somewhere. But in Indonesia, old soldiers never die and they never fade away. Until the Almighty God calls us. Then not only do we fade away; we are called away very fast.

So this population explosion is something in front of us—5 million jobs, 5 million new spaces in schools, in hospitals. This is the dimension of our challenge.

Climate change, we feel it. Jakarta is—the sea level is increasing 5 centimeters every year. And during one of my visits to the coastal area of Tanjung Priok, families, the water is in their living room. They are sleeping in their bedroom with the seawater in their bedroom. Climate change is not some theory; it is in front of us.

In Karawang—which is maybe, what, one hour from here—the sea has come in maybe already at least three, four kilometers—three, four kilometers, maybe more. Karawang—you are from Karawang, are you? (Speaks to audience member)

So climate change for Indonesia is real. Can you imagine four kilometers times 200 kilometers long, 300 square kilometers? How many hectares have we lost from productive land, from arable land, from our rice bowl? Karawang is the rice bowl of Indonesia.

And of course, in front of us, geopolitical conflict. I just would like to reiterate, you know, Indonesia, our traditional foreign policy is one of friendship to all countries. We respect all countries. We respect all great powers. We are free and active in our relationship. We always try to maintain equal—equal in our respect and relationship. We call ourselves—we consider ourselves by history—Indonesia was one of the founders of the Non-Aligned Movement. I would like to reiterate this because, although we consider United States as a very good friend and strategic partner of Indonesia, the United States having many times assisted Indonesia in our darkest moments—the United States have supported our war of independence. So we acknowledge this friendship. But as a good friend, sometimes we have to be courageous enough to remind our friends, remind our close friend who we admire, who we want to emulate—I think the top Indonesian intellectuals, educated leaders, most of them are educated in Western countries. I think many of our leaders understand and have read your Declaration of Independence. We also aspire to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. That is our goal also for our people. But this is important: In any geopolitical conflict, there are always two sides to a story. And each side is convinced they are right. Each side is willing to die for what they consider to be right. I have to remind everybody there is always two sides to a conflict.

The important thing is, do we want to resolve the conflict or not? If we do not want to resolve the conflict, we are entering a very dangerous region and a dangerous zone of time. A few days ago, I was listening to a remark by a very senior former United States military leader, Admiral Mullen. I think three days ago. I think Admiral Mullen was the former chairman of the US Joints Chiefs of Staff, if I’m not mistaken. Is that correct? Please correct me if I’m—he was the former chairman of Joint Chiefs of Staff. He reminded everybody—it’s on the YouTube—we are in danger of a nuclear war. We are in danger of a nuclear war. We hope, we pray that the leaders of the world will be wise and enlightened.

But we have seen in history many great conflict, many great explosion/conflagration happen out of accident. Wars happen because of accident. Sometimes wars happen because of one lieutenant or one captain who start firing because he was afraid. Therefore, what we talk about is compounded by these threats. Geopolitical conflict on all matters, in our opinion, the situation of the world, the fact that our planet is getting smaller, we need wisdom. We need compromise. We need patience. We need the courage to go halfway.

Zero-sum game victories I don’t think is feasible in the current state of the world. We can be right, but are we doing it in the long-term interest of our people? Without food, energy, and water, economic crisis, social unrest, civil war, failed state. Therefore, food, energy, and water is existential.

Indonesia, we are—we have been blessed the last three, four years with very consistent and very big rainfall. However, now we have to be prepared. After the phenomenon called La Nina, we have to be prepared for El Nino, and when El Nino comes, we have to be prepared for several years of dry weather.

Therefore, it’s also part of our initiative, the Indonesian defense community, we are working very hard to secure water. We are exploring for water in the dry parts of our country. I think over the last two, three years our military we have—we have drilled and we have made pumps, energy in something like 700 sites, and within this month, our defense university—we have sent survey teams, and we drill, I think, another 120 water pumps.

And also, what is very interesting is there is a new geological phenomenon, actually. The experts tell us there are underwater rivers flowing to the coasts of many of our islands, and this is very, very, very prevalent in volcanic islands. And we are, I think, the largest island—island groups with volcanoes.

There are many underwater rivers flowing every day to the coast. And now, our mission is to find where it goes out, and then to trap them in flexible pipes, and bring by pumps this freshwater to the land, inland to the villages. So, actually, the existential threat, there are solutions in front of us, and solutions which are not technologically very difficult for us.

It flows every day, every hour. We have also big rivers that are flowing to the sea, and with water management, with water engineering, we can make very, very good use of the water that’s available. The key is the will to find solutions.

When we talk about food security, there’s some things, again, that’s unpalatable to be spoken of, but I will say it anyway… How do we deal with food insecurity? To be very frank, if the political elites of all countries have cohesion, are united, do not fight amongst their lead—who wants to be what—and the elite are informed, want to learn, want to study, and the elite will not be swayed, will not be influenced by traders.

I want to make it clear. I am not against traders. I was—before going into politics, I was a trader myself. Trade—that is what fuels human growth and human enterprise. But in this matter of food security, sometimes the traders think short term. The political leaders must think long term. The traders think of annual profit. It’s not their fault; they are traders. They think of annual profit; political leaders must think five years, 10 years, 25 years ahead.

But sadly many countries, including my own country, sometimes our elites are near-sighted, uninformed, sometime do not want to be informed. I have been talking about food security in Indonesia I think for the last—I don’t know—20 years. When I retired from the military, I was elected as a chairman of the farmers association, and after that I was elected also as the chairman of the small market traders association. Maybe many of them come here to listen to me.

We have, what, now something like 16,000 traditional markets—16,000—and always the challenge is between the big supermarkets and the small, traditional markets. How do we reconcile that they live together, not killing—the big guys absorb all the profit and the small guys die because of lack of oxygen. This is the challenge again.

And many of our elites also—now after we see the conflict in other parts of the world, after the FAO, the WHO remind us, then now everybody talk about food security. But let me say very frankly, maybe three years ago many of our elite do not even want to address the matter of food insecurity. So I think this is something that we must take note of, and therefore, events like this is very important as part of the educating the elite. Solving hunger, solving food insecurity, yes, is about seeds, about technology, about this and that, and yes, but more important is the unity, the cohesion, the ability amongst national elites and international elites to work together. To cooperate—to cooperate, and this is easier said than done. I do understand that.

So our goal must be, as all the experts say, feeding 8 billion people. The problem is availability and affordability. The problem is some of the countries have secure supply of calories and secure supply of protein. And that is the challenge how we can reach zero hunger, which is SDG number two, the Sustainable Development Goal that we must all aspire to.

Here we see the dark green; those countries, secure calorie supply. And the dark blue, secure protein supply.

Food security, the essential thing is also trade, food trade. We see many countries that are reliant on calorie imports. We thank the Almighty God that Indonesia, actually, we need not be reliant on calorie import. We are now self-sufficient in rice. We are also able to produce maize on our own and we have alternatives to wheat.

The other essential element of food security, as everybody has mentioned, of course, is synthetic fertilizer. Half of the world is reliant on synthetic fertilizer. Also, the reserves of potash and phosphate is also not distributed equally around the world. It’s concentrated in Canada, Russia, some parts of the world. This will affect global food production.

And therefore, once again let us not be morally upset about the use of food as weapon. Food has always been a weapon throughout the history of mankind, thousands of years. Wars have erupted to secure food, to secure land, to secure water. So let us be very realistic, ladies and gentlemen. That’s why leaders must always calculate the entire spectrum of the threat.

As a former military officer, we learned that war is not just the beginning or the war start with the firing of a shot. No, war is already a spectrum. Trade competition is war. Financial war, we can destroy a nation by destroying their currency. So, once again, leaders must always think the entire spectrum.

Because, as I said, a conflict has two sides. One side may be strong in this area. The other side may be strong in the other area. And two conflict sides, they want to win. They want to survive. Therefore, they will use all weapons at their disposal. That is the lesson of history.

Fertilizer will be strategic because of the source of fertilizers, source of the ingredients of fertilizer. We must be prepared for daunting challenges ahead.

We all know everybody’s talked about the vicious—the cycles that are emerging: food price increasing, oil very high. The price of natural gas is already 10 times higher than two years ago in Europe. Cost of maritime trade, three times pre-pandemic average. Interest rates rising. Price of fertilizers increase. And this results in cost-of-living increase, real incomes falling down, the ability of to cope small families farmers decreasing. The financial power of several countries decreasing. What is the result? We have to be prepared for social and political unrest in many parts of the globe.

Some more figures. Wheat price have risen 200 percent in two years, palm oil nearly 200 percent in two years. Indonesia, very fortunate, we are the largest producer of palm oil. And at one time we were embargoed by Europe, our palm oil, but it turned out perhaps to be a blessing in disguise. Because we could not go to the European market, we are forced to use our palm oil for biofuel, for biodiesel. And now we have bio-gasoline. Sometimes threat, sometimes adversity result in opportunity.

So we… maize, sugar, soybean. We understand also the components of food, that energy very strong component. A lot of people have spoken about this. Corn, high component. Soybean, what, I think nearly 40 percent—38 percent components energy. Rice, not so—not so high. Peanuts, not so high.

Protein, protein crisis. In the next 25 years, the demand for protein will rise quite significantly, from now around 324 tons—324 million tons of a year to nearly 600 million tons, 80 percent increase in the next 25 years. And like it or not, I think we have to reassess the propensity or our habit of eating a lot of meat from cattle, from chicken, from pork because the input for one kilogram of body weight meat we need for cattle is 31 kilograms of input. For pork, it’s 10 kilograms. For chicken, it’s four kilograms. The most efficient is fish, two kilograms and some even 1.7 kilograms. So the future is actually aquaculture to provide our protein needs. This is force of nature.

Those who adapt, those who want to learn, those who want to invest will survive. And actually, the resources are in front of us. Once again, Indonesia is blessed by the Almighty God. We have many challenges, but we have a lot of sea. I think we have one of the largest—the longest coastline in the world. I think maybe Canada and Chile more than us. But Indonesia is—maybe we are second to Canada, I think, the longest coast.

Can you imagine how many hectares of aqua farms we can have on the coast and off the coast? We have now 23 million hectares of arable land. But we have also 120 million hectares of forest. Sad to say, about 80 million hectares of our forests are degraded—are already degraded.

So what is our vision? What is my strategy which I propose to my president that the degraded forest we convert to productive land to create food and energy?

They are already degraded, but before they supported forests. That means the land is fertile. By the greed of many short-term—how can I say that in an audience that’s a lot of Americans here, you know? Because, right.

But I would say that many capitalists are very greedy. Even some capitalists they are proud. They say greed is good. That is the essence, I think, of neoliberalism, right. There are capitalists that say greed is good. Let me be richer and richer, and I don’t care what happened to the poor and the hungry, you know.

Once again, I do not criticize capitalism, per se. But I’m saying we have suffered. It’s not anybody’s fault. It’s our collective fault. Whenever God has given so much blessings to people, sometimes the people become complacent and the people become negligent in protecting their resources and their future.

So, can you imagine if the 80 million hectares or 88 million—I think the data is there—if we convert only 16 million—16 million of those 80 million degraded. If we convert this to food production, we can be the breadbasket of the world.

So this existential threat and this, let us say, ecological or environmental disaster, we can turn around to be environmental and food opportunity for the world. It does not—we do not need too much technology. We do not need—the nature has given us this, let us say, comparative advantage.

Sixteen million hectares. Let us say 8 million for food and 8 million for energy. We can produce renewable energy, clean energy. Buy your energy from a lot of plants, from palm oil, from Iran, palm sugar, from cassava.

We also—we are in a tropical climate. We can have three crops a year. Three crops a year with good management, good technology. Good management—can you imagine the increase in production?

We also have 225 million hectares of marine territory. We also—within that area there’s 23 million hectares of marine protected area. This is the breeding ground where our fish—the fish of the world come to Indonesia to breed and to lay their eggs.

The fish of the world breathe in Indonesian waters, lay their eggs in Indonesian waters.

So Indonesia’s current role, we are now number-one grower of palm oil. We are now number-five grower of cassava, without the additional 16 million hectares of land.

We are now the number-two producer of captured fisheries. But we have a vacuum. We have a need for 40,000 fishing boats, of 300 grow stand to 500 grow stand. We have a need of 40,000 fishing boats. This is not including the aqua farm that we plan to build.

By the way, if any of the participants are still here on the 15th or on the 16th, I will be visiting fish aqua farm. If any of you would like to join me, I will be very honored if you would like to see that this is not a dream. In the future, we already—some of our entrepreneurs are already cutting this out and, by the way, making a lot of money.

But that is the risk. High risk high gain. To be the pioneer is always very courageous, need courage. We are the number-one grower of seaweed. Healthy, protein, antioxidant, is against cancer. And we are now already—self-sufficient in rice production.

So I think joining Jokowi in this government, I think, was the correct decision on my part. I’m proud that I joined much too many opposition from my own party.

But, as I said, that’s the challenge of leaders, right. Sometimes we have to have the guts to choose unpopular positions. At that time, it was popular, it was—at that time it was unpopular in my own party. But now they come to realize, oh, yeah—that guy is not that stupid.

You know, sometimes soldiers, we have the reputation of having no brains, especially infantry. I was in the infantry, you know. The smart guys in the army they always go to the engineers and the artillery. Those of us who are average they send to the infantry.

But now the developments in a certain part of the world where there is now open conflict—I will not say where. It’s somewhere in Europe. The development of war tactics now they say it is the return of the poor bloody infantry.

One infantry man can destroy a bank with a rocket which costs only maybe $100,000 can destroy a bank which costs $5 million. So I think I made the correct decision also at that time when I was young joining the infantry. And as a former soldier, I realize the importance of food.

I come now to a topic—my favorite topic, actually, is cassava, but this is also Bill Gates’ favorite crop. I think cassava will prove to be the savior crop of the world.

Indonesia, I think, can become the foremost producer of cassava, and cassava is the most efficient in the need for input, for water, et cetera, et cetera. If you see here, the input for cassava is quite efficient. It produces 250,000 calorie, but only need 65—what’s that—cubic meter of water per metric ton… the rice 1,139; wheat 954; maize 815. Very efficient.

Cassava is now a strategic food crop. It can produce the replacement for wheat, for pasta and noodles, et cetera, bread. Here I’ve examples.

This is already in production by our entrepreneurs. We are producing pasta from cassava; instant noodles, cassava. This Korean beef mushroom, cassava. We can produce bioethanol. We can produce alcohol, vitamin, other products, bioplastics, glue, explosives, feed for cattle. Cassava, very efficient. We have seen that. Health benefits—100 percent gluten-free, low glycemic index, high in iron and calcium.

I continue. I think I’ve taken a lot of time. Cassava products already in the Indonesian market. Here, we also see we already have the patents for modified cassava. We call it mocaf. We also have the intellectual property rights for the industrial processes. There’s already a factory producing cassava.

I hope the inventor of mocaf, Professor Subagio, please stand up. He’s the cassava professor—I think the foremost in the world—working many years in Nigeria in many parts of the world, and we see they’re producing processes. There’s also Mr. Fidriento, an entrepreneur—a courageous entrepreneur who pioneered the industrial production of mocaf. So we also now starting producing our logistics strategic reserve.

So let me conclude by how I see Indonesia’s future role. I think we will be the number one exporter of wheat flour equivalent—mocaf from cassava. We will also be the number one exporter of sustainable marine ecoculture production.

We are also—we will be the number one exporter of sustainable shrimp, aquaculture production. We do not want to deplete the natural fish. We have to preserve it because we are the breeding ground for many of the fish of the world.

We will also be the number one exporter of sustainable lobster aquaculture production. So we will be in the forefront to produce protein and calorie in the world. We want to be a factor in solving global insecurity threat. And we invite partners from all over the world to join in. Can you imagine 16 million hectares how many combined harvesters, how many tractors, how many silos, how many railroads, how many harbors, how many technologies, how many scientists, how many water engineers that we can accept and we can absorb?

So we are open. We invite all partners from around the world—that I think we can be a factor for growth. Indonesia can perhaps be an additional factor in the growth of the world economy, and in really providing solutions to overcome world hunger.

In conclusion—you see, they do not give coffee here for me. If they give coffee, maybe I speak for another two hours.

It is my opinion that I hold very strong to successfully handle the challenge. We need global peace, and we need global partnership. We have to work together. If we can come to this, if we can reach out to our adversaries, if we can overcome past mistakes, if we can admit to ourselves that perhaps we have made some mistakes, and we can work in a global partnership, I think we can solve the problem.

But, as I mentioned, in any country without the cohesion, without the unity, without compromise, without cooperation amongst the national elite, there can be no national prosperity. To have prosperity, we need peace. That is the lesson of mankind history. I was a former soldier. I know the ravages of conflict. There is no benefit to war and conflict.

Sometimes we are forced to, but as a former soldier, I realize we must avoid conflict. That doesn’t mean that we must be defenseless. No. Apparently humans as a species are very prone to domination and to take what is in front of them that is not protected and defended. That’s the human nature.

I think that concludes my remarks. Let us work together to achieve understanding, compromise.

Hopefully in this G20 in Bali—Bali—the name of Bali, of the Balinese people is pulau dewata, the island of the Gods.

So we hope that there will be magic and miracles in the island of the Gods. Let us work for peace and prosperity. Thank you very much.

FREDERICK KEMPE: Mr. Minister, that was a tour de force. That was just amazing. In a moment you’ll hear the minister on a panel with General Clark and with Gaurav.

For the moment, I just wanted to make one announcement. We want you all back here this evening 7:30/8:00 for our concert. We have John Legend, the great singer. We have Sandhy Sondoro. And we have the US Air Force Band back with us again.

We’re not going to take—because we’re a little bit over time, we’re not going to take the coffee break. So if you need a break, please take your break as you can grab it.

And with that, I want to turn your eyes to the screen to see Senator Stabenow, another message from the United States, the chairwoman of the Agriculture Committee.

Watch the keynote

SENATOR DEBBIE STABENOW (D-MI): Hello to everyone taking part in the Global Food Security Forum. Whether you’re in Bali or joining remotely from home, thank you for being here to discuss the incredibly important issue of global food security.

As chairwoman of the United States Senate Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition and Forestry, food security at home and abroad is a top priority for me. And we’re facing a truly unprecedented hunger crisis, as we know. Many factors have caused the rates of food insecurity to skyrocket, including the COVID-19 pandemic, the climate crisis, and Putin’s war in Ukraine. Some countries are experiencing historic drought, while others are faced with record levels of flooding. These extreme weather events harm farm and livestock production, and displace people from their homes and communities, as we know.

The World Food Programme estimates that as many as 828 million people go to bed hungry every night. And about 50 million people are at risk of famine. This should be completely unacceptable to all of us. Farmers play a critical role in providing US-grown food for those in need, in the form of commodities and ready-to-use food that can save a child’s life. But it’s also critical to help build local markets and invest in development projects so that local communities and economies can be more resilient and withstand shocks. It’s important that we use all of the tools in the toolbox to respond, because each situation throughout the world is unique.

In Congress, we’re staring consideration of the five-year farm bill, a process to reauthorize the food and farm programs in the United States. This includes programs like Food for Peace, the McGovern-Dole Program, and the Bill Emerson Humanitarian Trust, which are critical to address global hunger. The Senate Agriculture Committee has a long history of bipartisanship, particularly in supporting international food aid. I’m working with Senator John Boozman, the top Republican on the committee, to advance a strong bill that protects and enhances these programs.

Congress acted this year to provide additional resources to respond to the extraordinary levels of food insecurity we’re facing, but we know that more must be done. Thank you for joining in the fight to ensure that we tackle global food security in a way that benefits all of those we represent around the world. I look forward to working with you as we tackle this important issue.

ANNOUNCER: Please welcome to the stage senior anchor of CNN Indonesia Desi Anwar.

Watch the keynote

DESI ANWAR: Hi, everybody. OK. Well, welcome to the next session, which is hopefully a fireside with three very distinguished speakers, two of whom you’ve actually heard today. But if everybody can please settle down. And I know that we’re very, very late this morning. OK. If everybody would please find their seat, we do have three very distinguished speakers coming up and including our minister of defense, Prabowo Subianto, and also General Wesley Clark, and also Gaurav.

I mean, we’ve—wow. What can I say? I mean, Fred, Atlantic Council, I’m speechless. I mean, what an amazing lecture we’ve just heard there. And I’m just, you know—it’s incredible, the breadth and the substance. And I think we can all agree that we learned a lot from Minister Prabowo’s lecture and I think his only Atlantic Council forum. I mean, this has encapsulated everything about food security. And you know, what can I—well, let’s—I hope he’s coming back to join the session.

And I’ve been asked to stall for time here, so forgive me. Things have been very weird, somewhat, this morning.

Anyway, food security. We’ve listened to the keynotes this morning and we know that food security—global food security is very much present-day challenges. And of course, our food supply system, our global—the entire global food system rests on the premise of global security. If there is a disruption in the global security, it will affect food security. And the reason being is that we are now such a globalized world. We’re so interdependent with one another, particularly for our food supply, there’s not one single country in the world that can actually feed their own people without importing food, without getting food supply from other countries. And then once this supply chain is disrupted, obviously, this is a real threat. And we have had terrible, terrible global shocks recently, what with the pandemic, which actually brought the world to a halt. We’ve had—you know, we are in the middle of a war in the Ukraine which is, obviously, affecting food supply and also trade. And we are also in the middle of an economic—global economic crisis: rising food prices, inflation, energy crisis.

And of course, this must—these are something, global challenges, that need to be resolved on a global basis. Global problems need global solutions. And I think this G20 forum, this G20 summit is a very, very good opportunity for world leaders to actually gather together and find solutions for these problems.

Now, I would now like to invite my three panelists to the stage.

I’ll start with General Wesley Clark, chairman and CEO of Wesley K. Clark and Associates. It’s a consulting firm. And General Clark is—big hands, please. How are you, sir? Please take a seat. And, General Clark, welcome to Bali. Welcome to Indonesia. General Wesley Clark is a former NATO supreme allied commander of Europe and a retired four-star general. And it’s interesting when we talk about food security we are turning to our military experts to help solve some of the problems. Once again, welcome, sir.

And our next speaker, Minister of Defense of the Republic of Indonesia, the man of the moment, Minister Prabowo Subianto. Hello, sir. How are you? I just want to say, very impressive. Like I said, I was telling Fred and our friends from the Atlantic Council, I mean, I’m speechless. That was an excellent—that was a really good, long lecture. But I also would like to remind you, 2024 is still, what, two years away. OK.

Last but not least our—well, we’ve listened to his keynote speech before, very impassioned speech—Gaurav Srivastava, founder of Gaurav and Sharon Srivastava Family Foundation—also chairman of various groups, such as Harvest Commodities, Apraava Energy and Commodities, and Unity Resources Group. Gaurav, thank you for joining us again.

And let’s have a big hand for everybody, for our speakers.

DESI ANWAR: Ok, let’s start with you. If you don’t mind, Minister, let me start with General Clark. After hearing your incredible lecture—we learned a lot, obviously—just your thought on food security. I mean, General Clark, you were the former, you know, NATO allied commander for Europe. And there’s, obviously, some of the things that was mentioned, the idea of food security is very much tied with global security, with hard security. And just your thoughts on our minister’s speech. And also, how do these two interlink in your perspective?

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: So, first of all, I thought—I think Indonesia’s really setting a very, very high standard for approaching the issue of food security. And I’m very impressed by the technology, by the work on cassava especially. And you know, this is the way we have to move forward. Just like we discovered fish farming about 30 or 40 years ago and it spread around the world, cassava may be the miracle—it may be the miracle carb of the 21^st century. And I think Indonesia’s got a leading role in this, so I think that’s really impressive.

I think when you look at food security, I agree with what Minister Prabowo has said. It is about more than food; it’s about water, it is about energy. I do think we have to be sure we’ve got the right balance. When we talk about food security, it’s about availability, it’s about affordability, those things. But it’s also about taste. Everybody grows up with a comfort food and tastes change over time.

Now, my wife, her comfort food is a baked potato. I don’t care that much for baked potatoes, but she likes it. I like spaghetti and meatballs. That’s my comfort food. People have these—it’s partly what you grow up with. It’s partly changing tastes as you mature. But we have to take account of expectations that people have.

And the protein map that you showed, Minister Prabowo, was really interesting to me, because when you look at people in Africa and you look at the amount of protein they can get, the amount of calories they can get, of course, that’s the first thing you go with. But when these people come to London sometimes or Paris, they might be looking for McDonald’s. And so it is about expectations. It’s about availability. It’s about affordability.

I think we have to harness the best of government leadership and private-sector leadership in this space. I think—what I’ve learned in my—I studied economics of underdevelopment at Oxford. I looked at it in Vietnam. I worked it in—as best I could in Bosnia and looked at how they could recover. And for the last 22 years, I’ve traveled around the world and looked at countries. Look, you have to use the profit motive.

It’s just like what the minister mentioned about cassava, this man who has engineered the best way to do it. Has to be profit in it. So it’s the balance between government leadership and vision and the private sector picking up the step, having the right incentives and signals to unleash creativity and technology.

DESI ANWAR: OK. So the partnership is, obviously, very, very important between government and the private sector.

But let me just put it back to, you know, food nutrition, obviously, is very, very important, but let’s frame it back to food security. As we know with, you know, what’s happening in the war in the Ukraine, I mean, even Indonesia, we were affected, you know, because we still import a lot of wheat, for example, and fertilizers. General Clark, what would you see as the—as the biggest challenge? What is the state of our food security at the moment with what’s going on in the world and your own definition of food security? Because we are completely interdependent when it comes to, you know, the food system is very global. And then once you have these blockages and once you—you know, the supply side is disrupted, I mean, how can we mitigate that? And where do you see, you know, the challenges of food security—

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: Well, I think we have—

DESI ANWAR:—as a global security?

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: Look, we have to elevate consideration of food security. It’s grown in importance each year over—and each decade, really.

But in order to import things that countries need, they have to export. And governments have to help set the incentives for this. So if Indonesia wants to import, let’s say, cellphones and electronics from China or the United States or someplace, then how does it get paid for? And all of this has created in the area of food this incredibly complex network, and so it becomes something that—what COVID has taught us, what the Ukraine war has taught us is this must be a higher priority in all international discussions. We’ve got to strengthen these supply chains, listen to what our people need all over the world, and then governments have to work together to meet those needs.

DESI ANWAR: And on the global security side of it, I mean, obviously, if we have global security problems, it would impact food security, vice versa. And we have, for example, you know, climate change issues. And sometime in the future, if not already, fight for resources and diminishing resources will be a big problem as the world is trying to feed, you know, over 8 billion people.

And the other thing is that we have a very unequal world. In some areas of the world like you mentioned, Gaurav, we have oversupply of food. And in some parts of the world, you know, people go to bed hungry. How much of a threat do you think is food security to global security, especially seeing that what we need is global stability in order to get food security?

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: Well, I think what we are experiencing is one of these moments in history where mankind—humankind goes up or down. We have 8 billion people. We’re in an incredibly complicated world. We still have old aspirations, old ideas like some people think of the world as a chessboard. You know, this is my country, that’s your country, I want your country. We have to get rid of these old ideas of nationalism and move together toward a new understanding of our responsibilities for humanity. It’s a step-by-step process. It’s a generational process. And along the way, we’ve got to let go of some of the anger and hurt from previous generations. This is true in Europe. It’s true in Africa. It’s true in Asia. And it’s true in my country. We’ve got to look toward the future. There’s incredible technology opportunities. So it’s a make-it-or-break-it time for humanity.

DESI ANWAR: But do you think—is food security a real threat to global security?

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: Right. Well, food security has been brought to the fore by the war in Ukraine. So this is the moment, as Fred Kempe was saying yesterday, we’ve got a crisis. Use it. Make something different out of the way the world is structured today.

You know, we’ve had the Food and Agricultural Organization for 70 years. It’s great. We have the World Food Programme. It’s fine. Now, look at the current situation and let’s move forward. What’s the next step we need? How do we harness the strengths of government, the vision of government with the initiative and technologies of the private sector? This should be a principal issue at the—as Fred was saying earlier—at the G20, and we hope they’ll really tackle it.

DESI ANWAR: Gaurav, I mean, let’s pick up on that—you know, your idea, what is food security, the definition of food security. Where are we now? Are we at the critical, you know, junction when food security is threatening our global security? And also—like you also mentioned—you know, very impassioned in your keynote speech about, you know, putting—every child should not go hungry anywhere around the world. So how do you see this?

GAURAV SRIVASTAVA: I think it’s one thing to talk about these global ideas, but at the end of the day what matters is what we are doing back home. And being in conflict areas you start understanding that food, and energy, and oil, and water—these are national security issues. For far too long they have been considered not to be, and I think that narrative has to change.

Given today the conflict in Ukraine, given today the COVID-19 pandemic, given where we just came from, I think this thing has been [thrown] in our face. Indonesia, which has several hundred million people… there are so many people, and the choices are they need food to eat, they need to fill their cars with gas. And the choices they are being asked to make is should they—to take sides in a conflict.

And I think it goes back to what the minister said, is this policy of remaining as a nation that is neutral and cares about Indonesia first I think is important. And I think while it really important on global issues, it is also important to understand that the issues are local because if there is lack of food, then it is cause for serious security issues. And the conversations that are now being had back home in the United States, I think a lot of those conversations have to be in that direction.

It is also important to remember that the government is not the one who is buying and selling oil or buying and selling food. It is traders. It is private businesses, and I think it requires industry, requires talk leaders, requires government to work together in conjunction with traders to see what works; not impose policies that ultimately do not work. And that’s—that is the—that’s what I think.

DESI ANWAR: So it’s very important, you know, the partnership between the government and the private—public-private partnership.

GAURAV SRIVASTAVA: Public-private partnership.

DESI ANWAR: I think the important point is also, because we are so globalized, we are so interdependent for our food supply, our whole global food system is so entwined. So how do you see this going forward for countries to actually not only just increase their resilience, but within the countries themselves, there’s inequality when it comes to access to affordable, you know, nutritious food. What is the best way to address it because it’s not just an international or global issue, but it’s also—within the national itself, there is great inequality when it comes to food security.

GAURAV SRIVASTAVA: There is a short-term issue and then there are long-term issues. I think the short-term issues which need to be addressed is how do you deal with this imbalance. And yesterday we were talking at a roundtable, and we discussed ways of setting up special licensing programs to be able to work together and allow trade to flow.

And the other point is, at the end of the day, country needs to be self-sustainable. And in several conversations with the minister, his key idea of making Indonesia independent, taking issues that are security—whether it is defense, whether it is food, or whether it is energy—and making sure they are independent is key.

And that’s—so I think there is a short-term objective, which we—which we can—which we look working on this program, and then the long-term objective is creating self-sustainability. That’s what I think.

DESI ANWAR: OK. Minister Prabowo, actually, Indonesia, for the last couple of years, we didn’t import rice. We actually got an award from the International Rice Research institution for rice self-sufficiency. But we do still import other things like, for example, wheat and fertilizer.

Just, you know—just very quickly, I mean, we know what the—you talked about the strategy of Indonesia, creating a food resilience, national resilience, self-sufficiency. But given that Indonesia has the G20 presidency, now what would you actually like to see, the concrete outcomes from this summit when it comes to food security and creating global food security for everybody?

MINISTER PRABOWO SUBIANTO: I think when you notice the remarks of the speakers before me, also my remarks, I mentioned that there is food insecurity problem, but this problem has been compounded by—as I mentioned—population explosion, climate change, and geopolitical conflict. Climate change needs political wisdom and leadership from all countries. Population explosion needs wisdom, leadership, courage from the national elites. But geopolitical conflict, as I mentioned, needs statesmanship, needs leaders with a historical vision and a realistic—a realistic approach. I think this is what we hope from the G20. Here we are very happy, we hear that President Xi Jinping of China and President Biden of the United States will meet. This is—this is a—I think a very optimistic event. By meeting, by communication, by interaction, these two global powers must show global leadership, global statesmanship, global wisdom. So this is our hope from the G20.

So the problems of food security, hunger, is current a clear and present danger because we understand 300 million people are already starving basically; another 500 million on the verge of starvation, but this is all related to geopolitical reality. We understand 30 percent of wheat comes from Ukraine and Russia. We understand potash, phosphate is a resource very scarce. Fertilizer dependent on potash, dependent on phosphate, so yes, you ask me what we hope from the G20. We hope statesmanship with wisdom to overcome this.

DESI ANWAR: OK, the G20 itself, we’ve come in in a very, very challenging sort of environment, not just because it’s post-pandemic, but there’s a war in the Ukraine, a global economic crisis, and inflation. And of course, you know, tension between China and the US for example. So it’s, you know—and of course there is the Russia situation, but are you—how optimistic are you that, you know, world leaders can actually sit down, you know, with that wisdom and statesmanship that you are talking about?

And the other thing is Indonesia—this is our presidency. You know, what can we offer as a country to address and also to maybe, you know, facilitate the path to global food security as well as global security?

MINISTER PRABOWO SUBIANTO: OK. In my opinion, there are, let us say, optimistic goals, yeah. Idealistic goals. There are also realistic and modest goals.

I prefer to have realistic and modest goals. Indonesia, in my opinion, our contribution to the international geopolitical situation is that we succeed in making or taking care of our own house. We must keep our house—our own house in order.

We need—Indonesia needs peace, stability. And with peace, stability, we can provide solutions.

As I said in my presentation that with a little bit of investment, with a little bit of rearranging some of priorities, we can be the breadbasket of the world. This is not something impossible.

This is mathematics. We have already 80 million degraded forest. We must take care of this with our planning agency calculating 60 million hectares. If we convert this, this can be the breadbasket of the world.

So we can be a solution to the world.

Number two, energy. We have to go to renewable clean energy, green energy, to cut down global warming. That’s number two. This is, in my opinion, realistic.

We take care of our own house. We are peace, prosperity, smart investment. We can be the source of protein through the world, source of calories to the world. That is our contribution.

In the real sense, we are nonaligned. We are friendly with all the major powers. So we can be the intermediary. We can promote dialogue and friendship.

So I think, in my opinion, that is our, let us say, modest goals and idealistic goals.

DESI ANWAR: Yeah. And this is also an opportunity for Indonesia to showcase what we have and what we’re doing is very well displayed in this morning’s lecture.

Now, General Clark, your thoughts, please? You know, do you agree? What kind of leadership can Indonesia, you know, give in this circumstances? And also, for the US as being the global security power, what can the US do in order to promote global food security and make sure that, you know, everything’s—

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: Well, I think the United States can do several things.

Now, we’re going to hear later from some American experts on this and so I don’t want to say that I’m an expert on this.

But I have looked at it and I think, you know, there’s—first, there’s the role of the American dollar. And so we have to be very aware in the United States that when we use interest rates to deal with domestic American inflation, it has worldwide consequences.

I know we are sensitive to that, but we just have to remain sensitive to it because countries all over the world rise and fall based on how the Federal Reserve system responds to, in some cases, US domestic economic concerns.

So that’s the first thing.

Secondly, I think the United States has done a remarkable job with the technology of agriculture for things like row crops. So I’ve done a lot of work with the corn farmers in the United States, and you look at the productivity of corn. Now, I’m going to use the term acre instead of hectare. There’s about two and a half acres to a hectare.

But back when I was growing up, if you got maybe 60, 80 bushels of corn per acre, you were a great farmer in Iowa. In the 1990s, we were up to 90 bushels. Now the average in recent years has been 170, 180 bushels of corn per acre. And some—in some cases, we’re getting 350 bushels of corn per acre.

Why is this? A combination of factors. It’s private sector, farmer ingenuity, government leadership in terms of agricultural extension. So I think if we look at these principles and try to help countries all over the world with technology, some financing to get it started, sharing our systems on how we look at farmland, how we evaluate its need for nutrition, how we use what’s called precision agriculture, taking advantage of GPS to know for each meter of land what exactly are the nutrients that are needed for each crop. If we look at some of the Israeli technologies on drip irrigation, for example, we can do amazing things.

And so I think the United States has to lead. But I think the United States has to be very careful in doing this because we have a spirit of generosity in America, but we have something called Public Law 480 which enables us to take surplus US agricultural commodities and ship them abroad in times of need as a measure of relief. Sometimes in doing that we’ve actually undercut domestic agriculture in those countries that have been the beneficiaries, so I think we have to be careful.

You know, it’s what—the old joke is if you are in bed with an elephant and it turns over, you can be crushed. And so the United States, for—starting really a hundred years ago, became the elephant in world finance in so many areas and in food. And we have to be very careful about this because, as Minister Prabowo was saying, there’s so much potential in Indonesia, in Nigeria, in DRC, elsewhere in the world. We don’t have to rely on row crops in the United States. So we’ve got to use our leadership wisely.

DESI ANWAR: OK. Well, just very quickly, what would you like to see the outcome of this G20? What concrete results, maybe what, you know, maybe agreement? Or, you know, what kind of things would you like?

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: Well, I think what we’ll see is—already in President Biden’s talking points he’s elevated the issue of food security. And one of the things we’re going to do from this conference, I hope, is give talking points to the White House so we’ll get further intensification of this focus on food security. It really is a fundamental, and I think the White House is coming to understand this.

It’s not something about getting farmers to vote for a particular political party so, therefore, you’ve got to be nice in Iowa. It’s much bigger than this. And in the United States, we’re fortunate because we don’t really have to import food. We do like shrimp, get some of it from here, but—and tuna. But we don’t have to. It’s a matter of taste. So in the American discussions, we’ve misunderstood and underestimated the issue of food security. We have to change our appreciation of priorities.

DESI ANWAR: And, OK, Gaurav, I mean, the general mentioned about innovation and technology. Obviously, you know, food—it’s important to have innovation as well as technology. And more importantly, actually, is to energize people to care about food production. What are your solutions to, you know, achieving greater food security by strengthening, for example, the farmers or involving the young people, women and, you know, all sectors of society to focus on this?

GAURAV SRIVASTAVA: Now, I was talking to one of my friends from Africa and they mentioned that the US is kind of the head of the kite. And once there is tailwinds at the head of the kite, the effect is felt all the way at the back and there is a big lag that happens.

It is important to understand that for the reasons that we have been the elephant that turned left or right, the reasons are we need to be really careful and work together and understand that working with our partners like Indonesia and with other nations is the way to build alliances. By providing maybe financing through institutions like DFC, working with policymakers—and we have had several conversations—General Clark and I had several conversations with folks at the White House, folks in Congress, in the Senate on these critical issues as to the role that the US can play. And it’s important to understand that we cannot—cannot—put countries like Indonesia in that impossible spot to make a choice, because the realities of what we are facing back in the US and the realities here in Indonesia or other countries are too separate, and the basic sustenance needs of working together is essential.

The war in Ukraine is an essential—is an essential conversation to talk about. And I was in New York right around the time when we had the Citizens Award, October 19, and I had conversations with one of the members from the U.N. And they showed—and she told me of this large discrepancy between the support that goes to the issue of Ukraine and what’s happening in Africa, what’s happening in Asia. The value of human life is the same, whether it is a child in Ukraine or whether it is a child in America, child in Africa, or child here. It’s all the same. And the conversation that behooves us today is how do you create a program that prioritizes food security, energy security, and national security as one issue. And hopefully, we will be able to achieve that with—

DESI ANWAR: This is what you’d like to see come out from this G20 summit, OK.

We’ve run out of time, but let me just ask a final question to Minister Prabowo, or maybe you’d like to read your notes first. All right. In your presentation, I mean, there was a lot of gloom and doom about, you know, the threat of nuclear war. I just want to ask how, you know, the—how critical is a—I mean, do you think there will be soon at some point wars due to climate change and when food supply gets disrupted and when, you know, people are fighting for diminished food resources, energy resources, water resources? Is this something that, you know, in your—do you visualize, do you foresee this as something that is the threat that keeps you awake at night?

MINISTER PRABOWO SUBIANTO: Well, you know, I—of course, you know, I—basically, deep down in me I am an optimist. Yeah. But as someone who has to deal with security/defense, we have to deal with reality. And of course, our reference are to the players, the big players. So when I hear very senior US former military leaders saying they’re worried about nuclear war, when I hear many strategic thinkers like Professor Kissinger—Henry Kissinger, when I hear very important academics who are—whose life is about studying geopolitical conflict like Professor Mearsheimer or Professor Jeffrey Sachs or many of the leaders of this—of the world powers, when they talk that they’re worried about nuclear conflict, that—I’m worried, you know, because we are basically—we are—we don’t see the logic of a major world conflict in this time and age. Ideology-wise, every country can choose their own way to prosperity.

Every country has their own right, you know? The West have been very successful in democracy, but some other countries have succeeded. You cannot—you cannot deny that China has succeeded in their economic growth. They have succeeded in eliminating extreme poverty. We cannot hide this. We cannot denigrate this. So the success of the West, yes. But we have to see the success of China and the aspirations of other countries—Brazil, Nigeria, South Africa.

So what I’m saying is that I base my assessment on the assessments of the big powers—of the strategic thinkers of the big powers. When they say they are worried, well, I think it’s also logical that I’m worried.

DESI ANWAR: OK. Not to end on a pessimistic note. Thank you very much. Minister Prabowo, for that remark.

Well, let’s hope this G20 summit will be, you know, the path to global collaboration, will the way to world peace, because this is what we all want, right? OK, big hands, please. General Clark, Minister Prabowo, and also Gaurav, thank you very much for an interesting fire chat side. And I would now like to give the program back to the next session. Thank you.

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Ukraine’s ambassador to Indonesia at Global Food Security Forum: ‘Russian aggression’ is ‘the root of the problem’

Atlantic Council — Sun, 13 Nov 2022 16:14:00 +0000

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Flagship Event Sat, November 12, 2022 • 12:00 am ET

Highlights from the Global Food Security Forum

Economy & Business Resilience & Society

Event transcript

Uncorrected transcript: Check against delivery

PETER ENGELKE: Well, good morning, everyone. I hope we’ve all had a productive and enjoyable conversation this morning. I know I’ve learned a lot myself.

As stated, my name is Peter Engelke. I’m with the Atlantic Council, and we’re going to be exploring on this panel for the next 45 minutes the state of global food security—not a small—not a small topic, but really looking into what we consider to be the primary challenges facing the world when it comes to the question of food security and beginning to explore some of the solution sets as well.

So joining me on the stage I have an illustrious panel, and—of experts and officials who really run a gamut, I think, both geographically and in terms of their areas of expertise, and I’d like to introduce them for you.

So to my left is Ambassador Vasyl Hamianin, who is the ambassador of Ukraine to the Republic of Indonesia. Welcome, sir.

AMBASSADOR VASYL HAMIANIN: Thank you.

PETER ENGELKE: To his left is Bo Holmgreen, who is the founder and CEO of Scholars of Sustenance, which is an organization focused on food waste in Southeast Asia and also here in Indonesia.

Then we have—then we have Dr. Michał Kurtyka, who is the former minister of Climate and Environment for Poland, and I believe you are also a brand-new non-resident senior fellow at the Global Energy Center, which is a sister center here at the Atlantic Council. And I would like personally to welcome you to the Atlantic Council family.

MICHAŁ KURTYKA: Thank you.

PETER ENGELKE: And then to his left we have Guy Margalith, who is the principal deputy foreign policy advisor at US Indo-Pacific Command.

And then at the end today we have Laksmi Prasvita—I hope I did that correctly—who is the head of Communications, Public Affairs, Science, and Sustainability, for Bayer Indonesia. Welcome.

LAKSMI PRASVITA: Thank you.

PETER ENGELKE: And then I see that we do in fact have on screen, joining us virtually, is Maria Teresa Nogales, who is the founder and executive director of Fundacion Alternativas, which is located in Bolivia. And so there she is right there, yes. M.T., can you hear us?

MARIA TERESA NOGALES: I can. Good morning.

PETER ENGELKE: Welcome. Well, welcome to you all.

So as I said before, we only have—unfortunately—45 minutes for this incredibly important conversation, and really a diverse set of perspectives we’re going to be hearing from this morning. So let’s get into the—into the questions.

So really what I want to do first is ask all of you to answer the same question if you will, which is basically—specifically I should say—what do you see as the most pressing current challenges to global food security? A big question, and if you can all find a way to squeeze your answer into a couple of minutes if you can.

So, Ambassador, to you first, please.

AMBASSADOR VASYL HAMIANIN: Thank you very much. It’s a great honor to be here and to speak to the gathering. Thank you.

Well, it will be a difficult task to answer it within two minutes, but I’ll try.

PETER ENGELKE: Sure.

AMBASSADOR VASYL HAMIANIN: So I would not be repeating what is going on in the food security globally but because we had a lot of speakers, we know what happens actually. But I would say that the biggest challenge in food security issue is that we should watch it and receive it as a complex. That’s very important because food security is not just about a grain going from somewhere to somewhere. It’s not just one link; it’s a complex of problems that—coming from the seeds and then, you know, diesel fuel, and then chemicals, and then fertilizers, then labor force, et cetera, et cetera. And after that is trade and logistics.

So now when one link is undermined, then everything else is undermined, too, and now food security is in grave danger, so we—main thing I would say that we have to view this as a complex problem. And to deal with this problem it’s very important to go through a few stages like first thing is to see the roots—what is the root of the problem?

Now—when we are talking about Ukraine, right, because there are many other factors, but Ukraine—as people used to say, war in Ukraine, we identify the root as war in Ukraine. Next stage is to recognize it and on this stage of recognition, I think we have to speak very bravely. It takes a lot of courage to identify this, to acknowledge that this is Russian aggression against Ukraine, so we are not dealing with the war in Ukraine; we’re not dealing with Ukraine basically. The subject is Russia.

Third, we have to identify the instruments how to deal with this, how—basically how to deal with Russia, with Russian aggression, with the regime that made it possible. And the last one, to take action. So basically this is the algorithm, and I think the world is stuck on the—well, globally, stuck on this second stage of acknowledgement that, you know, it’s not a conflict in Ukraine; it’s a Ukrainian crisis. It’s not like war in Ukraine, like nameless war in Ukraine. But it’s Russian aggression against Ukraine. See the roots, cut the roots, cure the disease.

Second one, this problem is accumulative. What I mean is that it’s like a traffic jam. It takes ten minutes to get a jam, and then it takes like one hour to get it, you know, resolved.

So to mitigate the consequences of the food crisis, it will take maybe months, maybe years after what happens. And every day, every week of the aggression will get one month, two month, maybe years to get it resolved. So we have to look at it globally, we have to be responsible, and we have to be very much courageous and brave to acknowledge—to say, A—what is A? A. What is B? B. So a very important thing is that the world should unite to face it.

It’s not a good thing to deal with 50 crises at the same time. It’s like, you know, pouring the water from the spoon onto the fire when you can use the fire extinguisher and just extinguish the fire in a couple of minutes. So rather than to deal with 50 different problems—food security, logistics security, energy security, whatever it is—we would rather deal with one problem, and the name we know. It’s a Moscow fascist regime.

So basically I would say that if we are united we are stronger. If we are united we can resolve everything, and I would say that in this situation we can—like a global community, be a global community, be leaders, and use the rule of law rather than rule of force.

Last one—just last one. I personally don’t understand why and how it happened that a little man confronts the 10 billion of the global population, and everybody is trying to say that, well, everybody is afraid of this man. I mean, he is one, and we are the global community.

Thank you very much.

PETER ENGELKE: Thank you, Ambassador.

So Bo, same question to you.

BO HOLMGREEN: Yes.

PETER ENGELKE: You work in this region of the world. From your perspective here, how do you see sort of the—what do you think is the most important or most pressing challenge related to food security from the perspective of your work?

BO HOLMGREEN: Well, I come at it from a different way. We have spent a lot of time—I’m an engineer, so I use a lot of statistics to focus us. And basically in 2016 we analyzed the entire farm-to-fork concept, and we decided the best place we could have the biggest impact on food security right now—and fastest—was by going—when it falls off the fork—food waste, right? And in fact, we cannot rescue what’s on the fork, so it’s right before—it’s everything that doesn’t go on the fork, from supermarkets, and hotels, and so on. We rescue that, inspect it, get it safely in our cool chain technology to people.

But what we found then and what focused us so much was stunning. There were two facts that made us go, why we do this and where we did it. And the first one was—we back then called it 10-7-1, but now it’s 10-8-1 that tells you how fast it goes, and I totally admired General Clark yesterday for the observation on going from two billion to eight billion people, and we can still make food. But the best part of it is we are indeed almost eight billion people in the world, but today this fantastic food supply chain makes more than enough food—actually more than enough food for 10-plus billion people.

So you would think with all that extra food that everything would be good. Yet eight billion people, more than 10 billion food, one billion of us goes to bed hungry every night. So we simply have a distribution problem, and that is best seen in the old adage—you have heard this a million times—don’t give people fish; teach them how to fish.

Well, our slant on that is that’s true, but until then, let’s at least eat the fish that’s already out of the ocean. And that’s where we come from. So we need to simply fix this distribution problem, right? We have a very high level—we call it food equity where we hope one day to change access to good nutrition to not be based on just money in your hand, but also based on desperation and need. So we have to go to a better way of looking at our food supply chain because there is enough of it.

The other reason why we are now doing it in Southeast Asia is that more people in Southeast Asia than anywhere else in the world is coming out of poverty into middle class, and what happens then? Then they will start throwing the same amount of food away. And sadly, that food waste is just going to explode.

So we came to Asia for that purpose, and if we can rescue all that food waste from those who are now in the middle class and get it to the still poor people, then we are getting the nutrition cycle around. And the whole reason for doing it is not just for food and getting food to people, and so on, but it is the circular economy, and get the circular economy going, especially in countries like here, and Thailand, and Philippines. It’s immensely exciting because the populations are so huge, and if you can get the circular economy to work, we can go very far.

And then, of course, the final thing is that every kilo of food that would have been thrown away—because we are focused only on surplus food—every kilo of surplus food that doesn’t go to the landfill will not create methane gases, and will not hurt the environment so, you know, again, being an engineer, we measure everything down to the CO2 kilos that we save the world for, and so on—and emissions.

PETER ENGELKE: Wonderful. Thank you so much, Bo.

Michal.

Same question—easy question to ask; hard one to answer. But do you have a top-line answer to the question what are the—how do you see the most pressing challenge facing the world when it comes to food?

MICHAŁ KURTYKA: Thank you very much.

And let me get a little bit earlier in our history. In 1709, 600,000 French people died out of starvation. Eighteenth century; it’s basically a climate change but the other way around. The temperatures actually declined, and so there was less and less food available. And in 1783—to be more exact, the 6th of June 1783, a volcano erupted in Iceland. Twenty percent of people died of starvation in the following year, and then all hunger spread over Europe, and many historians right now consider that one of the main element, trigger of French Revolution, was this problem.

But interestingly, on the 5th of October 1789, when people in Paris ran to Versailles, it was not because they lacked food, but because they have learned that the day before in Versailles there was a sumptuous banquet, and so what was the problem? It was inequalities.

And so we are right now facing a world which is entering into a period of chaos, and inequalities will be playing a very—difficult tricks to us. And we must foresee a world in which—there could be a domino effect, you know—starvation, social disorder, political problems.

And let me right now take my hat off—COP24 president—so I was presiding over climate summit in Katowice in 2018, operationalizing the Paris Agreement. And I right now come back from Sharm El Sheikh where COP27 is happening. And so let me put my environment and energy hat and add to that, that in today’s intertwined world—and thank you very much, ambassador from Ukraine for reminding us that Russian aggression against Ukraine is sending tectonic waves on the world in terms of energy prices, gas prices, food prices, inflation, insecurity. That’s an important element.

But the other important element is the equivalent of volcano erupting in Iceland in 1783—today’s energy technologies. They are polluting, they are not preserving water, pesticide, plastics—all that is making us living in an intertwined world, and what is going on in Ukraine is impacting Indonesia; what is going on in Indonesia is impacting the US.

So we must tackle this problem together, and that’s the challenge: how to tackle insecurities of today’s world all together, and then how to build a world in which we will be having a different set of values. The growth will not be based only on the push of—if I may say profits and productivity which is bringing a lot of benefits out of globalization, but also out of respect for our planet and out of engagement of people.

PETER ENGELKE: Thank you. Thank you so much, wonderful comments.

So, Guy—so you are with US Indo-Pacific Command. From your perspective, how do you see the challenge? I suspect your perspective is unique but very important.

GUY MARGALITH: Thank you very much, and it’s an honor to share the stage with this distinguished panel.

Specifically I want to echo something that the ambassador said about Russia’s brutal and unprovoked invasion of Ukraine has led to substantial food insecurity. It has led to disruptions in food, fuel, and fertilizer, as the ambassador mentioned, as other individuals at this forum have mentioned. And this is something that we focus on very clearly because it sends a very important lesson. The lesson is that conflict, that war has severe impacts on global food security, and that’s why a major focus of the US Indo-Pacific Command—Admiral Aquilino, every single day, says his number one focus is to deter conflict. It’s to practice what the secretary of defense calls integrated deterrence, to use all forms of national power in collaboration with our allies and our partners in a multilateral, whole-of-government approach to deter conflict.

But one thing I want to emphasize is that when we think about security and deterrence, it’s not just about the absence of war. It’s not just about deterrence—deterring conflict. It is about the prosperity and the livelihood of people. That’s what it comes down to at the end.

And I think we need to expand our focus of what we define security as, and that’s something that we think about every day at INDOPACOM. It’s about how do we promote a human-centered approach to security because that is ultimately the way that we are going to promote a free and open Indo-Pacific that respects the rules-based international order.

If I could just highlight a few key statistics. In the US Indo-Pacific Command area of responsibility there are 36 countries. Thirty-two of them are either island countries, archipelagic countries, such as Indonesia, or countries that have a coastline. Those countries rely extensively on maritime trade for their food security. A lot of countries, specifically in Oceania—20 to 30 percent of their imports are food imports. It is absolutely critical that the rules-based international order be respected because it is the lifeblood of these countries. In Fiji it’s 20 percent, in Timor-Leste it’s 30 percent, so just a few examples.

And at INDOPACOM we have a few key lines of effort that we are focused on to promote the rules-based international order. If I could, I’d like to highlight just three of them. One is our Women, Peace, and Security programs. We collaborate on a gender-focused approach because we recognize that a gender-focused approach is a key way to promote resilience, and resilience is a key part of food security.

Two, as we collaborate with our allies and partners to fight illegal, unregulated, and unreported fishing—IUU fishing—this is a key area of focus because so many countries in Oceania and the region rely on fishing for their livelihood.

And lastly, climate change has a huge impact when it comes to food security or food insecurity. Our Center for Excellence, Disaster Management partners with our allies and our partners to include Indonesia, to include our other allies and partners in the region, to look at the impacts of global climate change, and to see how we can partner and work together to deter some of the biggest impacts.

So again, bottom line, we need to deter conflict, we need to promote the rules-based international order, and that’s how we’re going to achieve food security.

Thank you.

PETER ENGELKE: All right, thank you so much.

And Laksmi, so same question: how do you see the challenges facing us in the world today when it comes to food?

LAKSMI PRASVITA: Yeah, OK. Thank you.

And I would like to greet my minister, minister of agriculture. And we have also the secretary-general of the minister of agriculture.

Please allow me to sit here and talk about the food security, and I will talk about the food security in Indonesia. So if we take a look—have a look at the global food security index in 2022, actually Indonesia is improving. Yeah, we are green in the food security, so congratulations to us. We can weather the storm of this global supply chain disruption.

But if we zoom in detail into the global food security index, the highest score is in the food affordability. So it is affordable. The government is doing really good in managing the inflation in Indonesia. However, if we take a look in more detail at the lowest point is the food availability, so that is the lowest point in the index of food security in Indonesia. The food availability, having the lowest score is because of—due to the supply chain—the global supply chain disruption, the access to the farming technology, the access to the farming R&D, and those are the things that we need to put our attention if we want to improve the food security index of Indonesia, yeah—so the importance of the access to the technology to the farmer, the availability of the input, and the access to the global supply chain infrastructure.

So I stop there. Maybe we discuss more about what’s the solution then from the private sector view on this global—on this pressing issue of security.

PETER ENGELKE: OK, thank you so much.

And M.T., I hope you can still hear me.

MARIA TERESA NOGALES: I can.

PETER ENGELKE: Wonderful. And it’s so nice to see you virtually.

Same question over to you. You are working in Bolivia, and you see the world from that perspective and from other perspectives. From that geographic region as well as from your own experience, how do you see this equation?

MARIA TERESA NOGALES: Sure, I mean, I think we can all agree that we’re facing a set of compounding factors: climate change, the loss of biodiversity, degraded and contaminated natural resources, economic insecurity, energy insecurity, rising inflation, urbanization—I think is a subject that’s not touched upon sufficiently, which is definitely changing not only our production, but also our diets. Certainly war and conflict, which has been put on the table on several occasions throughout this forum, high food prices, the high cost of fertilizer, food export bans—all of this is, you know, presenting a very challenging scenario in terms of being able to guarantee people’s right to food.

But in addition to all of this, I would like to highlight two factors: one, the invisibility of all those people who work and are part of our food systems. So the people who are producing our food, or transporting our food, or commercializing our food are often not really taken into account in decision making processes. And I think that that influences our ability to really come up with effective solutions because if the actors whose livelihoods are involved in our food systems on a daily basis are not a part of the conversation, then we additionally are not able to understand the challenges that they face in order to ensure that we can have enough food and that that food is available to all.

So in this regard, I think one of the great weaknesses that we’re facing are governance challenges within our food system. And I’ll stop there so that we can delve into some additional questions.

PETER ENGELKE: All right, well, thank you so much, M.T.

So I see that we have roughly 19 minutes left, and we’ve gone through the first set of questions, and so I think that leaves us time for one more round robin. I’ve heard a lot of themes put on the table, and they are all enormous and all important. And we talked about war and conflict and the importance of unity. Urbanization is another one that we just heard about. We’ve heard about food waste. So there’s a lot to cover here.

And what I’d like to do maybe is to go to each of you and have you talk maybe a little bit more about your own—your own area of expertise as well as how you see, if you will, the solution sets. And so because we have—we have so many panelists and so limited time, it’s always unfair to the people who go last in the sequence, so I want to make sure that I balance that out a little bit. And let me start by going last to first for this round.

So M.T., you said—your last word was probably governance, I think was what I heard. So let me turn to you first and ask you how do you see the governance piece as a critical—maybe even the critical piece when it comes to solving the problems that you focus on?

MARIA TERESA NOGALES: Sure. Thank you.

And, yeah, I mean, I think at the end of the day governance is what sets the rules on how things are going to function. And so in this light, you know, in terms of food system governance, we’re talking about an absence of a normative framework country-to-country, region-to-region. Additionally, as I was mentioning, most of the actors that are involved in our food systems and that make, you know, food available in our households and in our communities are actually operating in the informal sector. They are very vulnerable to system shocks, and they do not participate in decision making processes.

So certainly, in terms of finding solutions to the challenges to food security, they need to be part of decision making processes, which means that our processes need to be very participatory. They need to be transparent, they need to be inclusive. And in addition—and this was put on the table earlier by one of my colleagues—is this concept of the rule of law. We need to make sure that our countries are strengthening the mechanisms that ensure that the rule of law is sustained, and that’s especially important when we are talking about generating guarantees for private sector investment because if our countries cannot guarantee, you know, private sector investment, then those are not going to come into fruition.

And finally—and I would say this is a huge problem in Latin America—is the absence of data. And without data, we cannot make informed decisions. And so I think there’s a lot of work that needs to be done in terms of governance and decision making processes, and ensuring that we have sufficient data to make appropriate decisions to make wise investments that can actually help us improve infrastructure, and logistical systems, and supply chains, and production.

PETER ENGELKE: Wonderful. Thank you so much.

Laksmi, maybe I can turn to you next because you were—yes, you—you were fifth on the list and I want to make sure we come to you sooner rather than later so that we’re fair.

LAKSMI PRASVITA: Thank you.

PETER ENGELKE: You said something in your remarks about, you know, the private sector, and obviously that’s the sector you are in and you come from. So I wonder if you might speak a bit to this sort of business model or models that might be applicable to solving some of the problems that you are focused on.

LAKSMI PRASVITA: Yeah, thank you for the questions, yeah.

So what is the private sector view on this food security challenge, and how do we sort it out? So at the heart of the agriculture or the food production—at the heart of it is the farmers, and we know exactly that most of the producers of the food in this world is smallholder farmers, yeah. About 80 percent of the food production in the world is produced by the smallholder farmers; 70 to 80 of the agriculture land is in the process by them.

So it’s very important that we empower them—we empower the smallholder farmers, we give them the access of technology, the most—if possible, the most advanced technology as fast as possible to the smallholder farmers so that they can get all the opportunity, the best opportunity they can have to produce more food, yeah?

So the government of Indonesia has been very open with this access to technology by allowing the latest technology of the biotech to enter Indonesia and to be used by the smallholder farmers to improve their productivity.

However, it’s not enough, I mean, the training to the smallholder farmers and equip them with the technology itself is not enough because when they produce lots of foods, where do they sell these—the harvest. This is very important.

So not only we empower the smallholder farmers, which is very important at the center of the food security, but also how to get the farmers into the supply chain of agriculture, into the business supply chain. And this is where it gets more complex, yeah, because we need to create an ecosystem of business on rural level, not only involving the smallholder farmers, but also the local, the rural entrepreneurs, so that the ecosystem of agriculture in that rural, you know, can have a viable business model. And only with this viable business model we can then sustain the food production, yeah, to weather all of the disruption in the supply chain.

And so what we do as the private sector is we develop a public-private partnership approach to develop the business model, what we call as the close-look business model where we lined up—lined up all of the actors along the supply chain from the smallholder farmers, the bank, the insurance, the agro input providers, and then the off-taker itself.

So that—the risk of the business is distributed evenly along the supply chain and all of the—everyone in the supply chain bear the risk. And this model will be very—it is—for the bank to give a safety—for the bank and financial institution to pour the money into the supply chain. So it is, I think, an effective model that we can try to scale up to make it bigger and also to replicate in the other area.

So with the empowerment to the smallholder farmers, with the most advanced technology, include them in the supply chain of the agriculture, and also include—being inclusive as well to the local entrepreneur, yeah, the small agriculture kiosk in the village, for example, into the supply chain. And it will zoom out more macro to the more global level to include this as MSM—either micro, small, or medium enterprise into the local supply chain, regional supply chain, and then global supply chain with—by creating this business model all together—all of the public and the private sector together, I think we can have a bright future in the food security.

PETER ENGELKE: Wonderful. Thank you so much for that answer.

Guy, you are next on the list. So you spoke about—among other things, right—the roles and responsibilities that your organization has in sort of the area of freedom of navigation—in the current challenges, of course. But over the longer run, what do you think the keys are to sustaining a world wherein we have freedom of navigation in most if not all places that count, including places in this part of the world? Yeah, if you could just maybe give us your thoughts on that piece.

GUY MARGALITH: Sure. Thank you, Peter.

I think it’s not just freedom of navigation, but freedom writ large—a free and open Indo-Pacific, freedom of commerce, freedom of aviation—all the freedoms that we rely on as part of the rules-based international order. So freedom of navigation of course is critical because so many of the countries in this area rely on maritime trade specifically. But it’s not just that.

And it’s not just the United States either. We need to act together with our allies and partners, with all of the agencies of our governments, and that’s a key focus that we have over at INDOPACOM.

I just want to highlight perhaps just two initiatives that the United States has focused on, and first, Indonesia, as part of its G20 presidency, just last month convened the finance and agricultural ministers for the first time in the G20 to focus on issues regarding food security, which I think emphasizes the fact that this requires a multilateral approach.

Two, APEC—Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation—will be hosted by the United States next year, and APEC is the premiere forum to discuss issues such as these because free and fair and open trade underpin our rules-based international order. It underpins our food security. So just a couple of the things that we are focused on at INDOPACOM and the things that we are looking forward to, to work with our allies and partners as part of our defense of the rules-based international order. Thanks.

PETER ENGELKE: Wonderful. Thanks—thanks so much for that answer.

And I guess I want to turn next to Michal, and you—there are few things that struck me besides I’m also, by the way, a historian so I love the references to the 18th century and 19th century and so forth.

But among other things, you talked about the importance of developing unity, right, in our responses to various crises—climate crisis, food crisis, other crises—as well as formulating a different set of values. And I wonder if you might—if you would be interested in deepening and extending those remarks, and particularly when it comes to the piece of how unity is associated with values and what that might mean practically for solving the climate crisis as well as the food crisis—again, a very simple question with a complex answer, and you have about 2-1/2 minutes.

MICHAŁ KURTYKA: Thank you very much. That’s an excellent question, and that’s a very difficult one because we are entering into a very fragmented world. So it’s much more difficult to develop practical ways of translating this unity into something tangible.

But my answer would be at two levels: global and local. At the global level, I believe that we need to develop new sets of clean and water-saving technologies because you remember what minister of defense referred to, the three elements—energy, food, and water security. So I believe that we should develop a level of global community, and that’s an effort of science, that’s an effort of enough scale for these technologies to develop. We need to develop water savings, pollution-free, emission-free technologies.

But then how to link this with what you spoke about—local families—because that’s the challenge. Yes, the change is happening locally, so how to provide these global technologies at local—at the level of local communities.

And I believe that in today’s world it will be extremely complicated to develop financial tools. Why? Rich North is basically out of money; South is disillusioned after COVID for any support of Western countries. So we need to develop new forms of solidarity, and I believe that if we, let’s say, go for a global fund of technology where you locate IPs, then you can also provide these technologies at local level.

Now let me take an example of Indonesia. I like very much because Indonesia is champion in geothermal energy. World’s biggest resources of geothermal lies here in Indonesia because of volcanos, et cetera. But this is extremely water-consuming technology, yes? You need to extract the heat with water from deep of the ground.

But there are right now research in California—an example for our American friends of solidarity—of deep water-free geothermal. So why not to put the disposition of Indonesia this water-free geothermal technology so that local communities can develop their own energy sources, and they can become resilient in terms of their ability to produce not only energy, but also out of this cheap energy also food and safe water.

PETER ENGELKE: Thank you. Thank you so much.

So Bo, the problem of food waste is enormous globally, right?

BO HOLMGREEN: Yes.

PETER ENGELKE: But you’ve been running a very successful non-profit here in the region that has made, I think it’s fair to say, significant inroads into addressing this problem. I wonder if you might draw from that experience and talk about how scalable this solution set you found is to the rest of the world.

BO HOLMGREEN: Right. Well, it’s certainly scalable and that’s why it’s so important that we do the right research, and we get lots of people on board to create a lot of little SOSs around the world, and so on, right?

But we looked at the supply chain, right, and we’ve heard these two days about everything from fertilizer to not having war, and so on, right? So I’m going to go back to my walk in Kyiv, of all places, right. And I was creating SOS at the time, and I had never heard of the Ukrainian holocaust before. I must admit I was uneducated on that, right? But I went down to those big rocks where they have the carved letters, and I was standing there reading for an hour. It was cold, but I was so fascinated because this was when Stalin simply took all the food away from Ukraine and brought it to Russia. And I don’t know how many millions of people died from starvation, right?

So we can optimize society—that’s what we’re doing with circular economy. We’re optimizing everything we can to make it the best possible world for all of us. But if you have crazy people that just do things like that, as you talked to, there is little we can do. So government has to come into it. Government needs to work together, but governments also need to do their own thing.

The first thing that happened in America, which was great, was something called the Good Samaritan law. You know, everybody sues each other in America, right, but the Good Samaritan law is that I can give you food, and if I don’t have any reason to believe it’s bad, even if it was bad and somebody gets sick from it, you cannot sue me, right?

The other good thing that comes now from America is this focus on not having an expiration—no, a best-by date, right? A real expiration date, that’s OK, but a best-by date—so many people look at that and throw it away far too early, right, and that’s where we have to come with the… chain trucks and pick all this stuff up, and recycle it same day out, right?

And there are just some things where government can do, and the last thing governments really need to do—and I love the fact—if we are actually going to send a strong message to the G20 leadership, it has to do with the environment, right? Like I said, for every kilo of food we can save, the world is a better place in the emissions and so on. So tax benefits, financial motivation to have carbon reduction is essential.

If I could, you know, issue a certificate to all the hotels and whatever we pick up food from, and they could have a tax benefit, now we would have them lining up, right, so government really needs to step up in all these countries. And I will say it is happening. I mean, we now work with a prime minister in Thailand, and they are very excited about our food banks up there, and Cloud Food Bank, and whatever we call it. But we have to show the vision and then get the support from the governments, and that’s fortunately happening, so it will be better but still a long ways to go.

PETER ENGELKE: A ways to go, but a hopeful message.

BO HOLMGREEN: Yes.

PETER ENGELKE: And I think that’s fitting to end this panel with the ambassador. We began with you, and your country is going through some—obviously, some very difficult times this year. But your message was also hopeful. You were one of the panelists who stressed the theme of unity, and I’d like maybe to have you discuss—I think it would be remiss of me not to have you, as the ambassador, to talk about how you are working with our host country, Indonesia—how Ukraine is working with Indonesia in the area of food security. And maybe you can leave us with some hopeful words about the constructive relationships that exist in this part of the world and your part of the world that will move us forward on this really critical topic that we’ve been spending two days now talking about.

AMBASSADOR VASYL HAMIANIN: Yeah, thanks. Well, good question again—not for five minutes, but I’ll try.

PETER ENGELKE: OK.

AMBASSADOR VASYL HAMIANIN: Well, in a nutshell, this is a very challenging market, and in terms of it’s a big country with big consumption. And, you know, I guess the—all the exporters of the world are fighting for this market like they fight for like say for Chinese or Indian markets. That’s why it’s challenging for me, but I’m very optimistic. I’m always an optimist so after we defeat the enemy in the nearest future and everything will gradually get back to normal, we’ll have a plan about developing the agricultural business and the trading business between Ukraine and Indonesia, and at large with the region of ASEAN because, well, good news is that two days ago my minister signed the agreement—TAC agreement, so we became partners with ASEAN so there will be a bigger market and integrated market. We’d like to integrate more on that.

Then, well, optimistic news is that, you know, we are talking about farm to fork, right, and it’s not about just make people eat enough; it make people eat quality food and diverse food, right, so I think Ukraine is not about just a wheat bucket, as we also talk about.

PETER ENGELKE: Right.

AMB: HAMIANIN: It’s also about the diversity, food technologies, processing technology, et cetera.

So my goals will be three, and I hope the businesspeople here will listen, and—I will be very open for communication on that. I will be concentrating on three things. First is the diversity. It will be not just wheat or corn or something; it will be—it will be all sorts of things. Actually I’ve explored the market—it’s fruits and vegetables and everything, and the products.

Second is added value. It must be—it must be like processed food.

And third is, you know, following the trends because the market is always changing so we can follow the trends, follow the technologies, stick with the technologies and like, you know, create joint venture or whatever.

So it will be a challenging business, but I’m confident—looking confidently. Thank you.

PETER ENGELKE: Thank you.

So I am going to bring the panel to a close. Could you all please join me in applauding our panelists here today?

And once again, thank you all for attending this conference. As a representative of the Atlantic Council, we are delighted that every one of you is here, and we look forward to a robust afternoon of conversations.

Thank you so much.

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Global Food Security Forum day two: How the G20 can use innovation and cooperation to fight hunger

Atlantic Council — Sun, 13 Nov 2022 16:12:38 +0000

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Flagship Event Sat, November 12, 2022 • 12:00 am ET

Highlights from the Global Food Security Forum

Economy & Business Resilience & Society

Event transcript

Uncorrected transcript: Check against delivery

ANNOUNCER: Please welcome to the stage Global Head, Inclusive Economic Growth, Abt Associates and Nonresident Senior Fellow, GeoEconomics Center, Atlantic Council Dr. Nicole Goldin.

NICOLE GOLDIN: Great. Well, thank you. It’s such a pleasure to see you all. This has been a really deep and tremendous couple of days of conversation, and our job is not an easy one. We want to take what we’ve heard, especially on solutions, and try to unpack that just a little more, add a little bit more concreteness and specificity, and really, I think, make it practical so that we can inform the G20 agenda and take some of these great ideas and solutions forward. We’ve been hearing about technology. We’ve been hearing about finance. We’ve been hearing about the food-water-energy intersection, if you will. We’ve been hearing about supply and demand, which, as an economist, is of course music to my ears. So we’ve got a lot of talk to talk about.

And I’ve got a great panel here to help me do that.

Immediately on my left is Qingfeng Zhang. He is the chief of rural development and food security at the Asian Development Bank.

To his left we have Bakur Kvezereli. He is the CEO of Ztractor, which I’m sure you’re all excited to learn more about.

Then we have Max Peterson. He is the—he is the vice president of worldwide public services at Amazon Web Services—excuse me, Amazon public sector.

And then we have Mr. Erez Fait, the co-founder and president of Agrinoze.

And I believe we have—yes, we have Dr. Arif Husain, chief economist at the World Food Programme.

And we’re lucky to be joined by His Excellency Oleksandr Kubrakov, minister of infrastructure in Ukraine.

So welcome. Thank you.

I’d like to get right to it. We’ve heard and we’ve been talking about how conflict, COVID-19, and climate change have exacerbated the situation and the food security crisis. So let me go first to your excellency the minister to ask: How has the food security situation in Ukraine changed since the war began? And maybe you can speak a little bit more about the grain deal and what that has done to the situation.

MINISTER OLEKSANDR KUBRAKOV: OK. Thank you very much for this opportunity.

And from the first days of full-scale mobilization, Ukraine infrastructure become one of the main targets for the enemy. And according to the World Bank report, the damage caused to the transport sector of Ukraine, it’s about 30 billion US dollars and losses reach 26 billion of US dollar. Since the beginning of Russian mobilization, all Ukrainian ports in the Black Sea and Azov have been forcibly closed to the entire—to the entry and exit of ships. The seaports of Berdiansk, Mariupol, and Skadovsk are under occupation and they’re closed until control is to be resolved. And before the full-scale mobilization, Ukraine supplied more than 15 percent of world’s corn export, more than 10 percent of wheat, and more than 50 percent of sunflower oil, and many other products of agriculture and industry. About 70 percent of Ukrainian products [are shipped] by sea, mostly by Ukrainian seaports on Black Sea.

So after just due to military mobilization, traditional supply chains were lost and at least 70 million people around the world are at risk of starvation for the moment. And it was very important for us to start Black Sea Grain Initiative because in peril we started—I mean, at the beginning of the war we started development of alternative channels of export of our product. It was, first of all, our seaports on Dnieper River, our railway lines in direction to European Union, and a lot of activities were performed where realized in cooperation with European Union with increased capacity of existing border cross checkpoints. We did—we did a lot of projects with our neighboring countries and solidarity lanes. It was important step in direction to fight food crisis and economic crisis as well. Thanks.

Important step was Black Sea Grain Initiative. It was signed on 22 of July. From that moment, from the first of August, we already exported about 10.3 million tons of agricultural products. Mostly, it’s Africa and Asia. European countries as well, but again, key regions historically was Asia and Africa, especially during the last years. More than 20,000—200,000 tons of agricultural export—of agricultural products were exported in cooperation with United Nations World Food Programme. And again, Black Sea Grain Initiative thanks to our allies, thanks to United Nations, Turkey, I think we know very well, I mean, how it’s important, how this initiative influence on global food prices. Each crisis during working of the initiative, we see how prices is growing 5, 7, 8 percent and then again, while initiative started working, prices became lower and lower, so—on the same 5, 7, and 10 percent. So on our side, we are doing our best in order to prolong.

NICOLE GOLDIN: Thank you very much, Mr. Minister. Hopefully we’ll be able to get you back momentarily.

But it’s a good segue. We’ve heard from other Ukrainian colleagues as well as a number of experts that have spoken in our panels that the food crisis and the compounding conflict, climate change, COVID has had a disproportionate impact on women, on children, in some regions on indigenous communities. So I wanted to turn to—first to you, Qingfeng, to talk about what are some of the strategies and how are you thinking about addressing those most at risk.

QINGFENG ZHANG: Thank you so much, Nicole. And thanks for the Council invite Asian Development Bank attend this very important session immediately before the G20.

Again, I just follow the conversation by our Ukraine minster of the infrastructure. After the Ukraine—the Russian invasion of the Ukraine, you can see the so many countries suffering in the Asia-Pacific. At least 13 countries relying one of the three key essential commodities from the Russia or the Ukraine. But you know, the—in addition to the supply chain disruptions by the COVID and also this war, climate change was severely effect the Asia-Pacific. Just thinking about this year, the floods in the Pakistan and heat wave in India, and also the droughts in the Yangtze River, basically involved 4 billion, you know, populations, over 40 percent of this world populations.

So with this severe challengings, Asian Development Bank, as one of the key efforts in the region, we formulate 14 billion US dollars from the 2022 to 2025 to address the food insecurity, covering both the immediate responses and also the long-term measures to build up the resilience. This year, we’re going to deliver 3 billion US dollars immediate in response, provide the working capital to the small SMEs, mitigate the fertilizer shortage, and more importantly also try to supply financing facility to address supply chain disruptions.

And as for the long-term measures like the three years 2023-2025, we are already programming about 10.7 billion US dollars focused on three key areas. One is small agriculture. Very much it supports the participation of the women and also the small farmers. Second highlights digitalization of agricultural value chain, highlights financial inclusion, find out the way to reach out to the small farmers and also to help this microfinance, to help the—our process quickly lead to our farmers. Lastly, you know, these two days we discuss about the fertilizer, natural-based solutions. We are going to introduce innovative financing facility to scale up capital investment, nature-based solutions, including the payment for ecological services…

Probably let me just pause here and then we can come back, discuss about the concrete, you know, measures. Thank you.

NICOLE GOLDIN: Fantastic. Thank you so much.

Arif, I’d like to come to you on a similar question. Qingfeng, you know, talked a bit about using or working through small- and medium-sized enterprises as one strategy to get at those that are often marginalized who also kind of dominate the landscape, right, of the economy in the market systems. In your work with the World Food Programme, how are you thinking about addressing and meeting the needs of those most at risk?

ARIF HUSAIN: Thank you. Thank you for the opportunity. Really happy to be here and I think this is an excellent question. I can tell you that I’ve been in this work for about 20 years now and what we are seeing this year, it’s, in fact, terrible.

You know, one thing which we talk about is that, you know, when the World Food Programme is setting records, it’s not necessarily a good thing for the world, right? And what we have been doing is we have been setting records since 2020. We fed 115 million people in 2020, 128 million people in 2021, and this year we plan to feed 150—more than 150 million people. So you can see that this is a, you know, gradual increase in the number of people who need assistance.

And coming to your question, the vast majority of the people we work with, they are essentially in rural areas. They are women and children. They are in agriculture. So on one side it is critically important to save lives, right? In 21^st century, if you are talking about 50 million plus people a step away from famine in hunger emergencies in upwards of 45 countries, I mean, that’s telling. That should be unacceptable.

And if we are going to deal with this, obviously, we need to deal with the root causes. First and foremost, still it’s the wars. It’s the conflict. Then, obviously, it’s the climate. And then it is economic marginalization, right? And these are not just words; this is what we are seeing out there.

So, first and foremost, we need to save lives. And after that, we need to start talking about changing lives. And that is where we are focusing a lot.

What is also very different is that we have learned very quickly that extreme points, they don’t work. So if you’re pure humanitarian, it doesn’t work. If you’re pure development, it still doesn’t work. And we are seeing that there is this recognition of this fact. And when you now look at IMF or you look at World Bank, they are coming into the space of where people FCV—fragility, conflict, and violence. At the same time agencies like mine, who is mainly humanitarian, they’re moving towards enabling people, changing lives, and trying to meet them in the middle. And if we can do that, and if we can bring the private sector into this, maybe we get out of this.

One other thing I wanted to mention following the Ukrainian minister, this Black Sea Initiative. This has saved a lot of lives. But you know, this is—initial deal was for 120 days, which is going to come to an end on November 19, essentially a week from now. This needs to continue. This needs to continue beyond till this war is done and trade comes back to normal. And if that happens, we at least dampen—slightly dampen the impact which we are seeing around the world, and that’s—that must happen going forward.

NICOLE GOLDIN: Thank you very much. We are going to come back on some of those governance points that you raised.

And I’m glad you mentioned the private sector. We’ve got three great representatives from the private sector. So let me turn to you, Bakur, to Matt, and to Erez and ask each of you to just tell us about, again, as concretely as you can how your product or the application of your product is disrupting the food security system—positively disrupting, I would say, or helping communities to adapt to climate change or to some of these situations. Bakur, why don’t we start with you.

BAKUR KVEZERELI: Thank you. Thank you.

I think we had great speakers these two days and great messages which should be carry over the G20 discussions. I think there has been a consensus in this room, in this forum that, you know, next three decades we will need to produce 70 percent more food with less water available for farming, with less soil available for farming, with less labor force available for farming. And I believe that—and unpredictable weather is contributing to all this. I don’t want to sound very Silicon Valleyish kind of approach that technology can fix everything.

Of course, we will need the policies, we will need financing, and everything. But I believe—it’s my personal position, not our company, in this case—that automation and autonomy, which will allow us to farm with less labor force, indoor farming or vertical farming where one acre of the facility we can produce the vegetables of the, I don’t know 20, 30, 40 acres.

Of course, electrification will play its role in machinery electrification, which is our message which we work on, to electrify agriculture in general. But with agricultural machinery will play its role on dependence on energy, obviously.

And alternative proteins. We cannot ignore the alternative proteins are nice to have. We are relying on very few protein sources. We talked about that yesterday, today. And we need to increase—diverse the proteins which we can use for food processing or production and so on.

I think that’s our perspective of a startup or technologies on that perspective, is to introduce more tech and, on top of that, digitalize agriculture as much as possible, which will bring transparency, which will bring predictability, and we can plan better. And our partner in this game is Amazon with their beautiful products in AWS, which supports a lot of robotics companies in our field, I think, that all synergy between very established corporations which have a great experience of digitalizing other sectors can be brought to agriculture and we can fix significant portion of the problems.

NICOLE GOLDIN: Fantastic.

And very quickly, for those that may not have heard you talk about Ztractor, just, you know, how does that fit in and what exactly is for those that might not be aware?

BAKUR KVEZERELI: We are manufacturing autonomous electric tractor. It’s completely unmanned. There is no seat for a driver on it. And we did it by purpose. We did some research before we started to design this tractor. Our belief is that with many, many tractors around the world we can connect them on one cloud and do the real-time data gathering from the machines, which will improve efficiency and give us better predictability of which crop is produced where—what will be the yield of almonds in California and Spain—and then the traders—we’ve met a few commodity traders here—can do better deals on futures. And—

NICOLE GOLDIN: So that’s a great segue to Max—

BAKUR KVEZERELI: Exactly.

NICOLE GOLDIN:—to talk about not only with Ztractor, but in general how is cloud computing changing and disrupting positively—

MAX PETERSON: Well, I’m super excited just listening right here to what one company is doing to reimagine how they deliver scale to farming. And I listened both to Qingfeng, who talked about the importance of small farmers, a really interesting example of how you approach automation. At Amazon, we believe that our responsibility is to be able to provide the sort of enabling technology that lets all of these solutions come to life.

I also agree with the gentleman from the World Food Programme. It’s not one thing. It’s not development activities in isolation. It’s not humanitarian aid in isolation. It’s not technology in isolation. We’ve got to find the ways to make all of these things work together and be used in the appropriate areas around the world because it’s—there’s going to be different solutions that are based locally.

I’ll give you one specific example because you—Nicole, you wanted specific examples. In India, we work with a company called Cropin who deployed something called SmartFarm. And India is an economy with a lot of small farmers, and so it was not important only just to focus on the food-production piece but also on the economic viability of all of these small farmers. And what Cropin used was they used a combination of technology running on Amazon. They integrated satellites. They integrated overhead Earth observation. They integrated Internet of Things types of sensors. They integrated open public datasets like the Amazon Sustainability Data Initiative. And they’re able to bring precise insights to the farmers on the ground, over 7 million farmers covering about 16 million acres of land, and they can help them understand precisely how to apply, you know, different technologies to—you know, to produce the crops in the most effective way for them, providing both food and livelihood.

NICOLE GOLDIN: What a fantastic example. And we’re going to carry on with the specifics, and that’s great.

We’ve heard a lot, Erez, of conversation around water and that linkage between water, food security, the impact of drought and of climate change and reducing water. So tell us how autonomous irrigation and Agrinoze is positively disrupting and bringing new solutions to the table.

EREZ FAIT: So, first of all, we are Indonesian. And before the food security became topic, the minister of defense was already thinking about it—before COVID, before the Ukraine war. So he gave us challenge to bring here the technology and to implement it in Indonesia. And we made the plan to send people to do the training. Apparently, two weeks after we started COVID came and block everything. So we manage with two people—which one is Wija, one is Yuza, that they were one of the project management—everything through Zoom to train and to make the system up and running until today. And this system shows that technology can overcome barriers.

So we are using the technology how to, I would say, fix or help the challenges that were discussed here. Because in all the discussions here, I heard about problems—water, finance, fertilizers, knowledge, scale-up, all those things that are challenges for the humans—but we are coming from technology solution, so we know how to take technology and to solve problems.

So, first of all, so we have to think—to know that the minister had this vision long ago, before it became topic. And that reason, in Indonesia we are most prepared compared to other place in the world. Although now we work in California and other countries, but still we have a base of people locally that know how to use the technology and they grow things that they never think can be grown in sea level.

Now, how we do it? We do it by automation and autonomous and taking all the data into algorithm with machine learning, which actually nursing the plant like baby in incubator. Because baby in incubator, it doesn’t cry. The sensors knows in advance what he needs, not like outside. So we develop a solution that is on the roots zone and manage the zones 24/7, even not exist in nature. You can take, like, hydroponic in the soil. So the roots are always efficient and produce.

In countries like Indonesia, which is the Equator, 24/7 means because the temperature is always correct. And we eliminate the depend on rain and climate. So once we have the soil and we have the ability to cultivate, everything is possible.

So the other thing that I want to mention—because the minister is the vision—is to think about what we call mobile farming, because we create kind of Ikea kit that could connect all the needs in one system. So, because Indonesia is big, we said let’s make a system that we can ship on a truck, put in a place, put the hose or the dripline, and start to work. This is counter of another problem.

The other thing is local production. In Indonesia, one of the thing is how to—it’s a big country. Logistic is big. Shipping the hose or the dripline, it’s very expensive because it’s mostly air. So we have a plan. And will discuss with agencies they are looking to contribute, like the DFC, because they want to enable the food security and the health and women and youth. So, actually, in our activity in Indonesia, we have young people that do crowdfunding in order to start this kind of initiative. And this shows that there is a need and it make people interesting and make people excited.

And then what we think is how to expand small villages. So because the technology is kind of centralized, we enable small farmers that have one, two hectares that one system can irrigate their plots and they just do the cultivation. So this is in general what we do.

Sitting next to me, the Amazon. Amazon is a big cloud, but we need to make the cloud give rain and the right rain. So I challenge him: How do we take this cloud and make it available to the people to make it useable? So this discussion between us later on.

NICOLE GOLDIN: It’s a great point and it speaks to kind of a quick follow-up for the—for the three of you in particular before we come back on some governance, which is: Where does partnerships come in, right? We’ve been talking about, we’ve heard about the scale. The scale of this challenge requires urgent action and it requires long-term thinking as well. So you mentioned partnerships. You mentioned sort of B2B. What are the challenges of scale? And when you think about partnerships—at Abt Associates, you know, we found in our work implementing projects for Feed the Future in Cambodia and Egypt of the US government that partnering with government, with local private sector, with the small- and medium-sized enterprises, and with civil society is really critical, especially for that inclusion aspect.

So, Bakur, maybe we’ll come to you first, and then we’ll go to Erez and then Max for your thoughts on scaling and partnerships.

BAKUR KVEZERELI: Thank you. I think, to go back to what was discussed for two days here, I think we received two loud, long wakeup calls, which are COVID and the war. And it’s not only food community; it’s everyone, logistics, all businesses, and society in general. And I think this will force collaboration because we need to find fast solutions yesterday. It’s already past due to solve basic issues in, let’s say—I don’t want to point to any particular problem, but there are issues where we can collaborate with government, with corporations, with other industries which are never been involved in agriculture like aviation. Aviation has the best sensors. We use two sensors on our tractor from aviation. They’re expensive, but they are fixing the issues no one have applied to agriculture before, right? And I think because of the circumstances, which are unfortunate, but we need to learn from this and make it—make the decisions now.

NICOLE GOLDIN: I love that example of cross-industry and thinking outside the box, and it goes back to the data point that both you and Erez mentioned and how you’re bringing data into it. And I’m going to come back to you, Erez, on this kind of scalability and partnerships. And then, Max, we’ll come to you.

EREZ FAIT: So first of all, scale means knowledge and team. So we have now in Indonesia about six project that we are planning already to start using the crowd finance and local entrepreneur. And although some of them are approaching a huge area—five 1,000 hectare—we start only with one because part of it is education, to build a local capacity. So this is the way that we can easily expand in each area, putting the seed. Later on, it’s only expansion.

So, again, it’s important to understand the people that help us are not farmers. They’re coming from defense and the economy, but they understand how to scale up because, in the end of the day, the issue is scale up. And it means how to educate the people, make the technology available.

So part of our solution now is mobile application where the farmer can, in a way, have direct relation with the plant through our system. So it’s not anywhere—any more blind because today they are blind. They don’t know, there is a disease, what to do. There is something happen, they don’t know what to do. So part of our solution, because it’s online using cloud, we enable to close the circle. Like today in Jakarta there is a problem, we know the problem before they know because when they sleep and there is a leak we get alarm. So all these things are available today.

So the issue, how to connect all the dots of the agencies that has the money, the agencies they have the needs. So, actually, the model that we have in Indonesia we are now copying to Uzbekistan, to Vietnam, to all those countries we have discussion with. And I’m going from here to UAE, and over there they don’t have employees. So I’m going to make people train here to work over there. So you can see that we are looking at the global problem as one problem and solving it the same way.

NICOLE GOLDIN: So, Max, I’m sure Amazon Web Services has some interesting thoughts on scale and scalability. I’d love to hear them.

MAX PETERSON: Well, actually, yeah. Good call. Amazon actually created a new leadership principle just about a year and a half ago called success and scale bring broad responsibility.

And I want to shift, though, from talking about the technology partnerships to talk about people partnerships, because part of the way that we’re going to all improve is to innovate out of this. And there is—I mean, I’m sitting next to two people who I just got the opportunity and met who are driving incredible innovation. At AWS, we recognize that we need a place to bring these sorts of innovations together. You need to include universities and research organizations and government and nonprofits and NGOs and industry.

And so we created something called cloud innovation centers. We do these in combination with universities around the world. We’ve currently got a dozen of these cloud innovation centers in operation around the world and they do exactly that. They serve as a place to bring together all of the people with incredible innovative ideas with the data that they need to make good data-driven decisions and with some technology from Amazon to be able to come up with these ideas.

And by the way, those 12 cloud innovation centers just so far in 2022 have done over a hundred innovation projects. And so we create these innovation challenges. They could be food security. They could be health. They could be anything that’s relevant to the local community. And it’s a phenomenal way to build the partnerships that you talked about.

NICOLE GOLDIN: That’s such a great example, and I don’t think we hear enough or talk enough about the importance of the academic community and that research piece. And it’s great to see you bringing that innovation and that academics.

We talked about sort of technology as an enabling factor, and another aspect of the conversation these last couple days has been about governance and the importance of governance, both at the national and in the multilateral context, to support aligning incentives, to support innovation, investment, and inclusion as well. And so I want to come back to you, Qingfeng, to ask you to kind of speak briefly about multilateral governance. You mentioned some models in particular on the financing side. We haven’t gotten at that. What are some specific aspects of models of multilateral governance that you can—that you could speak to?

QINGFENG ZHANG: Thank you so much, Nicole. Again, I—you know, if we’re talking about the difference between this crisis and also 2008 crisis, you know, good news is that—our colleagues in this panel already mentioned about it—we know the crisis much better than before and we have a good tools in our hand—you know, the technology, digital technology, you know, remote sensing and many other tools in our hand—to address the crisis. But at same time, we also know that the scale and also the complexity of the crisis much bigger than the 2008 crisis, so it requires cooperations between the international organizations and also the governments.

So this time we learned the lessons from the 2008 crisis, so immediately after the Russia invasion of the Ukraine and then in May all of the IFIs—international financial institutions; ADB, World Bank, African Development Bank, IFA—all of them get together, formulate, and they launch action plan to address food insecurity. Basically, we agree to adopt coherent strategy focused on five key areas.

Number one is the support the vulnerable people.

Two, promote the open trade.

Three, mitigate the fertilizer shortage.

Four is support the small farmers and also productions.

Finally, focus on long-term resilience…

So after that, of course, is the G7 hosted by Germany where we are—you know, establish sort of the global alliance on the food security. Just a few days ago, under the COP27, we jointly launch what we call is a food security dodgeball. So that means we’re going to watch what happening in agricultural market information, but at the same time also track our financial… and how to address the most vulnerable people.

Again, I’m not saying this is perfect. So many things need to be addressed. But again, compared to the 2008 crisis, I think the international community responded much quicker, much more, you know, coordinated, you know. And then they—I think going to be also effective.

Let me just pause here.

NICOLE GOLDIN: Thank you. It’s a good example and it’s one I will bring back to my colleagues at the Atlantic Council GeoEconomics Center as we’re thinking about reforming and what the Bretton Woods 2.0 will look like as we think about World Bank and IMF reforms.

And I want to come to you—back to you, Arif. Again, thinking about multilateral, you’re operating in—within the UN system. What are some of the aspects of the work? And what have you seen work well at the multilateral level in terms of multilateral governance and also in the financing aspect?

ARIF HUSAIN: Right. So excellent question.

First and foremost, I mean, you know, what we are seeing is that there is a consensus on the problem statements. You have IMF, World Bank, WTO, World Food Programme, FAO doing joint statements on what’s at stake. And on that side, essentially three things come to mind as the problem statements.

First one is that, as bad as it is right now, you can call this affordability crisis, meaning food is available but it may not be at the right place or it might not be at the right cost. But it is available. But if we don’t sort out the fertilizer issue and sort it out now, today’s affordability crisis will turn into tomorrow’s availability crisis, which means even higher prices. And I don’t think we can afford that in 2023. That’s one side.

The second one where we are coming together is basically about which countries are in trouble. What are the characteristics of countries which are in trouble? And what I can say is that if you’re a poor country, if you have high debt, if you happen to import your food, your fuel, and your fertilizer, you are in trouble. So what is the solution on that side? We need to start talking about debt relief or hunger relief, meaning instead of poor countries making their debt payments they could use the same resources to import their food and their fertilizer. This is something which needs to be considered. There is a precedent in the sense of there is debt relief for climate. Why not debt relief for hunger relief?

The third thing where there is consensus building is about, you know, our export bases for our staple commodities are extremely, extremely thin. What I mean by that is that less than 10 countries make up 70, 80 percent of our export base for wheat, corn, rice, soybean, even fertilizer. And, worse yet, less than five countries hold stocks of these commodities at 90 percent level. That kind of situation means that whenever a shock happens to any one of these countries you feel the pain all around the world, and war in Ukraine is just the latest example of that. So we need to sort of sort out the diversification problem going forward.

Now, very last thing on that is that, frankly, we have the money, we have the technology, we have the—it’s not about those things. At the end of the day, it is about staying the course because many of these things, if we are going to solve them, it’s going to take time. That requires political will and staying with the problem till it’s done, and that’s something which we have been missing. We missed it in 2008. We missed it in 2011. Hopefully, this time around we stick with the problem till it is resolved.

NICOLE GOLDIN: Thank you. I’m glad you reiterated and brought the debt issue back into the conversation. That’s something that we talked a little bit about earlier and yesterday as well. And it really is critical to keep that in context, especially to your point about as we go into the G20 and the finance ministers are meeting, and that is something that I know is on the agenda, and there is certainly a clear linkage, especially right now.

Believe it or not, we only have a few minutes left. Time has flown by. So I’m going to ask you all one last question. We talked about our successes and what is working, but sometimes we can learn as much if not more from talking about what hasn’t worked or what we haven’t tried yet and why. So in just about a minute, I’ll ask you all for a kind of final thought what you are excited to see moving forward, a key lesson learned within your own company, within your own product, or just something you’ve seen in the community that you think we can do better. And I will start with Bakur because you just raised your hand. And we’ll have just one minute each. Thank you.

BAKUR KVEZERELI: Thank you. Thank you.

So the—my thoughts—all this, again, going back to the discussions—is that there is—there are different agreements like Madrid agreement on one topic, there is the Paris agreement on climate. We don’t have a food agreement so far. There are multiple, but not as global and as powerful as—we don’t have targets. We don’t know what our target as a globe in food. And I think that Bali, Indonesia agreement in the next two days or three days will be a good start, good base for a future moving forward, just to agree on target what we need to achieve in grain production, in meat production, and so on and so on, right? I think that’s where we failed and now we need to do that type of agreement so everyone knows what’s our vision and what we want to achieve in what time period.

NICOLE GOLDIN: Great. Excellent suggestion. Thank you.

Erez, coming to you.

EREZ FAIT: So, first of all, I would like to refer to Ukraine because it’s on the cloud, Ukraine. So because of our experience of doing things remotely, we are working now with some Ukraine farmers that moved the agriculture from the area that was captured by Russia into the other side of Ukraine in order to provide food. So the ability to send a system remotely and just explain what to do, it’s part of our activity here. So this is the advantage of technology.

The other thing is how to make a small move in order to make a bigger move, because everybody speak about the problems and the thing is how to start to open this dam to bring the results to everybody now. Because, as you said, the availability is now and the issue of challenges is now, and we cannot delay food delivery. That’s the problem. We can delay things like luxury, but not food. So these are the challenges now.

NICOLE GOLDIN: Very inspirational. Thank you.

Arif, coming to you for a final thought, an inspired failure, or something that we can all take forward or do differently.

ARIF HUSAIN: Look, I mean, you know, there is a lot of hope. And frankly, this is—hunger is a solvable problem. It’s not just saying that; it really is when you look at it.

My final thought just is that, you know, we are always talking about whenever there is a project offered or something is offered, you know, we always talk about, you know, how much is it going to cost to do that. Maybe we need to turn this question on its head and start asking: What if we don’t do it, what is the cost? What is the cost of inaction? And if that answer scares you, you better do it. And if it doesn’t, it’s fine.

Right now, the cost of inaction of not dealing with food security in terms of destabilization, in terms of terrorism, in terms of migration out of destitution is huge. It’s just that we don’t pay it right away; we pay it a few months or a few years later. And I think we need to start thinking about that very, very seriously when we are making financial decisions and political will about solving many of these problems because they come to our doorsteps as well. Thank you.

NICOLE GOLDIN: Thank you. It’s such an important point. The counterfactual can be really powerful, and I think that also speaks to the importance of research and data. And maybe that’s something, as well, that we as a community haven’t been doing as good a job as we need to. And it comes back to that inclusion point.

Qingfeng, final thought? And then we’ll come to you, Max, to wrap this up.

QINGFENG ZHANG: Thank you so much.

Again, I stay hopeful. I also say G20 is a great platform to really enforce in term of the governance… That very, very effective to really reduce risk of the food insecurity. Now is the time for us to think how we introduce innovations in the G20, reinforce the declarations. Again, you know, since March of this year, at least 20 countries in this area is introduce trade restrictions, really make the market as very panic. So I think this G20 is an opportunity to review what works, what doesn’t, and then they incorporate the lessons and they release new declaration. I think that is our hope.

Thank you.

NICOLE GOLDIN: Thank you.

Max?

MAX PETERSON: I will quickly wrap it up, just say I’m incredibly inspired by all of the people on the panel here and the sharing that they had. And one thing that we try and do is encourage people to think big. And there’s a lot of really big thinking here. The challenge with thinking big, however, is if you’re thinking big enough you’re going to fail. But what you need to do is you need to realize that food security is—failure is not an option. And so we just look at ways that we can help people fail, learn, improve, and move faster, and I’m very encouraged by all of my panelists here that we can—that this is solvable and that we can solve it. We just have to think big and take action.

NICOLE GOLDIN: And fail, fail, fail. So thank you and learn from it. Please join me in thanking this fantastic panel. We could have talked all day. Thank you very much.

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Global Food Security Forum day one: The top food security solutions for G20 leaders to watch

Atlantic Council — Sat, 12 Nov 2022 13:28:41 +0000

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Flagship Event Sat, November 12, 2022 • 12:00 am ET

Highlights from the Global Food Security Forum

Economy & Business Resilience & Society

Event transcript

Uncorrected transcript: Check against delivery

MICHAEL VATIKIOTIS: Please take your seats so we can begin. It’s pretty much a follow-on from the session that my friend and former colleague Adam Schwarz just moderated. He ended up talking about a few solutions. What I’d like to do today—and first of all, let me just introduce myself. My name is Michael Vatikiotis. I’m reasonably well-known in Indonesia because I lived here before as a journalist. I now work for the Center for Humanitarian Dialogue. It’s a Geneva-based conflict-resolution and mediation organization. We’ve become involved in food security in quite a big way with the outbreak of the war in Ukraine.

But I’d also like to use this opportunity—and I firmly believe that, as has been said already in the room today, the G20 conference meeting of leaders is an excellent opportunity to focus global attention not just on the problem, but also on action and solutions. And so what I’d like to do with the session today—because we will continue this discussion tomorrow—is to kind of draw up a list of ideas where they can be outline or in detail that we can perhaps hope to get the attention of the participants in the G20, and in particular I believe the Indonesian government, which is the host of the conference, if only because I know that President Jokowi himself has a real interest in the issue of food security. And I think it would be a real opportunity for him to say something meaningful and for us to be able to contribute to, at least in a small way, a couple of initiatives that could be put on the table for discussion and end up being agreed upon. So that’s an ambitious goal.

But I would like to start by highlighting one of the things that I think has now become much more evident in terms of food security. And before I open the discussion, I’ll just make this point because, as we’ve heard already today, there’s a lot of discussion about the supply of wheat and grain. But now I think what’s become very evident is that fertilizers are a key issue. According to figures that I’ve seen, even in a conservative scenario the high cost of nitrogen fertilizers is threatening the global production losses of up to 66 million tons of staple crops such as maize, rice, and wheat. And this will affect at least 50 of the most food-insecure countries, reducing the amount of crops they’re able to grow—including here in Indonesia, not necessarily food-insecure but definitely reliant on fertilizers. So that’s, I think, one issues that we should really try to bring to the attention of people here at the G20.

In addition to that, we’ve heard earlier today the importance of trying to draw a closer link between water, food, and energy. I was recently in Jordan, a country that is now increasingly facing water stress. Syria, a country already in conflict, severe water stress that’s generated huge numbers of cholera cases, it’s linked to water but also to food and to energy. And so I think one of the other things we might try to do is talk about how to strength—or, define and strengthen that nexus.

And in that connection, also, we might also want to look at, as we’ve already begun to, the two other issues that are floating around and hovering around food security, which is pandemic preparedness—because in the COVID pandemic there was this move, as we’ve heard already in the room, to impose export restrictions as a sort of knee-jerk reaction. And there perhaps needs to be a mechanism to address that in the future. And then, finally, climate security, which everyone tends to see as a sort of medium- to long-term problem which is already upon us, especially in the African continent.

So, with that, can I begin, please, with fertilizers, since it is an issue that has not been given a lot of airing? And I think it’s an opportunity here at the G20 to really put that on the table. So I would like to first turn to my old friend, Hashim Djojohadikusumo, because he’s into organic fertilizers, which of course is one solution. But I would like him to perhaps help us frame the issue and maybe look at some of the solutions. Hashim.

HASHIM DJOJOHADIKUSUMO: Thank you, Michael. It so happens that I had an interesting conversation with our colleague Pak Kasdi, who earlier addressed us with his remarks. And Pak Kasdi is the secretary general of the Ministry of Agriculture. And he just gave, you know, some tidbits—interesting tidbits about our fertilizer situation. I think Pak Kasdi said that Indonesia actually requires 25 million tons of chemical fertilizer, but we only have an allocation in our budget for 9 million tons, Pak Kasdi. So we actually have a budget shortfall for 60 million tons for chemical fertilizers.

I was aware of this problem about 10 years ago and I got very interested in actually starting some green sustainable solutions, and one of them is actually the production of organic fertilizer. And organic fertilizer from degraded forests, Michael, from biomass, from woody biomass. Actually, my colleague Dr. Willie Smits is the one who got me interested in this. But there are other solutions, as well. And one of the other solutions is the production of fertilizer from maggots. You know, this—maggots, from black soldier flies feeding on waste—and feeding on waste, feeding on garbage, but also feeding on the residue from, let’s say—well, General Clark mentioned about the production of cassava. You know, only 35 percent or 28 percent, I think, of cassava actually becomes tapioca, and the balance 70 percent is waste, General Clark. That waste can actually be the feedstock, Michael, for black soldier flies, which in turn produce maggots, which in turn produce very lucrative, high-quality liquid fertilizer from, dare I say, the urine from the maggots, OK? I know I was a bit squeamish as well thinking about this, but actually, there are many nature-based solutions, as Willie and Pak Kasdi actually mentioned—nature-based solutions to the problem.

Yes, we have a major problem, but there are solutions. And I am optimistic. I am optimistic because there are the greatest force all over the world—not only in Indonesia, but elsewhere; and we’re talking about Africa, we have friends from our African colleagues who were here earlier from the African Ex-Im Bank. There is room for optimism, I think, ma’am. And that is that nature-based solutions, I am convinced, is the wave of the future.

Michael.

MICHAEL VATIKIOTIS: Thank you, Pak Hashim. So perhaps one of the things to perhaps sort of put on the radar of leaders is to start to explore those solutions immediately.

I’m conscious, also, that the immediate problem, of course, is the supply of particularly natural gas and ammonia nitrate, which is actually causing the production of fertilizers to decline drastically and for the price to go up. So I’d like to once again turn to Kira Rudik from Ukraine to talk about—because one of the keys to the supply and reduction of the price would be for a pipeline that actually runs from Russia to Ukraine and out to the—to the Black Sea. So perhaps, Kira, if you could give us a bit more detail on that.

KIRA RUDIK: So I would like to make a general comment and support my colleague, Vasyl, Mr. Ambassador, in terms of us tackling certain problems.

When we are talking about the pipeline and about the fertilizers, we are talking about a small part of the potential solution to the problem that would not fix itself. When we are talking about the issues that will arise in Africa, in all over the world, we for some reason omitting inevitable statement. There is war in Ukraine that was started by Russia, and it would not end by itself. It will just not. It will continue creating more and more issues for the whole world. And, yes, there would be sanctions and we will insist on them being stronger because these are people who are coming to my land to kill my people. And, yes, we will be working against all the transportation of ammonium through our land because we want to weaken Russia, because we want them to stop coming and killing our people, our children, raping our women, and destroying everything that is there to survive.

We are right now in this grain deal, which is a temporary very virtual agreement between many parties—it’s United Nations, Turkey, Ukraine, and Russia—that the transportation of the grains through Ukrainian ports and transportation of the fertilizers through Ukrainian pipeline continue. This is as fragile, as I have already spoken to you before, for so many reasons. Just two weeks ago, Russia decided that they will exit the grain deal, just by the one side, just—early in the morning they said, well, we are exiting.

And as of right now, same as was the general question of the security, we are facing one question that we do not have answer to, is: Who or what in the whole world is organization or a leader that can make Russia stick to their words? It goes same with Ukraine and war in Ukraine. It goes same with keeping up with the energy supplies. It was—it’s going same way with the food supplies. And because there is nobody right now, there are no resolution. There are no security guarantees that could be put in place so there could be a peace deal. There is no way for the grain deal to be put in place and be signed by all—by all the parties. You know why? Because neither U.N. nor Turkey nor anybody else can force Russia to execute to the word that they have given. And this is why inside Ukraine the deal is perceived as very virtual and something that would not last long.

I think everybody at these tables understand how essential for the world food security this ability is. And I want to stress again how fragile every single path of every single ship now is. It depends on the emotion, on the word, on unreliability of the country that is an aggressor and has been acknowledged a terrorist state by so many other countries. So when we are talking about resolving food security crisis, we must not close our eyes on the point that we must resolve security crisis first, because everything else that we will be doing—all the plans that we will be putting together—will be dropped by this one question: What or who will pressure Russia to keep their part of the bargain?

MICHAEL VATIKIOTIS: Thank you, Kira. And do you think that—and let me just follow up with a question. Do you think that actually comes down to, as—because it’s, obviously, in Russia’s economic interest—to payments to—I mean, in order to—this issue of how to keep their word—to essentially assuring and ensuring the payments?

MS. RUDIK: For the last eight years—and I want to again inform everybody that war in Ukraine started eight years ago. Right now is just a full-scale escalation. For the last eight years, the strategy of the leaders of the world was let’s have economic ties with Russia the way that they would be happy, that they would be satisfied, that they would be fed up, and then they would not have any intention or any logical reasons to attack. And they—then we will just make it too expensive for them to fight.

Unfortunately, this strategy failed. So the economic ties with Europe and the reliance of European countries on Russians’ energy and the billions of dollars that every single day are being paid by European countries to Russia did not stop them from attacking. Same way having money flowing in and having payments being on time and open to them would not stop them from anything. And again, I’m talking from the history and I have proofs to that. Every single day right now is a proof to that. Two weeks ago, when they dropped out of the grain deal, is a proof to that. But nobody can give me the proof of otherwise, that if they will have this assurance that they will continue going on and on on this deal.

We should not be emotional here, but be very logical and act with the historic facts. So, as of right now, all the historic facts I’m using as arguments to prove my point. Economic feeding the tiger and having the economic ties with it does not help and stop the empire of fulfilling on its imperialistic mission, expanding and destroying other nations.

MICHAEL VATIKIOTIS: Thank you, Kira. And I think that actually encapsulates what the challenge will be for the G20 leaders because there will be this argument on the table. But it still leaves the problem, which is of course the price of inputs is rising and is going to cause severe problems for food production in the coming year.

So I’d actually like to turn now and get a perspective on this from Rahmad Pribadi, who is involved in the fertilizer industry, and you know, to give it some perspective on exactly what is likely to happen, if he’s—if he’s here. Yes, he’s over there. Sorry.

RAHMAD PRIBADI: Thank you, Michael. First of all, let me introduce myself. My name is Rahmad Pribadi. I’m the CEO of Pupuk Kaltim, which is the fifth-largest urea producers in Asia-Pacific.

So let me speak—allow me to speak from the perspective of fertilizer producers. The issue in fertilizers is more on affordability rather than availability. Of course, availability is still an issue that we have to carefully watch what’s going on with some export restriction from some countries, but I think the key is affordability.

The affordability of fertilizer has worsened in 2022 because some issues in geopolitics and many other things.

Just to give you a perspective, in—if you prepare pre-crisis and 2022, the urea price has increased about 250 percent, whereas rice—the price of rice remained stable. Price before crisis and after crisis remained the same. So we are seeing now fertilizer becoming more and more expensive for farmer to purchase. And for that reasons, we’ve seen the decline of fertilizer consumptions. Globally, it is about 5 percent. But if you look at Asia, East Asia and South Asia, that number is even higher. That is 6 to 7 percent. That, I think, something that we—everybody has to be concerned about, like what, Michael, you have mentioned. The decrease in consumption of nitrogen fertilizer will immediately impacting food production.

So I guess, to that perspective, I would like to probably propose, if there is any initiatives that this forum can take, I think we all have to work together to make sure that fertilizer price remain affordable for the farmer, especially in Asia where most of the farmer are small farmers. That can be done, I think, through subsidy, which Kasdi has mentioned. But again, Hashim mentioned that the amount that is needed and the fiscal capacity of the government does not match, so that is something that we have to look for the solution.

For a country that—an agricultural country like Indonesia, who is at the same time also gas producers, probably we have to also look at reducing the feedstock price. Natural gas price for fertilizer industry has to be maintained low so that the price of fertilizer, especially for small farmers, can be maintained at a level where it is more affordable. And I think when we are talking about export restrictions on agricultural product, which Mr. Kasdi has mentioned in the previous sessions, I think that also has to include into fertilizers. I think the forum should push for removal of any export restrictions on fertilizer. Hopefully, by doing so fertilizer will be more affordable and the availability can be maintained.

Thank you, Michael.

MICHAEL VATIKIOTIS: So, if I read you correctly, a price-support mechanism for fertilizer. Given the political obstacles to ensuring a more natural supply, then perhaps this is something that requires special attention here at the G20.

And I want now to actually turn to Ambassador Dave Merrill because, you know, earlier today—earlier, in the first session, he talked about the need for the G20 to actually consider mechanisms to provide these kinds of solutions on a collective basis in ways that perhaps have not happened before. And I’m remined that, of course, in one of the earlier G20 meetings, during an economic crisis of 2008, there was a fund established, you know, to address the economic crisis. And I’m wondering if we might want to look at ways in which the G20 could agree to special mechanisms or forums in which these kinds of things could be done.

But, Dave, over to you.

DAVID MERRILL: Well, thank you—is it on? Yeah. Thank you, Michael. You’ve asked me to elaborate a little bit more, and I want to elaborate even more tomorrow so I want to save a little bit for tomorrow. But here are some specific things that we think can be done.

We had an in-depth session on this at the US-Indonesia Society—USINDO—September 9. We had experts from around the world.

Now, one is, of course, the financing of emergency food reserves and distribution. There was something done on that in some G20 meeting that took place this summer. I think it was among the finance ministers. And they, as you would expect, agreed that the multilateral development banks, WFP, FAO, WTO, et cetera should do more. There are some kinds of facilities that they have in mind and we’d like to hear more about what they intend to do. If there were a communique, which we don’t know, we would think that would be part of it, building on what they did this summer with the finance ministers.

There need to be national and local distribution schemes, internationally-coordinated food emergency reserves. I don’t know what they did about that, but you would think that something would be done about that.

And of course, encouraging NGOs and private charities. We’re going to be talking about that tomorrow afternoon. Now, the NGOs and private charities can only do what they can do with what they’ve got, but if the world can get them a little more to work with then they can do more.

It’s been mentioned about fertilizers several times. The fertilizer use is a problem. The fertilizer prices are a problem. We need to minimize trade barriers on fertilizer. We need to improve the liquidity of small and medium enterprises and national fertilizer value chains in lower middle income countries. We need to revisit security schemes for fertilizer—subsidy schemes, sorry—subsidy schemes for fertilizer to make them financially more viable, increase their impact, and improve the efficiency of fertilizer use to assist farmers to do more with less. There’s a lot of technology going around to achieve more with less fertilizer, more efficiency of fertilizer. In fact, there’s even one technology going around—I think there’s a representative here – that does—from Israel—who does productivity increases with no fertilizer—with no fertilizer, just through selective application of water at the right time. So there’s all kinds of technology—increased fertilizer, no fertilizer, the need to be redoubled, retripled, everything else.

Improving the productivity of smallholders growing staple food crops, that more or less goes without saying. But what should be done about that? What should be done to increase the yield—close the yield gaps for smallholders with sustainability? If you can’t have more wheat, you can increase the nutritional quality of diets—programs for women and children, micronutrients, and so on that can make what foods you do have go further. These are fairly obvious prescriptions, but I don’t think they’ve been written down.

Promoting agricultural research. A lot of us has been involved for decades in agricultural research—crops that would be resistant to climate change, higher yields on less land, and so forth.

Now, guaranteeing affordable supplies of staple foods would have to be looked at either by the G20 or by someone else. Physical supplies—make sure that there’s access via trade, and what we think there should be is some kind of G20 forum for food security dialogue. We’re not saying that Indonesia has to be the automatic chair of it, but Indonesia is in a good position to chair a forum. It’s not meant to be a new international agency but a place to discuss these things going forward. And we think Indonesia, with its more or less neutral position internationally has found itself in a great position to exert moral suasion and position itself to get the most out of the international community.

The other thing that Indonesia has done in the past is rice. There was a rice crisis in 2008, I believe, and Indonesia acquitted itself well in the rice crisis. And so countries that eat rice—I know it sounds uncharitable—but if they ate more rice and less wheat, then the demand for wheat would be less, and then the price of wheat could ease up.

And it shouldn’t be impossible for, let’s say, the Filipinos and the Indonesians to eat more rice. It’s not objectionable to them. Of course there are some that want wheat in their noodles, and maybe they have to pay more for the wheat in their noodles if they want the noodles that badly. But if countries who eat rice—I’m not sure where China comes out on this because they eat rice and wheat—but if countries who eat rice traditionally can be encouraged to eat more rice, at least temporarily, it would ease the international demand for wheat and the price of wheat, in addition to whatever can be done with getting the ships out of Ukraine and everything on that front.

So these are some of the ideas that we think should be encouraged by the G20. Now in the form of it, I don’t know. It’s opaque to us. It may be opaque to everybody, maybe it’s not opaque to some of you. But how the G20 can do this, whether through moral suasion, whether it’s through a communique—it doesn’t have to be a communique. If they can’t have a communique, they can have something. They can have a speech. They can have a declaration of principles, or all kinds of things can—there are plenty of minds in this room that can devise the title of the document.

MICHAEL VATIKIOTIS: Thank you. Thank you, David.

Hashim, go ahead. And let’s keep the discussion—and then Gaurav afterwards, yeah.

HASHIM DJOJOHADIKUSUMO: I do want to say I’m a good friend of David, and just a devil’s advocate, David—I mean, just to illustrate how complex the situation is—I don’t want to diverge too much from the theme, which is food security, but I think we have a problem if you are asking people to eat more rice. There are two implications. One aspect is the health aspect—diabetes. Me, I love eating rice. I eat—in fact, I had Nasi Goreng this morning. You know, it’s—but I think we have to admit that eating more rice, with its glucose in the rice, is a major driver of diabetes in China, India, and Indonesia. I mean, we’re—so that’s one.

Now another—the second one is the climate change aspect. I’ve been told by experts—maybe Pak Kasdi and others can enlighten us all—is that actually rice paddy cultivation is a major producer of methane into the atmosphere. And it’s a contributor—a net contributor of emissions to the atmosphere.

So, you know, it’s very—the whole thing is very complex, you know, and I just wanted to say that because I don’t know whether increased rice consumption is the answer, frankly. Thank you.

MICHAEL VATIKIOTIS: Thank you. Gaurav.

GAURAV SRIVASTAVA: Thank you, David, and thank you, Hashim.

You know, it’s important to remember. You know, my wife and I—she is Japanese-American, I am Indian-American. Culturally we are coming from multiple cultures, and that’s the beauty of the United States, is that you can come from anywhere and still be American.

I think we’re here to acknowledge the cultures and be able to work together, and as we are having this conversation, the more pressing question is people are hungry right now. They’re not going to go to bed tonight with a full meal. We’re going to have a coffee break with a couple of watermelons and decide whether we want some more cantaloupes in it. It’s a bit of a misnomer.

So the question is what do we do today, what do we do right now, and yes, the conversation today is Russia, and Ukraine, and the invasion. And it’s a pertinent topic to be discussed. But Indonesia’s philosophy, which David mentioned, of being neutral is because Indonesia has a population that is—that they have to feed. They have to run their cars, they have to run their bikes. They require oil, they require food, and how do you regulate that?

I think, as we have—as we convene here, the question is the mechanisms that are being put in place by the government today, do they regulate with what is needed in Africa, as the lady from the African EXIM Bank said before, and does suggestions like the price gap that we have today—does it work? I think that’s the more imperative question because it is OK to sit and pontificate on what’s going to happen in 50 years, but the question is I’m hungry right now. And I know—and I think Sharon can say if I get hungry this is—it becomes—even for me it becomes very difficult.

Imagine a kid who hasn’t eaten. So we have to really think about what do we do as top leaders as we convene here to work from a policy point of view and from a business point of view. I think that’s my—that’s what I think.

MICHAEL VATIKIOTIS: Absolutely. I mean, one statistic that grabbed me was that, just in September, food prices in Kenya increased 15 percent. And that’s already translated into insecurity and rising criminality. So it’s the impact on human security—not just stomachs but also, you know, physical violence.

GAURAV SRIVASTAVA: I mean, it is important to remember, you know, as we are sitting here, if the population is hungry, that is what gives rise to violence—violence that can destabilize whole nations.

So how do we work together with the two bread baskets of the world; that is Ukraine and Russia, in a program that is regulated whereby which the flow continues but it is better monitored under a system. I think it’s something to think about.

MICHAEL VATIKIOTIS: Yes, and, you know, we’ve already got two nice ideas that are on the table that could immediately make some impact: one is the idea of financing for emergency food reserves—of emergency food reserves, and then also this idea of a food-security-focused dialogue at the high level, between governments because that actually drives to the immediate needs for action.

I’d like to come back actually, if possible, to our friend from the African EXIM Bank because I thought she gave a very good perspective on the practical, you know, challenges of ensuring supply and affordability. So if you could come back again and give us some idea of what you think is needed and what could be—and what could be put on the table in this meeting over the next few days.

Q: Thank you. The name is Gwen Mwaba. Yeah. So, I mean, one of the things that we are doing for the African continent beyond the statements that I made around the immediate solutions is we’ve developed an Africa Trade Exchange whose purpose is really to aggregate the needs of Africa for grains and fertilizers so that we can approach supplies on a pooled procurement basis. We did the same for COVID-19 vaccines during the time when there was scarcity for vaccines, so adopting the same model, we believe that we can bring the cost of logistics down through aggregation, and also the supply, because of the volume, will be higher than individual African countries importing by themselves.

So this exchange is up and running. Now the exchange primarily is meant to support the implementation of the AfCFTA, and so the idea is that African producers of fertilizer would be supplying African buyers. And our statistics show that there is adequate production of the key fertilizers and their derivatives on the African continent; however, the supply doesn’t always end up in Africa, and part of that reason is because the supply is being purchased by countries outside of the continent.

So when we spoke to some of the larger suppliers in Morocco, in Egypt, and other African countries, one of the things they said is yes, we have production, but we’re tied into contracts of a year to 18 months. So one of the things we need is for some of those contracts to be released so that that fertilizer can be redirected to Africa so that, for the next farming season, they can be, you know, adequate at production and increased production if we can’t get fertilizers from the Black Sea region where Africa is a big importer.

In addition to that, obviously our institution will finance a lot of that production and supply of fertilizer, and we already have—we initially had $4 billion, which has already been consumed, so we need other international DFIs to come to the table to provide the financing that is needed to make these supplies available to the African continent.

And I think the other points were made in my earlier intervention around what we might be able to do around sanctions immediately. But basically so any support to the Africa trade exchange is very welcome.

And finally, even though this exchange was set up primarily to facilitate the implementation of AfCFTA, during the crisis that we’re facing because of the Russia-driven war, we are also reaching out to international suppliers globally—Western countries included—to participate on the Africa Trade Exchange where there are supplies available for both greens and fertilizers which can then be supplied onto the African continent. Thank you.

MICHAEL VATIKIOTIS: Thank you very much.

Actually, I’d like to come back to the ADB on this because, you know, it might be something that could be—if you could follow up on that discussion on trade exchange and what could be done multilaterally in this region. Thank you.

Qingfeng. Yeah.

QINGFENG ZHANG: Yes, thank you so much, Michael.

Again, I—after the Russian invasion of the Ukraine war, actually this in May, while the international financial institutions we generally formulate the action plan to try to address this food insecurity, one of the key action is mitigating fertilizer shortage… and also the variability issues. That is a key issue because the last three years fertilizer price triple already, so the price will be high.

So I—one of the immediate actions, while helping Sri Lanka, the country or the crops in terms of the financial stability, so while we did these, we said… together we are quickly provide the social protection measures and also the budget support to help them to produce the fertilizer as quickly as possible. Of course, we also provide to those SMEs to help them to procure the fertilizer.

I think a second measure is very, very critical to how to translate this challenge into the opportunity to say—because of, you know, we too much rely on the chemicals. Probably in the future translated you know, this policy change to the more subsidy to encourage the efficient utilization of fertilizer.

And the same time, our colleague from Indonesia was mentioning about the nature-based solutions.

Finally, I have to say we’re also talking about in the future probably not necessarily relying too much on the natural gas as a raw material of the fertilizer. We need to use probably hydrogen as a source of fertilizer as a way out.

So we have a number of the solutions. So again I want to emphasize the smooth supply of fertilizer probably is a defining factor for the length, also, the—of this food crisis. So it’s very critical for the G20 have an agreement to ensure this smooth and the free trade of the fertilizer. That is very critical.

Let me just pause here. Thank you.

MICHAEL VATIKIOTIS: Thank you. Just as a—General, go ahead—because I want to then go back to innovation and technology, but go ahead.

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK (RET.): Well, I’d like to offer three specific suggestions starting on the technology side. Ten years ago the United States Agency for International Development was in Africa, in South Sudan, and Tanzania, and pushing two technologies. One was a cassava that did not have to be cooked to be eaten. Normal cassava was 20 years’ supply in the ground; this only lasts a couple of years, but now you don’t have to cook it. So it made it much more accessible.

Secondly, the introduction to Africa of yellow sweet potatoes as opposed to white sweet potatoes—now USAID was pushing this. What I don’t know and what I haven’t—maybe there are experts here who know this. Did it result in anything? Is there widespread, worldwide understanding that there’s cassava that doesn’t have to be cooked to be consumed, and that there should be no more white sweet potatoes in Africa? You need yellow sweet potatoes for Vitamin A.

So I don’t know whether these—I don’t know if we’re propagating agriculture advancements correctly, and this takes me to the idea of agricultural extension services. In Angola, the Israelis brought their agricultural extension service to bear on a project in an abandoned Portuguese valley, and brought in Israeli experts to talk about drip irrigation, to talk about how to price and develop for the markets, and it produced some exceptional results.

But that system is not in place in many African countries is what I’m afraid of. So I’m wondering whether one of the suggestions we can make to the G20 is that there should be a lot more emphasis on agricultural extension services. This is what has really produced America’s innovation in agriculture. It’s done by all the universities, land grant institutions do it.

Now the second thing, though, about it is some innovations are protected by intellectual property. There was a lawsuit a few years ago against a farmer in Indiana—you may have seen this—where he kept the grain from the previous harvest and replanted it. And then it turns out, no, he can’t do that because he has to buy fresh seed each year, and this was upheld by the US court system.

Obviously, there is some concern about if you take away intellectual property protections you undercut innovation. But do we have the balance right? What’s happened in the agricultural innovation market is firms have consolidated, and so Monsanto, for example, has a huge impact on corn and other grain innovation. Is there too much consolidation in this market at the expense of what’s good for the public?

And the third thing is the idea of strengthening the financial support for the World Food Programme so World Food Programme can provide reinsurance coverage for the kinds of grain deliveries to countries at risk or in cases of conflict zone so they can get in there and assure the owners of the vessels and the factors that they can be protected.

So those are three ideas. I just throw them out on the table. I’m not an expert in it, but I’ve worked in the system enough to know I think there’s something here and I would invite the group to tailor this or accept it, reject it, or refine it in some way specifically. OK.

MICHAEL VATIKIOTIS: Thank you, General.

Can I come back? Let me take two of these, at least, and maybe expand on them—the first on agricultural extension services.

I mean, I was going to ask Erez Fait because, you know, one of the things about nature-based solutions and technology related to that is the speed with which things can be conveyed to the farmers on the ground, and I see that as a problem because in many parts of the world it’s actually quite difficult to convince people to abandon their traditional practices.

So, please, could you—

EREZ FAIT: OK. First of all, you’re right. It’s like almost changing religious, almost, because farming, going from experience of their ancestors, and actually farming doesn’t change almost 10,000 years. Only technology improve. We have people, drip lines, but the practice is the same. So we apply the same amount of water and same amount of fertilizer.

We came—and, thank you, General, for mentioning some of the technologies, but we are coming from a different approach as a company of education the farmer because technology without education improving doesn’t work. People need to adapt.

So we started in Thailand. The minister of agriculture invited us to take one hectare of abandoned paddy that was meant to grow only rice and we managed to grow almost seven to 10 type of crops.

Next to me sitting Widja, that he is a local partner that actually managed a project that started by minister of defense three years ago. And the minister was practical, make decision, let’s do—let’s not talk and to move forward, and we established a five-hectare project where we grow more than 30 type of crops indoor/outdoor and we prove locally the new practice of growing rice only with 20 percent amount of water. No swamp, no methane, no weeds, and no germination replanting. And we did the same for corn and other crops.

And the beauty is that everything was run by a local team that was trained remotely because of the COVID, and we have the same in California, the same in New York, the same in Morocco now.

So when we speak about government, like, government provide health and provide education, and education/health doesn’t have ROI on the other side because it’s usually obvious that government need to provide health and education and security.

So I think—I’ve seen it also in Vietnam. I recently have meeting with Vietnam and they provide the farmers with the infrastructure because they understand that if they will build the greenhouses and provide the water and electricity, education, the farmers grow more and they pay tax, and by paying tax this become instead of vicious circle it’s become a positive circle.

And we can continue and I would like to give Widja, that he is coming from different field. He is coming from defense, from other background, and now we join together to change this ecosystem for good by doing it available.

And, again, it’s not more expensive. It’s less expensive because we are talking also with DFC and the US government to build locally the technology. If it’s a drip line, if it’s the facility, and then the logistic is much easier.

So government can finance the infrastructure to the farmers and then from the tax that they’ll pay you can deduct it.

Widja?

MICHAEL VATIKIOTIS: Please go ahead.

WIDJAJANTO: OK. Thank you, Erez. Thank you, Michael.

I would like to resonate three things, Michael, if I may speak on behalf of this G20 discussion.

Let’s promote our G20 communiqué and global food security solution by having—one is about technical proficient. I learned a lot from Israeli company from my colleague here, Mr. Erez, from the project initiated by Mr. Prabowo, my minister of defense.

But the problem is this technology is only available in his country whereas our country doesn’t have diplomatic relations. So I have to go around third country, fourth country, fifth country. You know the result? Transshipment more costs.

So we need to find a solution…

Number two, for the TikTok generation and also about the farming practices that you mentioned, in our area, I’m the oldest. I am 52. The rest is young people. They do the farming with their phone. They do the farming—the control—with internet. So we make it sexy. We make it more hype for the TikTok generation. You’re right. So if you come to my farm, you will no longer see an old farmer, Michael, but young people, I promise you.

The third is financial inclusion. I would like to promote also because the problem is when I went tocentral Java, most of the farmer doesn’t have big land part. Small portion—0.5, 0.2. How do we incorporate this?

The nice guy here from ADP, they must have learned from some type of municipal here in Indonesia to promote also this kind of initiative, having strong support from a financial institution like ADP. G20, I believe, is a good opportunity by Michael to talk about this.

Last, but not least, about incentive, or I call it less import restriction. In my experience, to import agriculture technology stuffs the bank is crazy, let alone the fertilizer. So we need to tell the government: Don’t only impose tax for us. You can grab another revenue from the selling of the harvest, as Mr. Erez just mentioned, in other countries.

So this four angle I would like to propose to be discussed further tomorrow. I believe Erez has his session tomorrow. Be more than happy to do the testimony. Thank you, Michael.

MICHAEL VATIKIOTIS: Thank you, Pak. That is very useful input.

Now, I mean, we have two—in a way, we have the technology side and my concern there is the speed with which technology can be used to alleviate the problem.

But then we have, as we just heard from—earlier about the question of financial support for WFP, and on the question—I mean, finance, it seems, is the short-term solution. and I’d like to ask Niels again to comment on this because you have a very practical experience.

And then, Gaurav, I’ll come back to you.

NIELS TROST: Yeah. Thank you, Adam.

I think it’s important to take the discussion back a little bit to what we can do immediately, and I think it’s great hearing possible solutions in the field of innovation, which is all great. But I think that will bring solutions in five years from now, 10 years from now.

But, today, we have people starving—literally starving—in Africa. And I think Kira made an interesting comment about Russia pulling out of the grain deal and one has to wonder why did Russia pull out of the grain deal.

My understanding was that they were unhappy with the fact that many of those shipments did not end up in the country—in the continent that needs it most, which is Africa. So then we have to ask the question why do these shipments not go to Africa and the reason is that the grain prices—it’s affordability again. The prices are too high for Africa to be able to pay it and Europe can pay those high prices.

And the second issue is that financial institutions are not willing to finance these shipments from Russia because of self-sanctioning reasons, and I think if we want to look at an immediate solution we have to take this discussion beyond geopolitics and really look at practical solutions.

Even though it may be difficult to accept morally, I think we may have to come to the conclusion that we have to cooperate with the largest food producer in the world—the largest food and energy producer in the world, which is Russia.

Now, that may be morally a very difficult decision to take. But I do think as world citizens we have that responsibility and look at how can we practically help, for example, the African continent.

And I think, for me, one of the practical solutions is to look at self-sanctioning. You know, why are we self-sanctioning and should we be self-sanctioning? Do we not have a moral obligation to help those in need?

So that’s one thing that I wanted to focus on. And I think if we can convince the financial institutions that are part and parcel of this industry, the fact of the matter is we cannot as shipping companies finance these cargoes ourselves. The financial requirement is simply too large. We need the banks to start opening letters of credit again. We need the banks to say yes, we do have a moral obligation to bring food and energy to the world.

And the same applies to the insurance companies. Same applies to the shipping companies.

One of the comments that was made is about the importance of fertilizers and the affordability of it. Affordability, of course, is price. The largest fertilizer producers are based in Belarussia and Russia, and we have been sanctioning some of those producers and also self-sanctioning.

So I think, again, we need to address that. We need to look at that. Do we really want to do that? If we want to bring the price down the fact is you have to increase exports. It’s as simple as that. And, again, these are difficult decisions to take morally. But we do have—again, I like to stress it—we do have a wider, a bigger responsibility to bring fertilizers to the world and bring energy prices down.

Again, fertilizer prices are closely linked to energy prices. So if we want—if we really want to bring prices down and make food and fertilizers more affordable, we have to look at increasing energy exports and reducing self-sanctioning.

So these are just the points that I wanted to emphasize.

MICHAEL VATIKIOTIS: Thank you, Niels, and I know that a lot of people want to—some people want to put more proposals on the table, which is great.

Sharon, I think you wanted to speak. We need a microphone over here as well.

Sorry. Sorry. Just while we’re getting ready, you know, Niels, that’s a very good point. To your point about the moral, you know, and Russia being the largest producer, surely that’s a question of leverage as well. There needs to be a tradeoff here where supply, but it comes with leverage and in terms of, you know, making sure—holding to the agreement and who has that leverage.

But we’ll come back to that.

GAURAV SRIVASTAVA: I think the question is there is—we just—we need to find a solution on how to work with two breadbaskets, given the interconnectivity of food and energy.

But there’s another issue which I would like to circle, which is we’re talking about agriculture, and in most countries in Asia and Africa agriculture is done by women, and women and children are the ones who bear most of the flak for this—with the conflict in Ukraine with what’s going on now.

And maybe, you know, Sharon wanted to say a few things about—on that.

SHARON SRIVASTAVA: Thank you.

You know, just in sitting here and listening to everything, I see it as, like, there’s a current situation, which was the reason why we wanted to hold this in the first place because we saw how fragile the energy and food connection is because of these breadbaskets being held up in the world.

So I think a good way to look at it is that’s the current immediate situation that we need to think about how to deal with.

and then there’s the future solutions and situations, which include the new technologies—you know, the TikTok agriculture—and that comes down to the agency of human spirit, I believe, which is what someone here mentioned.

How do we think about empowering individuals in their own countries to grow their own food and how do we enrich the soil for those endeavors? Someone mentioned roots—fungus growing on roots and other solutions to being less dependent on exports and imports for their nations.

I think that the other point to your point is, as Nicole mentioned, there’s a disproportionate effect that food insecurity has on women and young people, and we’ve, certainly, seen that in our travels in Asia and Africa where women are really at the forefront of trying to feed their families.

So one thing we can think about are what are the laws that are in place that either support them to building, you know, food security for their communities or that disadvantage them.

Can they own their own land? You know, what are the inheritance laws around farming? Can they get business loans? I think someone brought up, you know, the loans—Ex-Im Bank. How do we think about empowering those women who are really at the forefront, in many ways, of feeding their communities?

And, of course, education, you know, because even if we do have the new technologies and we invest in those new technologies, how do we educate these women? And a lot of them are female farmers. Like, that is the reality, and how are we thinking about that? I think it’s a really important thing to think about in our discussions.

MICHAEL VATIKIOTIS: Thank you, Sharon, for bringing it down to that very human and vital level. Thank you.

Fred, you had a proposal.

FREDERICK KEMPE: So I think of these things more from a geopolitical standpoint. So I’d make two proposals for the G20 or maybe—in general, maybe this is even for the United Nations.

But it seems to me that we should—and this goes back to what General Clark said in the first session, which has been tweeted out and is getting some traction—your quote, General Clark, “A nation cannot invade another nation and jeopardize the food security for the entire world. It’s simply impermissible.”

So why not weaponize—why not make it an international crime to weaponize food security and hunger?

Now, calling things an international crime has done nothing to stop Putin so far. But, on the other hand, for it to be there to make clear that this is beyond the pale of what the international community can accept, I think, would be useful.

The other thing is countries, because of the fear of rising prices and food insecurity, applied export bans, which made the food insecurity worse—India on wheat, others on palm oil, others on fertilizer products.

So I think the G20 could agree that they would, as a group of 20 countries—leading countries of the world—agree not to engage in agricultural export bans.

And so I think these two geopolitical factors, because let’s not kid ourselves, the reason we are where we are right now, which is the World Food Programme called it the worst food crisis in modern history. The last one was 2008-2012. We’ve got 300 million people on the edge of disaster, 800 million people in food insecurity that weren’t there before the war in Ukraine.

And so I think it’s really—at a time like this, never let a crisis go to waste. This is the time for the G20 to put some signals in the ground of a geopolitical nature.

And then I really liked Hashim’s nature-based solutions, which didn’t get on anybody’s list. And so I think nature-based fertilizer solutions—I mean, this is a little bit beyond the geopolitical issues but I would put that on there as well.

MICHAEL VATIKIOTIS: Thank you, Fred.

Yes? At the back there. Thank you.

Q: Yeah. Thank you. Yeah. I just want to add on the point of empowering women on the farmer because I think that is very, very important, especially in Africa. If you look at how farming are done in the traditional way, the issue or the challenge that people are facing there is huge in term of capacity, also access to finance. Access to finance is a big issue because in many cases finance are not there and bank are not there to support to those farmers, especially the small farmers.

And also, in term of capability, they do not have much capability to really improve the productivity of their land. You know, they have limited—and most of them are doing it manually. So the technology, the capability are not there, and also support are not there.

So one of the things that, when we look at what we can do quickly to really see the impact of those people, I think, is about empowering them in term of technology, in term of access to finance. That’s very, very, very important.

In this respect also, I think, when it come to policymaker, the policymaker has a big role in term of how a country is willing to support the agriculture—how the country is willing, really, to eradicate the food insecurity. And those are the things that, you know in term of quick win that we can implement and do it. Thank you very much.

MICHAEL VATIKIOTIS: Thank you.

Q: Yes. I’m from East Africa and I just wanted to add on the point that Niels brought on the table talking about the impact on Africa.

So, obviously, Africa is a continent of 1.2 billion people, and the impact on food security has been huge. Just going back to the point that Niels made, the geopolitical nature is that you have a double whammy where not only does Africa not have the supply side of the food—you know, the wheat, the rice, everything—and you know, because of the sanction—the self-sanctioning that was talked about, Africa is not able to access not just food, but fertilizers as well. I can tell you that I am personally involved right now in trying to get fertilizer into Kenya. In Kenya, they have the short rains that come in December and right now they weren’t able to access the fertilizers because—one, because of the sanctions on getting fertilizers from Russia; and, two, the credit lines. You know, the financial institutions aren’t willing to provide the credit lines to bring these fertilizers and the food into Africa.

And the third aspect of that, obviously, is you then have a drought. You’ve got the environmental aspect of it, which, obviously, nobody’s talking about here because we’re talking food security and we’re talking about energy. But you know, you’ve got a huge drought, you know. The wheat that went into Djibouti and Ethiopia, there’s thousands and thousands of people starving, you know, who don’t have access to food. Now, when you talk about the fertilizer problem, not only don’t you have that food coming into Africa, but now the farmers who were going to actually grow food—talking about the short rains that I talked about that are coming in December—we won’t have that fertilizer in December. So, again the food—you’ve got the food that should have been grown locally not being available for people to eat, creating even more hunger.

So I think this is a very, very important forum to bring these particular issues to and see if, you know, some of the talent that we have in this room are able to bring this to the G20 and specifically talk about this problem in Africa. Thank you very much.

MICHAEL VATIKIOTIS: Thank you. Before I—I mean, before I sort of begin to sort of summarize some of these proposals, I think we had one more over here and then I’ll turn to Matthew. Then I’ll summarize, and then you can close.

Q: Great. Yes. I’ll be quick.

Just picking up on some of the comments that have been made about financing and financial inclusion. And a contextual/should have proposal—policy proposal point is—it didn’t come up this morning—is, predominantly in the aftermath or exacerbated by the pandemic is the issue of debt. We are seeing increased debt at the sovereign level, at the country level, as well as at the corporate level and even at the SME level. The IMF has warned of nonperforming loans and a debt crisis, really, at all levels. So when we think about the financing solutions and the financing challenge and the access to credit and opening up those credit lines and even financial inclusion and microfinance supporting small- and medium-sized enterprises and smallholder farmers, I think we need to keep that context and what that means as far as thinking about innovative financial solutions that are also operating and can address that debt issue and that reluctance, whether that’s debt swaps, whether that’s thinking about blended finance, and even getting into some of those microfinance. So just wanted to make sure that we’re linking in the debt agenda, which is on the G20, and when we’re bringing the food security and climate finance into it as well that we are linking to that overall kind of sovereign and macro debt crisis, because that will be on the agenda of the G20 as well. And we can tap into that, into those solutions.

MICHAEL VATIKIOTIS: Thank you. That’s useful.

Matthew.

MATTHEW KROENIG: Two possible solutions, one short term and one longer term.

We heard from several of our colleagues in the private sector that one of the challenges here is that banks are unwilling to provide financing because they’re afraid of falling afoul of Russia sanctions. And so I think one solution is education. You know, there’s always humanitarian carveouts in US and international sanctions. But educating the private sector about that, that they can facilitate flows of food without falling afoul of sanctions, that’s something that think tanks or universities, others around this room can contribute to.

Longer term, in the last section I said that part of the problem, I think, is we’ve become too dependent on too few suppliers providing too few food sources. It seems like a lot of what we did talk in the second session was about diversifying sources of food supply: providing financing, providing technology to, you know, increase domestic production—African fertilizers, for example—introduce new food types like yellow sweet potatoes. And so—and it’s not a concrete solution, but in terms of a strategic framework it seems like diversifying sources of supply so you’re not so dependent on any single source is an important part of the solution.

MICHAEL VATIKIOTIS: Thank you, Matthew.

Hashim, quickly, and then—yeah. Please go ahead, Hashim—Pak Hashim.

HASHIM DJOJOHADIKUSUMO: Yeah. I think—I think one of the things that we haven’t really found a solution or perhaps a proposal for a solution, on the payments problem. We’re talking about nature-based solutions. Thank you very much, Fred. I mean, that’s medium to long term, right? But as Niels and Gwen and our friend from Kenya, East Africa, you’re facing an immediate problem. December you need fertilizers, right? And the problem is there’s a lot of money which wants to go and send to Russia, but banks don’t want to facilitate the transfer of payments. That’s a problem. And so I think what we can do is maybe—this is a short-term solution—perhaps there is somebody from the Inter-American Development Bank, maybe from the African Development Bank. Can those multilateral institutions, can they guarantee the LCs without fear of retribution from AFAC, right, from the Treasury Department? I can tell you for a fact that Indonesian banks are deathly afraid of phone calls from the US embassy, you know? I mean, they’ve told me they’ve had phone calls from the US embassy representing AFAC from the Treasury Department making sure that Indonesian banks don’t open LCs to Russia, OK?

So this is something that I think has to be—maybe we can address it in a few days’ time at G20. Maybe the multilaterals can open the LCs. Maybe the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development can open the LCs. Maybe the European Investment Bank can open the LCs? So I think maybe that’s the short-term solution, a neutral multilateral institution and not too phased by nefarious activities by the Russians. At least it’s for humanitarian we open and they open the LCs to Russia, just purely on humanitarian grounds. Nothing—you know, I mean, not as a bias for the Russians or otherwise. That’s a short-term solution, maybe. I don’t know. But maybe our friends from the multilateral institutions can tell us.

MICHAEL VATIKIOTIS: Thank you.

Gaurav.

GAURAV SRIVASTAVA: I think, you know, Hashim, you made a very important point here. And the crisis here is immediate and it needs to be addressed.

But while we are having this conversation, it is also important to remember that we’re not condoning anything here, but it is more to create accountability and let the trade flow. Let accountability happen under a proper program where systems can be put in place so that self-sanctioning doesn’t happen, so that the governments can work together. And that’s really what this is about, and it’s about creating a program of accountability between all the stakeholders. It is Russia, Ukraine, the United States, and other—and other members of the G20 that can work together to find a solution that makes everyone accountable for better solutions. I think that’s the goal.

MICHAEL VATIKIOTIS: Thank you.

General, I know you wanted to quickly jump in, and then I have to summarize.

GEN. CLARK: What Gaurav and Hashim and Niels are pointing out is absolutely essential. We don’t want to self-sanction in such a way that we’re depriving the world of food because of Russia’s military action. However—however—while we argue against self-sanctioning, if we’re going to call for that I think we have to stand forward and say Russia should pull out now. I mean, if we don’t say it on the—in the basis—in the name of food security, who’s going to say it? This is not really about US-Russia.

I’m sorry. I’m a former general. I know you probably think, ah, here he is trying to get mad at Russia and stuff. I’m not. I’m just observing a very obvious point. The immediate cause of this crisis, as we’ve all said, is a Russia—Russian unprovoked invasion of Ukraine. It is impermissible. And I would just like to humbly make the suggestion the first finding of the conference should be: Russia, stop the invasion. Pull out. Let Ukrainian farmers plant their crops, de-mine, et cetera, and then we can also resolve the sanction…

So I think, you know, before we go after self-sanctioning, we have to state the obvious. This is on Russia.

MICHAEL VATIKIOTIS: Thank you.

So I know we’ve sort of run out of time, but I did promise that what I would so is try to summarize and capture, rather, some of the suggestions that were put on the table at this session today that we might want to take forward in the—in the stakeholder discussion tomorrow in more detail. And as I saw them—heard them—I think it comes down to five or six suggestions.

First, financing of emergency food reserves. And I think, you know, I’m going to try and put emphasis here on the immediate needs. So that’s the idea that there should be a mechanism for financing emergency food reserves. And that sort of falls, I think, on many of the governments in the G20 and the multilateral organizations. The UN will be there.

The second would be a G20 forum for food security dialogue, which doesn’t obviously address the immediate problems but begins to create a mechanism for anticipating. These kinds of problems are going to be with us for some time and need special attention.

The third, which I thought was very nicely put by Gwen from the EXIM Bank, which is the idea of a trade exchange to aggregate the needs so that the costs can be brought down. And I think this is an idea that perhaps should be extended to many other parts of the world, as well, particularly in this part of the world.

And fourthly, agricultural extension services. This gets into the realm of something a bit longer term, but obviously vital. And under that would come the whole raft of innovations and nature-based solutions. I mean, as someone who has been recently working in East Africa on some of this—climate change related issues, one of the problems is actually persuading communities that are rather isolated of—and it really is about extension—of the need to, for instance, grow crops in a different way to address and mitigate the impact of climate change. So it’s very, very important; it’s just not immediate. But it has to be done.

And then we come onto the very important issue of finance. We heard one suggestion, financial support for WFP and grain delivery. But I think I do hear in the room a lot of voices calling for a better way to mobilize in this very complex and sensitive geopolitical context some way of finding the financing for obtaining the vital inputs to agriculture. And I very much—and I’ll just sort of capture it in one sort of phrase—I like the idea of this humanitarian mobilization of payment facilitation. And it makes sense to me as someone who’s worked in the humanitarian field that we do all sorts of things to bend—no, to adapt to difficult circumstances in the humanitarian field. Well, why not do payments as well? You know, and it’s something to think about.

And at that point—at this point, I will hand over to Matthew. And I hope this has been a useful discussion. Thank you very much.

MATTHEW KROENIG: Great. Well, thank you very much, Michael. I’d just like to say a few words to adjourn the session today and conclude the first of two days of the Atlantic Council’s Global Food Security Forum.

I was introduced earlier. I’m Matthew Kroenig. I’m the acting director of the Scowcroft Center for Strategy and Security at the Atlantic Council. We lead the Atlantic Council’s work on food security because we do see it as a real security challenge.

And it’s been a pleasure joining you today for this rich set of discussions on global food security challenges and opportunities. I learned a lot. I found it useful. I hope you did as well. We talked about some of the challenges—climate, COVID, conflict; some of the solutions—global governance, financing, technology. Michael did a brilliant job of summarizing those for us just a moment ago.

But this is just the first step. As you know, we’re going to come back tomorrow for a large public conference. We invite you all back here at 8:15 a.m. Bali time 7:15 p.m. Eastern Standard Time, for the second day. And we’re going to continue to build on some of the solutions we’ve identified today.

So we have a terrific lineup for tomorrow. Experts and officials to appear include Indonesian Defense Minister Prabowo Subianto, US Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, Ambassador Cindy McCain, Desi Anwar from CNN International, and many more. So we hope to see you back here tomorrow.

Let me again thank our forum co-hosts, the Ministry of Defense and Coordinating Ministry of Maritime Affairs and Investment of the Republic of Indonesia, Gaurav and Sharon Srivastava. Thank you, Sharon and Gaurav, for making this possible.

And thanks to the moderators of our session, Michael and Adam, who did a terrific job.

And thanks to all of you who came to participate today. Thanks to all of you, the hundreds of you watching online.

And to those of you who are here in person, you don’t need to go home. We’re going to have a reception to immediate follow in the Cucina restaurant just downstairs. So if you’re interested in joining us, just find the staff with the black lanyards and we can lead you to the reception. We look forward to continuing the conversation over drinks and, again, to seeing you tomorrow.

So, again, thank you. Thank you very much and we’ll see you back here bright and early tomorrow morning.

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Global Food Security Forum day one: Why food supply is on the brink

Atlantic Council — Sat, 12 Nov 2022 13:09:49 +0000

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Flagship Event Sat, November 12, 2022 • 12:00 am ET

Highlights from the Global Food Security Forum

Economy & Business Resilience & Society

Event transcript

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FREDERICK KEMPE: It’s my pleasure today to kick off our first day of programming at the Atlantic Council’s first-ever Global Food Security Forum as an official sideline event of the G20 summit here in Bali.

So the Atlantic Council’s mission for sixty years has been to galvanize constructive US leadership alongside partners and allies to shape the future. The mission is old, but the relationship for us in Indonesia is new.

The Atlantic Council in many ways is a misnomer geographically because we’ve been the global Atlantic Council for some time, with programs and centers that span interests around the globe wherever we have partners and allies working to shape the future.

We’re known as a think tank. I’ve never liked the term. We’re more of an action tank. We like actors, practitioners, scholars like you who want to come here not just to hear speeches, but to come up with ideas, come up with recommendations, come up with solutions for a better world, and in this case particularly with food security.

And so I’m delighted, in that spirit, to convene such an accomplished group of local, regional, and international leaders across government, business, civil society, media for today’s series of roundtable discussions on global food security. For those that are joining us virtually—and this is an on-the-record session; we also have a virtual global audience—this will also be recast for people at sometimes better hour for their region. But we welcome you all, and you can follow along with the hashtag #AtlanticCouncilFoodSecurity. So the hashtag on Twitter, #AtlanticCouncilFoodSecurity. We’re still using Twitter. We’re not sure we’d invest in it.

But the—I’d like to first acknowledge and thank our forum co-hosts, including the Ministry of Defense and Coordinating Ministry of Maritime Affairs and Investment of the Republic of Indonesia, for their partnership and hospitality in organizing this conference. So a huge thanks to Minister Prabowo Subianto and Minister Luhut Binsar Pandjaitan, who will speak to us tomorrow in sessions tomorrow, in keynotes tomorrow.

I most of all want to thank, sitting to my left, my seat next to me and the seat next to him, Gaurav Srivastava of the Gaurav and Sharon Srivastava Foundation, our forum co-host and underwriting partner. So, Gaurav and Sharon, thank you for your friendship. Thank you for your vision. Thank you for your generosity. We quite literally would not be here without you, so thank you so much for that.

I also want to salute someone I’ve just respected for many years for his service to our country and for his intellectual leadership, General Wes Clark, former Supreme Allied Commander of Europe, of NATO, and member—and the senior member attending this conference of the Atlantic Council Board of Directors. He is here as our board leader and was a driving force between this impressive conference—where are you, Wes? Here we go. General Clark.

I briefly—I’m very briefly going to preview what you expect over the next two days. Today we’ll engage in two roundtable discussions on the state of global food security and challenges involved. These sessions will allow us to delve into the topic deeply and in a little bit more of an expert manner, drilling a little deeper than perhaps we’ll do tomorrow, and lay the groundwork for tomorrow’s programming which will feature a diverse set of keynotes, fireside chats, and panel discussions expanding on the topics we address today. Not only will we have Minister Prabowo and Minister Luhut, we’ll also have the US Senate majority leader, Chuck Schumer, joining us virtually; a couple of members of Congress, so it’s going to be a very strong day.

And then lastly—and we hope you will all be here for the close tomorrow evening—we’re going to close the conference with an exclusive concert for those who are attending our conference with the celebrated singer/songwriter, John Legend, who has—they call him an EGOT-awarded singer/songwriter. That means he has won the Emmy, he has won the Grammy, he has won the Golden Globe, he has won the Oscar, he has won the Tony. It’s extraordinary that we’ll have him tomorrow playing beside songwriter/singer—Indonesian singer/songwriter Sandhy Sondoro. I think all of you from Indonesia know him well. And the US Air Force Band of the Pacific which you heard up behind us today. So it’s truly an extraordinary way to conclude these two days.

Global food security sits at the nexus of the world’s most pressing challenges as food security rises threatened by near-term shocks like the COVID-19 pandemic, Putin’s illegal war in Ukraine, and long-term risks of climate change and sustained conflict. Ending world hunger will require enhanced public-private cooperation and wide-ranging innovation in agriculture, technology, finance, and policy.

Putin’s weaponization of food security in the last year has underscored that food security has got to be discussed together with energy security, with military security, with all aspects of international and national security. One cannot deal with it separately.

Today’s workshop, roundtable serve as a venue for and driver of this cooperation. The goal of these discussions is to allow all of you an opportunity to delve into food security challenges and solutions in this more—in a smaller setting than tomorrow, laying the groundwork for our second day.

At the end of the conference, we will be distilling insights from our meetings and collecting them into a memo and concrete recommendations for leaders of the G20 summit and beyond. So as you make your comments, as you make your statements, as you raise your questions, keep in mind what in there might be a notion that we might want to put a pin in as an idea for action. Our challenge to each of you is to help us identify these concrete solutions and recommendations that we today can turn to policy action, so an action tank; not a think tank.

I want to remind everyone that this session is on the record and is being live-streamed for a public audience. If you wish to speak or provide comments, raise your hand and we will pass you a microphone. And now before we get started, I’d like to turn to Gaurav for a few remarks. And let me thank you once again for your vision and your support of this wonderful gathering.

GAURAV SRIVASTAVA: Thank you.

Thank you, Fred.

Excellencies, members, ladies and gentlemen, good afternoon and warmest greetings. On behalf of our devoted planners, partners, facilitators, and my courageous wife and life partner, Sharon, we welcome you. We welcome you with open arms and optimistic hearts. I am emboldened to see so many familiar faces—friends, colleagues, and my extended global family and cherished community united in a singularly imperative mission to end the pain and suffering of all human beings, a mission that must succeed.

I would like to thank the Atlantic Council, Fred Kempe, and his unrivaled team. Thank you. Their perseverance, resolve, and commitment to making this momentous event a reality.

I would like to thank our other partners—the Ministry of Defense of the Republic of Indonesia and the Coordinating Ministry of Maritime Affairs and Investment of the Republic of Indonesia—for making this forum possible.

I would also like to thank my dear friend Pak Hashim for making this event possible. Thank you.

There are innumerable challenges facing our planet, our citizens, and our way of life –obstacles that threaten to breach and undermine our most basic core human values; to overshadow our proudest achievements; to completely replace peace, love, and benevolence with war, hate, and indefensible cruelty—an affront to everything as we as human beings are. Time and time again, it’s been said we cannot and we will not let this happen. And still, as we gather today, desperate men, women, and innocent children from all four corners of the globe are facing food insecurity—driven to the brink of starvation; suffering; robbed of dignity, respect, and hope.

But the question is: How can this be? How can this abomination, this seismic crisis of inhumanity continue to blight the existence of even one global citizen? We know the contributing factors far too well: the social and economic root causes; the vicious cycles of poverty, inequity, and bloody conflicts which only serve to divide and destroy. These unrivaled problems need expedited solutions. These complex questions demand pragmatic answers. And that’s why we have come from far and wide to shoulder the burden of blame together, to share the responsibility of rectifying our wrongs, to harness the conviction and tenacity of our most brilliant minds and leaders, and tirelessly work together to restore the sanctity of the human race to ensure peace and prosperity for everyone.

This forum, these workshops, are about discovery and discourse, about difficult conversations that must be had. The conflict in Ukraine, the ramifications of COVID-19, the catastrophic market shocks, and the critical interconnectivity of food and energy, that reminds us we must work together.

Ladies and gentlemen, the goal is clear, the stakes immeasurable, the mandate divine. Thank you and god speed.

ADAM SCHWARZ: Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen. My name is Adam Schwarz. I’m a nonresident senior fellow at the Scowcroft Center for Strategy at the Atlantic Council and CEO of Asia Group Advisors, a public affairs firm focused on Southeast Asia. I’d like to add my welcome to that of Fred’s and Gaurav’s to everybody here to join us on this opening panel of the Global Food Security conference, and thank Fred and Gaurav for pulling us all together today on this very important topic.

I want to just spend a little time just kind of on a format for today. As you can see, we’ve got quite a large group today. We don’t have any prepared remarks or opening remarks planned on the schedule, so what I’d like to do is start with a few questions and then we’ll open it up to questions. Feel free to raise your hand. I’ll do my best to keep track of the sequence in which the hands were raised. Given that we do have such a large number of people in the room, I would ask if people could keep their remarks relatively brief—two or three minutes, if you can—and we’ll try to give as many people an opportunity to speak as we can.

In terms of sequence, as Fred was saying, what we’d like to do with this opening panel is to lay out a number of the challenges—and there are obviously quite a few—with food security at the moment, and then—and then move into a discussion of solutions and recommendations to be sort of added to the list that we hope to get to by the end of this two-day conference.

So let me—let me then, if I may, start with Pak Hashim, who has done so much to make this event happen. And, Pak Hashim, let me just sort of ask you your thoughts. You know, what sort of drove you to bring this event here? Why is it so important for us to have this event here on food security in Indonesia at this—at this stage?

HASHIM DJOJOHADIKUSUMO: Adam, thanks very much for addressing your remarks to me and addressing your question to me. I think the major reason for my involvement in this forum and the efforts to bring this about is because—it’s because of Indonesia’s increasing interdependence on global markets.

You know, I think many, many people are very surprised, especially Europeans and North Americans, as to the effect of the Ukraine crisis, the Ukraine war, on countries as far away as Indonesia. But one statistic it comes out very glaringly, is the fact that Indonesia imports, I think this year, 14 million tons of wheat—14 millions of tons of wheat. Indonesia produces very, very little wheat. I think it’s zero tonnage. And therefore, anything that happens in faraway places such as Ukraine has a direct impact on the livelihoods of Indonesians.

And I understand—and somebody asked me, why is the Ministry of Defense of Indonesia involved in this forum. It is because many of Indonesia’s 500,000 soldiers depend on what is—what we call Indomie, which is the instant noodles, for their food supply every day. So any negative impact on prices would have a direct impact on the soldiers of the Indonesian armed forces and the wider population.

So this is, you know, the primary reason why I got involved. And any impact on wheat prices has another impact on other commodities, other food—corn, sorghum, rice—and has, you know, a knock-on impact. So that’s primarily the reason why I got involved.

Thank you, Adam.

ADAM SCHWARZ: Thank you very much, Pak Hashim.

And let me now turn—given that, obviously, the—what’s been happening in Ukraine is such an important part of this discussion we’re having today, I’d like to turn to Kira Rudik. If you would—maybe just ask you kind of the same question. In your view, just lay out for us in your—why you think this is—this is such a critical issue for us to deal with today.

KIRA RUDIK: Hello, everyone. I am Kira Rudik, member of Ukrainian parliament, leader of the liberal party, Golos. And it’s my pleasure to being here today.

It’s nine months since the full-scale invasion by Russia in my country started. And it may seem as literally another side of the Earth from here, but one of the things and one of the lessons that this world teaches us is how connected we are to each other, how dependent we are on each other, and how fragile are the connections that are between us.

Before the war started, my country was top five world’s largest exporters of wheat, grains, sunflower oil, tomatoes, and corn. Right now, my country—who’s one of the missions is to feed the world—has so much complications in doing so. The ability to provide to the whole world is essential and critical for us, and the war would definitely affect the food security not only in the countries that have the direct connections with Ukraine but all the countries in the whole world.

Since the beginning of full-scale invasion, the food prices, the grain prices have gone up 30 percent. And the issue is that it is not only this year that would be affected because you can imagine that it is very hard to plant—to plant wheat during the bombarding and to get the harvest during the bombarding. To have the territory of Ukraine, our huge lands, mined, and where we were supposed to provide for the life, there is death right now. And this is killing us. This is killing us as people of purpose, as people who are there to continue being the breadbasket of the whole world.

There is a grain deal, an ability to export the grains from Ukraine using the ports. It is incredibly important because one of the worst thing that could be for a farmer—and you can imagine that—is to see grains rotting in the siloes. So that’s a fantastic one, but it is such a fragile agreement. Every single moment the ship is going in and out, it’s so many people having fingers crossed or praying because you never know if it’s going to reach its destination. So what kind of food security is there if it’s absolutely not secure?

So, for any discussion about security and about the ability for my country to continue to provide for the whole world, we should start with the question of peace. We should start with the question of victory. We should start with the question of predictability. We should start of the question of security because food security comes as add-on to the general security.

And the impact of what is going on right now we will see moving further down the road because even during the war Ukrainian farmers were able to get onto 80 percent of the suggested harvest, but we do not know what will happen next year and the year after. We will do our best because this is one of the missions of my country. But would we be able to do so? That depends on the support of the international community that we are asking for. Help us help you. Help us to provide to you. Help us complete our mission: feed the whole world.

Thank you and glory to Ukraine.

FREDERICK KEMPE: So I just wanted—I just wanted to say, first of all, thank you for your heroism and thank you for the heroism of the Ukrainians.

We also, at the Atlantic Council, want Russia to find its way into a Europe whole and free over time. That is our goal. We did invite Russians to attend today and we regret that they aren’t here.

But in any case, Kira, that’s a wonderful statement, and thank you for putting this into context. Russia and Ukraine together provide a third of the world’s wheat. And so Pak Hashim talked about wheat. That’s where it comes from, so much of it.

So let me pass back to Adam to continue the moderation, and I think we have a special guest.

ADAM SCHWARZ: Fred, thank you very much.

I would like to acknowledge Defense Minister Prabowo Subianto, who has just joined us. Welcome, sir. And if I may ask you to say a few words to the group, obviously, defense is—and the security implications of the food crisis. Would you prefer to talk tomorrow? Yes, sir. Very good. We’ll –

PRABOWO SUBIANTO: Yeah, I just want to listen.

ADAM SCHWARZ: Very good. We’ll continue on, then.

So what I thought we might turn to next, after talking about the specific country level that we just talked about, was talk a little bit kind of the regional differences on how the food security challenge is impacting different parts of the world. And I’d like to ask two people to sort of address that. The first is Qingfeng Zhang from the Asian Development Bank and the second would be General Wesley Clark. So, Mr. Zhang, could I ask you to begin, please? Well, I’m going to start with Qingfeng.

QINGFENG ZHANG: Yes. Thank you so much, Adam. First, we are honored by you guys invite Asian Development Bank to attend this very important forum.

In terms of the regional difference of food security, three things I want to highlight. Even before the Russia invasion of the Ukraine, this region already suffering from the political conflict, including, like, Afghanistan, Myanmar. The very, very deep food insecurity already taking place.

And also, this region, of course, before the Russia invasion of Ukraine, climate change also have the big impact in this region. You just look the floods, droughts… affect the food insecurity. And you look at what happened in Pakistan this year, the floods, and also droughts and the heat wave in India, and of course, you know, the droughts in the Yangtze River was a significant affect the food security.

And again, just like our Indonesia counterpart just mentioned about it, the Russia invasion of Ukraine basically escalate, you know, the food insecurity risk many of our countries. And these 13 countries heavily rely on import of the wheat, fertilizer from Russia and also the Ukraine.

So when we come to the what we need to do, I think it’s no single blueprint. But three things are very, very important. Number one, you know, is demand-side management. Two is supply side. Third is the logistics.

So I want to just quickly share, you know, in September ADB just announced 14 billion US dollars food security plan to address those three issues. Of course, the first one, short term we’re going to provide the social protection, social safety net, address and support the vulnerable people. As a second, of course, is for long term from the supply side to support the… agriculture, digitalization of value chain, and then the natural-based solutions. Thirdly, one thing we need to learn from the 2008 food crisis; that’s, you know, we need to keep the trade flowing and open. But unfortunately, this year you can see even in this region about the treaty countries is they are introduce trade restrictions. So I think through this group of discussions we need to continue promote the open trade and regional cooperation, particularly for fertilizer.

Probably let me just stop here, I think, today. Tomorrow, we will have the chance to continue the discussions. Thank you, Adam.

ADAM SCHWARZ: Thank you very much, Qingfeng.

General Clark, your sense of how the food security challenge is impacting different parts of the world?

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK (RET.): Well, thank you, Adam.

First of all, I think the problem between Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and the consequent shutdown of exports from Ukraine through the Black Sea has brought global attention to the food security issue. But it’s overdue attention. This is not a problem of one event. This is a problem that has been building for several decades now.

To the immediate issue, of course, those shipping routes need to be opened in the Black Sea and they need to stay open. The farmers in Ukraine need to be able to plant, to fertilize, to harvest, and market. At the same time, Russia also must export grain and fertilizer and get the world agricultural system back in check.

But as Pak Hashim noted earlier, this is a deeper problem because, really, populations have grown, consumer preferences are evolving. And as the Global South increases in development, it wants to eat the same food as the Global North, and yet these lands don’t support the same crops. So Pak Hashim, you were mentioning the 40 million tons of wheat being imported. Yes, and this is representative of the problem all across the Global South. We’ve enjoyed the chocolates and coffee that come from tropical countries, but they could be producing millet and other grains. They could be subsisting and living on cassava, which can be grown there rather than importing wheat. But the global economy has knitted us together in such a way, through these global supply chains, population growth, and changing consumer preferences, that we’ve built a system that is so interconnected, it’s so efficient in terms of just-in-time delivery that any shock causes perturbations; perturbations like rising prices, and of course that hits the lower income the most—the most difficult.

It hits countries in North Africa and East Africa the hardest because they need the grain imports the most right now, but it really is a global issue. It’s hitting people in South America. It’s hitting the American consumer. It is exacerbated by energy because when the price of natural gas rises, then the price of fertilizer rises. When the price of oil rises, then the costs of shipping go up. So everything is connected here.

Thomas Malthus, over 200 years ago, predicted population would explode geometrically, but food production could not keep up. And every few decades, someone reinvents Malthusian economics and says it’s over.

So when I was a young man growing up, the world population was two billion. People said it can’t possibly support five billion. I was at the Milken Conference ten years ago when we crested seven billion—seven billion—and now we’re at eight billion. And yet what’s happened is technology has enabled us to provide food and even better nutrition, but we’ve done so with the metrics of international finance. And now even international finance is an issue for us because, for over a decade, since the financial shocks of 2008-9, we’ve had very, very low credit costs. So it was easy to borrow money, create your letters of credit, finance international trade.

Well, now the cost of money is going up. It is being driven by the United States’ own Federal Reserve System. Now maybe we’re going to see it capped at a 4 percent, 4-1/2 percent fed rate. We don’t know yet. But we do know that the financial implications of this are worldwide in terms of what it does to rates of exchange for currency, and what it does for the cost of imported food in countries around the world.

So it’s a very, very complicated, interrelated system, and where it ties in to me, especially, in my lifetime, is with the issue of instability and conflict. So we can look at what happened in Syria in 2010. We know that was related to land reform. It was related to an increasing inability of people to buy the food they needed for subsistence as they became urbanized. It was also related, of course, to another factor that we’re driving, and that’s climate change.

So between Syria, the Sahel in Africa, Somalia, and East Africa, changing rainfall patterns, everything is in the mix. So what we hope—what I hope we’ll be able to do, Adam, in this workshop is the various experts here will jump in, give us their particular points of view, and then we’ll use this to make sure that in the upcoming session tomorrow and for the G20 we don’t let political leaders skate over the problem. These are problems; they have to be addressed realistically—not in campaign pledges, but with real programs, real technology, and real financing.

Thank you.

ADAM SCHWARZ: Let me, if I may, now turn to Ibu Nani Hendiarti from the Coordinating Minister of Maritime Affairs and Investment. Ibu Nani, for your—if you will share some thoughts with us from the variety of portfolios that you cover, how is this looming food security issue impacting those portfolios? Thank you.

NANI HENDIARTI: Thank you, General Wesley. Very good afternoon excellencies, ladies and gentlemans. I think I would to thanks for this very good even where we see the issue on the food securities is very important, beside water and energy.

So in our national program priority, we said that this food security is at a low priority, so—and then we have several programs to support these priority—national priorities. So we understand. I think we really see that agriculture specifically is impacted by two issues. One of this in context of the climate change, where they have also different impact to the both sides… And then also the—in terms of the adaptation of the climate change, but also in terms of the mitigations where we understand the methane is also part of this agriculture sector that we need to give specific attentions.

So I think in the context of this we would like to highlight also that this issue will also connect with the rising of the global population and also incomes, as well as the urbanizations, are also driving strong and… grow in the food.

So beside also that link with the food, I think water is also other essential element of our existence. For example, in Java, islands in Indonesia, it’s the most populated island with about almost 150 million of people. So the rapid urbanization in Java boosts water demand for the household and also the industry. That is creating also competition with irrigations in important water-scarce agriculture region.

So I would like—then we would like to also rising this issue so the… connection between the three is important, especially food and water, I think. Yeah. Thank you very much. Thank you.

ADAM SCHWARZ: Thank you, Ibu Nani.

So let me move now to—not as if the food security challenge is not a significant enough one as it is, but given that we are hosting this conference while COP27 is ongoing, I did want to open the floor and ask a few questions about the intersections of food insecurity and the problems—the logistics problems that we are having globally with the parallel and climate change challenge.

And I’d like to begin with Willie Smits, the chief science officer at Arsari Group. Willie, thank you. Can we get a mic in the middle there? Thank you.

WILLIE SMITS: Thank you, Adam. Long time that you came to see the orangutans in East Kalimantan… Yeah, I’m more on the solution-based side of the equation, looking at how we can overcome the problems. So maybe I’d like to go into depth that there is actually hope. We are looking at indeed the interconnections between climate and food security. We see shifting climate zones. We see forests dying off in Siberia, in Canada, and as a result we have very big emissions of CO2, and we have land-use changes. So all of those are also going to impact what crops can be produced where, what diseases, what pests will be impacting the agricultural productivity. So on a worldwide scale, these interconnections are more than obvious with the shifting climate zones that we are facing.

But there are also local solutions that need to be sought in the tropics. Here in the tropics we have the most stable climatological conditions so we can create agroforests, and agroforests, they can provide all the services that the people need. They can provide the food security, they can provide materials, they can provide energy, they regulate the local climate, they absorb vast amounts of CO2. We can produce biochar from all the waste materials that can be absorbed into soil in quantities that are much, much higher than what we face at the moment in the atmosphere. So we can actually reduce the risk of fires, we can create more jobs, and that way we can reduce the impact upon the remaining forests. We can increase biodiversity.

But those systems are not turnkey because they are complicated. People need to know how, people need to integrate various technologies and plans. But if you understand about nature and you see how nature has regenerated soil, then it is possible to do so. There’s things like the fungi on the roots of the trees that produce a substance called glomalin and that can fix the soil, prevent erosion, store again carbon.

So really, those are the ways to go. We should go away from this monoculture attitude which is actually gambling and is much more susceptible to pests and diseases and as they are influenced by climate change worldwide.

So I think more attention for the mixed systems and the real solutions. Thank you.

ADAM SCHWARZ: Very good. Thank you very much.

Let me—and that’s a good beginning segue into the solution part of our conversation, but before we get there, I didn’t want to table one or two other issues or challenges, and perhaps we could now turn to sort of the politics and geopolitics.

We have with us today Peter Engelke—I hope I’m pronouncing that correctly—and Nicole Goldin, who have been looking at this issue from the Atlantic Council from both a political and an economic perspective.

I’d like to ask each of you to sort of share your thoughts from those different perspectives—how you see these emerging and probably increasing implications from the food security challenge that we are facing.

Peter, can we start with you?

PETER ENGELKE: Sure, great. Thank you so much. And thank you, everyone, for joining with the Atlantic Council here today and tomorrow. We’re delighted that this event is upon us.

So I run our Foresight practice at the Atlantic Council which means that we take the idea of sort of longer time scales. We take that seriously, and so to answer the question about sort of where are we headed when we look at food and its relationship to geopolitics, I mean, it might be appropriate to look at where we’ve been historically.

And where we’ve been, frankly, is that in the long sweep of human history is that if you look at city-states, nations, empires, et cetera, that food and geopolitics have been incredibly intertwined over the longer sweep of our history through cities, states, nations, empires trying to secure supplies of food—stable supplies of food through domestic production, through trade and diplomacy, but also through—and this is the critical point, I think—through conquest and through warfare, and that food has been both a source and a consequence of conflict and warfare for much of our species’ history. States have sought to deny their rivals access to food as well as the territory upon which the food is produced.

And as a result of that, of course, individuals have suffered greatly. We’ve already heard about that this morning. Hunger and famine have been, of course, the twin results of that conflict over time.

If you flash to the world that we live in now, you flash forward, we have been living in a really pretty benign relationship, if you’re talking about geopolitics on the one hand and food on the other, since really the end of the Second World War. Until not that long ago, we could make a claim that the modern global food system has been a real improvement over the history that I just described. I mean, we have had, as we’ve heard this morning, an open global trading system plus a very tech- and energy-intensive system. That has meant that we’ve been able to dramatically increase the amount of food that we can produce globally. This is per General Clark’s point earlier about how we can get from feeding 2 billion people to now 8 billion people in the world, and therefore defeat Malthus in the process.

This system, of course, is not perfect. Never has been. There’s all kinds of problems with it, as we’ve also heard this morning. But nonetheless, that linkage between food and geopolitics is—has been a little bit more sedate in the post-Second World War period.

Then we come to this year, right? We come to 2022 and we see, of course, the impact of the war in Ukraine, which, as we’ve already heard this morning, that conflict can, in fact, have real global repercussions on the question of food and the relationship, therefore, between food and sort of power in the world. It also reinforces, as we’ve also heard this morning, that the global food system that we’ve built, upon which we’ve relied—also a point that General Clark made earlier about the efficiency of that system—that efficiency of that system is highly vulnerable to disruption. There are only a relatively small number of breadbaskets in the world. And if you choke off one or more of those through drought, through flooding, through warfare, you can actually have real and unfortunate impacts on the world, in addition to the high dependence that we have on energy and the energy system.

And if you add to all of this what I call ecology’s long shadow—which is not just climate change; it’s biodiversity and the problems that come with both of those things—we’re entering into a world that I would characterize as more geopolitical risk surrounding food rather than less. And that I don’t think has characterized the world that we’ve inhabited for a very long time. So if we look ahead, we’re looking at sources of risk between the relationship between food on the one hand, geopolitics on the other that arise from climate shocks, right, that the severe drought and flooding, heat waves, et cetera that we’ve seen in the world over the last few years, that are—it’s becoming more common. It’s going to continue to be more common in the future.

The impacts, of course, are going to be negative on food production. And as a result, therefore, you’re going to get impacts on fragility—state fragility around the world, and therefore you’re going to get the spillover consequences from that. You’re going to get more conflict in localized areas. You’re going to get forced outmigration in more.

And then, of course, you’ve got a series of geopolitical shocks that arise from—arise from all of this, including the increased risk of hoarding and protectionism even by major states in the system. And of course, the specter, frankly, of conflicts over food between states, which has—we’ve been largely spared from in the—in the post-Second World War period.

And then the last source of risk I would—I would point out would be really the risk that the global governance system is not going to keep up with the demand for solutions, right? We know, looking at the interstate system, that it’s not easy to arrive at global solutions through world—through global agreements. And as a result, there is a real possibility that, despite the scale of this challenge, that, like, for example, thus far with climate change, we may run the risk of not being able to solve—to address this problem through multilateral solutions.

And then, on top of all of this, I think it’s also important to point out that we’re trying to decarbonize the energy system at the very same time, that very same energy system that we’re—that feeds, quite literally, the global food system.

And I know that I—I don’t want to go too much longer, but I want to say that the future is not lost, despite what I just said. There is quite a bit of room for optimism. We’ve heard that from a number of speakers. And that’s why we’re all here, because we believe in that.

The first is, of course, there is enormous space for innovation. We’ve been innovating our way out of the Malthus trap for two centuries, and that’s going to continue. We have speakers here at this conference who are going to be speaking directly to the ways in which we can innovate, not just through technology but through approaches to how we harvest food and grow food.

The second, of course, is that there is, in fact, always cooperation for global governance, including at forums like the G20, right—that human beings possess agency and states possess agency, and that we need to remember that. It may be hard. It may be difficult. It may be really difficult to tackle so-called wicked problems. But it can be done.

And then, finally, we can, in fact, diversify the production challenges that we just heard about to make the global food system more resilient by geography—in other words, create more breadbaskets around the world; by commodity, to reduce our dependence on just a few small numbers of seed varieties in the world; and then by type of production, in other words to go to these kinds of solutions involving agro-forestry, more creative sort of aquaculture, and the like.

And with that, I’ll stop. Thank you.

ADAM SCHWARZ: Nicole? And if I could ask you to keep it a little bit brief because I want to move us into our solution part of our conversation. Thank you.

NICOLE GOLDIN: Absolutely. Thank you. I’ll just make a couple of additional points and add on to all that Peter and some other folks have said already on what I would say are the geopolitical economy dynamics at play.

And just picking up a little bit on some of the things we’ve heard about population hitting 8 billion and some of the demographic issues and how those play into the geopolitical economy, is that in addition to thinking about these at the kind of country and the broad macro level, it’s also really about people, right, at the community and even in the household level. And so when we think about those geopolitical economy dynamics, I think we also want to make sure that we’re getting into the solutions conversation, that we’re recognizing that not all people and not all places are affected equally.

So we talked a little bit about some of the regional distinctions, but we would, I think, be remiss if we didn’t acknowledge and bring into the conversation the fact that women and young people are particularly often disproportionately impacted by the food crisis, women and children in particular. And so how we think about that in terms of household dynamics, I think, is really critical.

We talked a little bit about region. I was pleased to hear the coordinator bring up urbanization because, again, those urban food-insecurity issues are often not as prominent in the conversation or in the solutions conversation. So we really need to think about those rural-urban linkages and those dynamics, particularly as they come back to play in terms of that conflict and stabilization, right, and getting back to those young people who are more than half the world’s population and how they are impacted by these at the individual level and how those kind of aggregate up into community and national issues.

So I’ll stop there. I know we’re short on time. But thank you and look forward to continuing.

ADAM SCHWARZ: Thank you, Nicole.

So I’d like us now to sort of begin to slide into the—what I’ve been thinking of as or describing as the solution part of the conversation. Obviously, it’s an equally complex and broad conversation as is the challenges.

I’d like to ask David Merrill, the president of the US-Indonesia Society. David, you ran, actually, a large food security conference in Washington I believe last month. Maybe we could ask you to kind of set a framework here for what are the different parts of the solution set that the world is looking at to sort of begin to meet this challenge. Thank you.

DAVID MERRILL: Well, first of all, I’m going to agree with General Wesley Clark. It’s always a good idea anyway, and he happens to be right.

It’s excellent to discuss the troubled state of global food security, but the task is: What is the world going to do about it? We have come a long way. In the spring of this year, the G20 wasn’t even sure that it wanted to deal with global food security. It said this is a political issue; this is not an economic issue. And it took about four or five weeks for the G20 to come around to say this is an economic development issue no matter how much it’s related to war.

At this moment maybe someone knows—I don’t know—whether there will be a G20 food security communique. First of all, it has to be no objection by any member of the G20, so that alone means we don’t know for sure unless someone knows. But there are things that can be in it.

First of all, the international organizations have to agree to do what they can—the multilateral development banks, the World Food Programme, the FAO, the WTO, and others. I think progress is being made on that. I think it was made on that this summer during the multilateral meetings held here in Bali.

On fertilizers, I don’t know whether there will be specific recommendations on fertilizers. There should be, on increasing fertilizer supply, on the kind of fertilizer, on how they should be used efficiently, and so on. There are many people in this room who are experts on that. Whether their ideas will be translated into G20 recommendations…

Domestic supply response needs to be cultivated.

And there should be, I think and others do, some kind of mechanism created out of the G20 itself for some kind of forum for discussion of global food security, possibly chaired by Indonesia. This does not have to be an organization that will dictate to others, but it has to be, in my view, an organization that can continue to examine and bring about solutions coming out of this G20 meeting.

So I think that we need to build a bridge. There are those of us here who probably know how to do that, if it’s not too late, to the G20 food security communique. Here we are in Bali. The meeting is taking place tomorrow or this week. And there’s a lot of talent in this room. The principle that NGO suggestions should be looked at by official bodies is well-accepted. So I encourage us to do everything we can to produce some recommendations for food security for the G20. Thanks.

ADAM SCHWARZ: David, thank you very much.

Since you mentioned fertilizer as a key issue, which it most certainly is, I’d like to ask Michael Vatikiotis, to my right here, who’s a senior advisor for the Centre for Humanitarian Dialogue and has been involved in the Black Sea Grain Initiative, on the issue of fertilizer to maybe bring to the group a few of the ideas and initiatives that you’ve been working on. Thank you.

MICHAEL VATIKIOTIS: Thank you, Adam. Thank you, Adam.

First of all, just to echo Dave Merrill’s very, very important points there, that the G20 is an extremely good opportunity to actually bring forward ideas for supportive mechanisms on some of these key issues.

I think, first of all, just to—because there’s a lot of concern about the fallout from the uncertainty around the Black Sea Grain Initiative. I mean, let’s first of all just say what it is. I mean, the main assumption was that if sufficient grain, you know, and agricultural products were able to move into the world markets from, as we’ve heard earlier, a part of the world where most of it comes from or a good part of it comes from, then global wheat prices—not so much just supply, but global wheat prices—would come down. This, in turn—this, in fact, turned out to be true. In the—in the weeks ahead of the actual agreement on July 22 and then actually following the agreement, the price rises that we’d seen after the invasion of Ukraine, in fact, stabilized. And these gains were erased by July. So that was the good news.

Now, the difficulties were markets. Markets are always jittery. And with the current agreement, even as Russia has come back into the agreement, the expectation of the market was that grain supply would be resumed fully or at least efficiently, but that’s not been the case. And of course, now there’s the expectation or the worry that the agreement could be interrupted again or its—or its rollover and renewal affected by the situation on the ground. So prices are still the issue. There’s been a lot of discussion about the fact that the grain supplies themselves have not necessarily been going to less-developed countries. It’s all about the price.

And that brings me on to fertilizers, because, of course, the global price of fertilizers and the supply of fertilizers has been severely impacted. Seventy percent of Europe’s fertilizer production is now at a standstill, and that supply needs to be resumed. And that means ammonium nitrate from Russia through to Ukraine, also potash from Belarus.

But I will just make a larger point, if I may, Adam, about, you know, the—speaking to what we just heard from Dave about the need for support mechanisms for these kinds of solutions. I also feel—and I hope that in the following session, after 2:45, which—after 3:00, which I’ll be moderating, we can begin to put some ideas down for consideration by the G20. It seems to me that many of these solutions are contingent and have not yet been well-linked or coordinated.

So the Black Sea Grain Initiative is great. But as we’ve heard in the room today, there are all these other issues that are affecting world food prices as well. A question I would ask is: Is the WTO, UNCTAD, the FAO, and the WFP, are they all arranged in line to address the problems in a coordinated way? And that, I think, speaks to Dave’s very good suggestion that perhaps there should be a mechanism for global food security.

Thank you.

ADAM SCHWARZ: Michael, thank you very much.

So there’s a lot of interesting commercial innovation around the table that has been focused on addressing this challenge, and I’d like to begin to turn our conversation into that direction. I’d like to begin with Gaurav Srivastava. Your foundation has been looking at this—these issues quite intensively. Can I ask you to kind of begin with your thoughts on that subject?

GAURAV SRIVASTAVA: Yes. Thank you very much.

It is—you know, it was a very important point you brought about price. And especially we are here in Indonesia, where it is a price-sensitive market. The important thing to remember, as we have heard, is food security and energy security is national security. And I think the tremendous work from the minister of defense making Indonesia an independent nation and also on the security has been tremendous.

We’re talking about two of the breadbaskets of the world, Russia and Ukraine, right? And at the foundation, we have been looking at the correlation between energy and food, right? And it’s important to remember while we are working on these renewable energy solutions, which are critical and which I think will address the needs in the future, there is a transition period. That is just the reality of it. And we have to regulate the energy that fuels the ships, that the fuels the tractors, that fuels the cars, that—or that will basically reduce or make the price more manageable.

The other issue, which is an important issue—and I would like to turn to Pak Hashim after this—is the difference how does the commercial industry work and how do policymakers work. And there is sometimes a disconnect between that. And given Pak Hashim’s background in the commodities sector, I would like you to shed some light on that. And after that, maybe, Niels, you can say a few words, if that’s OK. Is that OK?

ADAM SCHWARZ: Yes. Sure.

GAURAV SRIVASTAVA: Pak Hashim?

HASHIM DJOJOHADIKUSUMO: Right. Gaurav, thanks very much.

Yes, I just want to say just a few words, actually, you know, just in support of what Michael Vatikiotis said and David Merrill, that we are discussing food security but actually maybe the next time we should have it combined with energy. Because, as you both said and Gaurav also said, they’re intertwined, you know? Food and energy is intertwined, right? Higher energy prices impact food prices and impact the fertilizer and so forth.

So I think—I think that’s basically what I want to say. I mean, it’s—I think some of the folks here on my left mentioned the impact on North Africa, on East Africa, and we talked about climate change. One small little aspect that I just want to add to what all of you folks have said. I think there’s a demographic challenge in the future. We’re talking about the near-term challenges, but there is a medium- and long-term challenge, and that’s the demographic—I would call a demographic challenge.

It’s that, Indonesia, agriculture is not a particularly popular profession for young people. And if you notice in this island of Bali, most of the farmers are over 50—50 years old, 60 years old, even, you know, approaching my age, 68. And if you notice, most of the young people in Bali and I would say also in Java, they prefer to have—work in factories, work in hospitality and restaurants, and not particularly enticed by agriculture. So I think it’s a long-term problem that we have, and I think it’s not only Indonesia. I think it’s other parts of the—you know, the developing world.

There’s one statistic that some of you may know or may not know. It’s that, actually, Indonesia today is a majority-urban society. Fifty-six percent of Indonesians live in what are called urban areas—56 percent. Only 44 percent of Indonesians live in rural areas. And even then, young people are going to the cities because they’re more excited by city life and so forth. So there is a movement in Indonesia to what they call the digital agriculture. It’s to make agriculture more appealing to the TikTok generation, you know, to the people—and you know, a lot of Indonesians are much more familiar and much more comfortable with the digital economy, the TikTok generation. And there is a movement in Indonesia to try to get agriculture to be more appealing. But it’s going to be—it’s a challenge. And I think, as we go from 8 billion to 9 billion to 10 billion, it’s going to be a bigger challenge. So how do we keep the rural population in the rural areas, right, producing the food?

OK. So that’s—sorry, it’s a long—a long answer.

GAURAV SRIVASTAVA: Thank you.

Niels, do you want to say something?

NIELS TROST: Yeah. Thank you, Pak Hashim. Thank you, Gaurav.

I think we heard a lot about how we need to solve the food crisis and address the food insecurity in future, and whether that is through technology or, like Pak Hashim said, getting the TikTok generation interested in the agricultural sector. I think we also need to look at solutions that we can implement today.

You know, I happen to be in the fortunate position—or unfortunate, maybe, today. My company’s active in both energy and agricultural commodities. And we see—and we spoke about this a lot now—we see a clear correlation between energy prices and food prices. It’s been said by several people. We also see a clear correlation between increasing food prices, a shortage of food, and how that leads to uprisings and destabilization of our economies and our democracies. So we do have a responsibility to address that.

Now, food security, in my view, at the end of the day means food supply. We need to do something about increasing the supply and keeping the supply that we have today flowing to the market. And that brings us to the question of: How can we get the actors in the industry to all work together? We have practical problems today that we need to address.

The other day, General Clark and myself, we looked at supplying rice to an East African country. Everything is lined up, the transportation and everything, but we face an issue. That particular African country cannot open letters of credit. There is no financing available. And I think that’s an issue that we really need to address.

You know, my company exports corn from Ukraine and wheat from Russia, but we face a practical problem. We’d like to bring this wheat to Sudan, to Yemen, to Uganda. Some of our friends from Uganda and Zimbabwe and DRC are here. We face a very practical solution. The ship owners do not want to load grain and wheat from Russia. The banks do not want to finance it. So it means that we have to finance it ourselves, and that brings us to a certain limitation. We can only do so much with our own funding.

And that’s the problem we face today. It’s great to talk about future solutions, but today we have a solution already. And that means we need to get the industry actors to recognize that we all need to work together, that we need to make some difficult decisions. You know, Treasury, the US government, has been very clear: the oil and the food needs to flow to the market. There are no sanctions on food and energy exports from Russia. But yet, the industry is self-sanctioning, and that has contributed to the shortage that we—that we see today. I think that’s an issue that we really need to address.

And I hope that in the next two or three days we can all come to an understanding that we need to make the difficult decision—even though maybe politically we don’t like it—but from a practical aspect we need to say we need the food and the energy to continue to flow. How do we do that? By getting the ship owners, the banks, the insurance companies to recognize that we have a bigger responsibility than—how can I say—our morals, our moral ethics.

We have—maybe we—the biggest victim in all of this is, for example, Africa. We haven’t spoken a lot about Africa. Every barrel of oil that now goes to Europe because Europe can pay these higher prices, every grain—cargo of grain that goes to Europe because Europe can afford to pay these higher prices does not go to Africa. That is an issue that we need to address, and we can only address that if we get the industry to accept that we need to finance these cargoes, we need to insure these cargoes. The ship owners need to be willing to go to the Black Sea ports.

That’s one thing that I’d like to throw into the group for us to think about.

Another aspect that I think we need to recognize is that food and energy, as has been said many times now, are related. We need to address the high energy prices. Again, prices are dictated by supply and demand, so we need to do something about increasing the supply. The quickest way to bring prices down is to increase supply. It’s very simple.

How do we do that? By finding a mechanism to facilitate increasing oil exports. The G-7 community has come up with the idea of maybe facilitating supply by introducing a price cap, and I think it’s—it will be an interesting discussion to see if there are maybe better alternatives to a price cap. There’s all kinds of reasons why price caps may not necessarily be the solution. And I think it’ll be—it’ll be good to see over the next couple of days if there are people in this room that can come up with better alternatives to a price cap.

I think I’d like to leave it at this for now.

ADAM SCHWARZ: Niels, thank you very, very much for that.

Well, I want to just reiterate what I said at the very top, is that while we’re sort of going around the room kind of picking people, I do want—if anybody does have a question, please do—or wants to make a comment—please do feel free to raise your hand and I’d be happy to recognize you.

Oh, General Clark.

GEN. CLARK: At the risk of coming in again, I want to thank Niels for his very practical comments because what we have to, I hope, come out of this session with are the specific ideas that we’re going to ask the G20 to take account of and hold nations accountable for.

What the crisis in Ukraine—what Russia’s invasion has shown is that the world has changed today. A nation cannot invade another nation and jeopardize the food security for the entire world. It’s simply impermissible and we need to say that very clearly.

But we also have to go to the captains of finance and industry and say it’s no longer business as usual. It’s not simply about your fiduciary responsibilities to your investors. As Niels was saying, there’s a higher—this is what government should be about. Government should be about regulating, helping, foreseeing issues, and setting the conditions in which the private sector can work to maximize its profits within those constraints. And those constraints need to be modernized because we’re in a total global system here on food security. We’re just seeing the first indication of it.

So geopolitically, just to follow on something Peter was saying, in the United States—and I’m sure in Asia—people are very concerned about the future of Taiwan. Now, what could happen with Taiwan, shipping the South China Sea, where a third of the world’s commerce goes through? Imagine what the impact of that will be on global food security.

So I think, you know, it’s a wakeup call now between—in this war in Ukraine. It’s a wakeup call for the international community to really look at the consequences of globalization, of how it’s affected each of us. And it’s no longer sufficient, in my view, to say, well, it’s up to the private sector. We’ll let the Rothschilds decide, you know, how much credit they’re going to give to the Prussians on whether they’re going to get to invade France again. No. We’re past the eighteenth and nineteenth century. This is the whole point of global governance. We’ve got to move toward a greater appreciation of responsibilities.

Now, I hope—and, Niels, building on what you—we’ll get other people here who are the experts to come up with their specific suggestions so we can take this forward and have something the G20 can really sink its teeth into on food security. Thank you.

ADAM SCHWARZ: General Clark, thank you for those remarks.

I did promise to get back to some of the kind of agricultural innovations that are—that are happening and some of the—some of the very exciting ones to deal or be a contributor to meeting the challenge of food security. Bakur Kvezereli and Erez Fait are both sort of in this space. And, Erez, maybe I could ask you to start.

BAKUR KVEZERELI: OK. I will start. I’m Bakur Kvezereli, founder of Ztractor. It’s a Silicon Valley startup.

I would say, like, we need to invest more in startups. One way to approach the technology, because startups have an advantage over the corporations to implement innovation and innovate, as we don’t have a switch in cost. We don’t have existing business model. We don’t need to adopt our business model. We are starting these companies from scratch and we have an advantage over the corporations to introduce smarter solutions, let’s say.

Another thing I would like to mention is that, you know, we are building autonomous electric tractors for agriculture. We want to build 25,000 tractors a year coming—starting from 2025 and build—on top of the tractors, build a network which will connect these tractors where we will be able to collect real-time data. And the real-time data, we see the benefits of real-time data in industries like aviation. Aviation is much safer, much more predictable with the real-time data collection. We see that real-time data in the postal and mailing services, which is convenience and efficiency and transparency. And we see the real-time data in weather forecasting, right? We believe that the future of—I mean, we can fix many problems in agriculture field by introducing real-time data collection from the field, which is from tractors, from weather stations in the field, and so on. In this way, we can—it can serve as early alert system. We can predict the future of yield. We can predict the crisis. We can predict the outbreak of the different pests and insects and so on.

I think focusing on startups can be one angle of not completely solving this problem, but addressing the problems we are facing today. Thank you.

ADAM SCHWARZ: Thank you, Bakur.

Erez, over to you, please.

EREZ FAIT: Good afternoon. So far, we heard about the problems. I would like to talk about solutions.

So we started about six years ago with developing autonomous system that irrigate the fertigate the crops based on the crops’ needs. You can think like a baby incubator. And because we believe that food security means self-independent production in every country, because we found out that the logistics become an issue—COVID, war, et cetera.

And we have a later-on session, but I would like to mention that the only way that we think to overcome the issue of education and the issue of knowledge is by technology. And I can say that the minister of defense left, but he was in action about three years ago and we establish a farm in Indonesia before the COVID. It was implemented during the COVID, remote control. It’s still active and it’s produced more than 30 type of crops, indoor/outdoor, with great results. In parallel, we work in California, where there is drought, and we manage to grow things with no fertilizer and less water, et cetera.

So we think that the way of solving the issue of agriculture is produce locally all the things that agriculture needs. And this will shorten the cycle of logistics because cost of logistics and distributing the knowledge to the remote area, like Mr. Hashim said, is the main issue. And we are working here, together with the farmers, together with the universities, how to adopt this technology and bring back the youth to the circle of the production of the food. And the idea, especially in countries around the Equator like Indonesia, is to grow food all year round independent of the rain and other climate issues. This is something that later on we can share to see how we can help solving these kind of challenges.

Thank you.

ADAM SCHWARZ: Erez, thank you very much for that.

We’ve got about 10 or 15 minutes left, and I want to just sort of encourage anybody who has a—has a comment to raise your hand. Before I could say it, ma’am, over to you, please. Can we have a mic in the middle of the left-hand row, please?

Q: Thank you very much and good afternoon. My name’s Gwen Mwaba from the African Export and Import Bank.

And I’d really just like to first start by commending Niels for those comments that you made, which were top of mind for me. We are, indeed, facing serious issues with payments to Russia, where grains and fertilizer are coming from. And even though the sanctions clarify that they’re exclusions, the self-sanctioning is a real problem. So, for example, an African development finance institution such as the Afreximbank, if we try to make payments to Russia through our Western correspondent banks, they freeze those payments. So I’m wondering whether there’s need to emphasize or clarify these sanctions, or for those sanctioning countries to issue notices which we can share with our Western correspondent banks so that they don’t exclude payments that are related to food and fertilizers. That’s one point.

And then the second point is, again, the capacity of financing to African counterparties has been curtailed or canceled altogether, as is usually the case when there’s a crisis. And I think somebody had mentioned that it’s not business as usual. So it’s important that Western financial institutions in times of crisis like this don’t pull back things like confirmation lines, because the price of energy and of fertilizer and grains has gone up, trebled and quadrupled, so that means there’s more financing capacity in a—in a trade flow where there’s already an existing trade financing gap of billions of dollars. So we need that support from the West.

And then my final point was really even as we solve the problems—the immediate problems to get grains to these vulnerable countries, what do we do about the medium to long term? I think we also need to encourage investment into Africa for more production of food, but in order to produce more food you need fertilizer. So perhaps investors should also look at partnering to set up fertilizer production plants on the African continent so that there’s more or less self—dependence on other nations, and I think in the longer term there will be more food security for the continent. Thank you.

ADAM SCHWARZ: Thank you very much. I’m sure that’s a topic that will be picked up in the following session. Thank you. Thank you for raising it.

Matt Kroenig, you—I think you raised your hand. Matt from the Atlantic Council.

MATTHEW KROENIG: Great. Well, thank you very much, Adam, and this has been a fascinating conversation. I’m learning a lot.

I wanted to offer a framework for thinking about this challenge because as I’m listening it’s occurring to me that food security is not unique. A lot of these challenges we’re facing are the same challenges we’re facing with semiconductors, with energy, with PPE, with rare-earth elements. And it seems to me that the common theme is that after the end of the Cold War we built a global economy designed for efficiency, not for security. And that worked in a globalized, frictionless post-Cold War world, but now that geopolitics has returned we realize that doesn’t work. We need secure supply chains. And so, you know, when you look at, you know, energy, Europeans were too dependent on Russia, and in the post-Cold War world that worked. Now it doesn’t. We were dependent on China for PPE. That no longer makes sense. Dependent on China for semiconductors.

And it seems the same when you look at the global food supply. You know, 75 percent of human calories come from nine food sources. We have a few breadbaskets like Russia and Ukraine producing. The rest of the world is importing.

And so as we look towards solutions, it seems to me like some of the solutions here may be similar to the solutions in other areas. Diversifying supply chains. So instead of, you know, importing everything more local production—millet in India, urea fertilizer in Africa, the diversity in terms of more biodiversity.

So I’m not an expert in this area but I’m seeing patterns, and I think maybe some of the solutions we’re looking at in other areas of reshoring and allyshoring may make sense here as well.

Thanks.

ADAM SCHWARZ: Thank you very much.

You know, as we sort of begin to—without stealing too much thunder from the session to come, begin to think through what is it that we want this conference to contribute to the findings of the G20, perhaps I could ask the ambassador of Ukraine to Indonesia if you had some thoughts as to what—from Ukraine’s perspective, what would you like the G20 to have to say on this food security issue, which will come up in a couple days?

Thank you.

VASYL HAMIANIN: Thank you very much.

Good afternoon, everybody. Actually, I was not preparing to speak in this panel. But since you asked, right, I’ll just make some very, very brief remarks on what I think on that.

First of all, I would believe that the—if the you talk about the crisis—right, food crisis, whatever, logistic crisis—first of all, we have to identify the roots of the crisis to deal with it efficiently, and, otherwise, it will be like, you know, giving remedy to a person—instead of giving remedy to a person, like, contaminated with something just give painkillers, and the crisis will develop and the human body eventually dies.

So instead of giving painkillers we must give the proper remedy after identifying what is the key problem, and we know what is the key problem for all the crisis. To put it in other words, rather than repeating that it is the Russian aggression, I would say that this is the global crisis of trust and diplomacy.

We failed. United Nations failed, like League of Nations many years ago. So, now, after U.N. is paralyzed, it’s very important for the world to identify the group or, whatever, global leaders—global leaders—who can work out the instruments and mechanisms of how to deal with the problem efficiently and from the roots—starting from the roots, right.

So I see—I hope, right, it’s not—it’s something I can know. But it’s my hope that leaders of the world must act like leaders. They not only have the rights to decide the destiny for the world economy and society and the directions for development.

They also have duty to protect security, peace, development, prosperity of the world, and this is a heavy duty. And in this situation, the world leaders—what I mean, acting by leaders? They don’t have to just discuss and trying to see—you know, give the painkillers. Let’s talk about the food crisis and don’t talk about the war. No.

If you act like leaders, you have to identify the problem and take immediate measures to nip it in the bud. To clean the body of a virus this is essential.

That’s why—by the way, I was pleasantly surprised that this food security—Global Food Security Forum is on the auspices of Atlantic Council and the minister of defense, which is very meaningful.

If you want to resolve the crisis, like, you know, grain deliveries, as my colleague and friend, I would say, Ms. Kira, mentioned, we are facing demining of the lands, we are facing the rebuilding of infrastructure, and we are facing the physical problem of protection of the farmers and of the deliveries, right. And this is the point where we apply something real. We apply the convoys for protecting the vessels, we apply the demining, and we apply the air defense to protect the actual siloes and warehouses from the attacks, right.

So this is very meaningful, and this is the point where the practical instruments can be applied. I’m in the military. Unfortunately, living in the 21st century, the—having the small world where all the processes are happening, like, fast. Anything happens, someone sneezes in the Latin America, someone, you know, coughs immediately in Australia, right, it’s like—it’s seconds, right.

So whatever we do it will influence the world, not just the region or not just whatever country. That’s, basically, what I said. Act as leaders and try to be practical, not just theoretical.

Thank you very much.

ADAM SCHWARZ: Ambassador Hamianin, I thank you very much for those remarks, and sorry to put you on the spot there

Just I wanted to give the last word, again—actually the same question but to some of our Indonesian academic colleagues who are here with us today in terms of your view of what you’d like to see come out of this conference in terms of food security from an Indonesian perspective.

And, again, I’m putting people on the spot here, which I apologize, but I want to at least give the opportunity to Rachmat Pambudy at the Bogor Institute of Agriculture or Eni Harmayani at Gadjah Mada University, the faculty of ag technology.

Again, don’t feel obliged, but if either of you would like to comment we would be happy to hear from you.

Is there—they’re not taking that opportunity because they’re not here. So we’ll pass here.

Oh, yes, please?

ENI HARMAYANI: Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.

My name is Eni Harmayani from Gadjah Mada University.

ADAM SCHWARZ: Thank you.

ENI HARMAYANI: I think, for the past years, there has been significant progress in boosting agricultural production.

However, this has hardly reduced the number of hungry people and malnutrition. So I think eradication of hunger and malnutrition is an achievable goal if community at the local efforts are empowered. And, also, as you asked what is the output of this G20 in terms of food security, I think the international community must support the ability of each region to feed itself and to invest in local production so the problem of globalization can be minimized because the regional area can produce their food by itself.

So support by international community for the region to feed itself, I think, it’s very important, and combination of technology and also local wisdom is very important because human is the center of the development.

Thank you very much.

ADAM SCHWARZ: Thank you very much.

I’m going to now give the last word to go Gaurav. Maybe start us off, and I’d like you to maybe give us a few concluding remarks from your end.

Thank you. Oh, please, sir, can we get a mic? I understand we do have a few more minutes. Thank you.

KASDI SUBAGYONO: Thank you very much. I’m Kasdi from the Ministry of Agriculture. Yeah.

So I would like, because one colleague has raised about the result of the Agriculture Working Group here in Bali for several months ago. So the G20 Agriculture Working Group just concluded and come up with twenty-two paragraphs of the communiqué, but, unfortunately, only one communiqué—one paragraph is not consensus by all the members regarding the geopolitical tension of Russia and Ukraine.

But, substantially, in fact, that we are going to come up with three priority issue.

First is how we can promote sustainable and resilient agri food system within the situation is not, you know, unpredictable here and in global situation. So agri food system, dynamic behavior, we have to—concern on that.

So, secondly, is about the—how we can promote an open, fair, transparent, nondiscriminative of the agriculture trade, and this is all member agreed that all the countries, especially who the center of the food production, is not allowed to restrict of export. This is very important because if you do that, so the country within the very insecurity in food there will be troubles. This all member agree with the export restriction should be avoided.

The third is how to promote innovation. Everybody talk about the technology promotion but we are focused on agri partnership, especially for millennial people, that’s just mentioned by Dr. Hashim that is right here in Indonesia. But we are now start how to train the millennial people in term of the technology because they are very friendly in the technology. This is why transformation of agri food system is very important.

So in terms of experience in Indonesia here, so we are now facing the global food crisis. So Indonesia start with a policy and program how to secure on that. First, how to increase the production capacity of your food. This is very important, especially for us here in Indonesia. We still imported 11 million tons of wheat from all over the world—11 million tons. So that with 9 million tons of food, 2 million tons for feed.

So it’s very, very, very—and one very—I’m very glad to see that one of our colleagues raised about the cassava. So we are now focused on cassava, on sagu, on sorghum. Should be substitute from the how big of food that wheat, for example, to import it. So we substituted to reduce of our import on the wheat.

So, secondly, is how to develop of substitutions of meat, for example, so not only of cattle but we also develop of poultry and so on. So that means that we have to try to find another alternative if you don’t have any source of food on this country. So that is very important.

The third priority is about, well, in terms of the conclusion of Agriculture Working Group in Bali that export restrictions should be avoided, so we try to have increasing production of any of commodity because we have very diversified commodity here—horticulture, food crop… and the livestock as well.

So we try to have—when we have more we have to export it. So this is the—so we have five strategies here in Indonesia. So especially one that I mentioned already—how to increase our capacity production, promote the local best food diversification. It’s not only rice because now we’re increasing our production of rice. We have surplus already. Ten point two million ton we have stored of rice right now. Right now. So we have tried to export it from that.

So, secondly, is how to promote—sorry, to strengthen food reserve and logistic system. This is very important. Certainly, modernization of agriculture, as everybody mentioned about the mechanization, machinery is very important because you can reduce losses.

Here in Indonesia losses is 11 percent to 12 percent of our harvest. If you do mechanization, we can reduce until 5 percent. So, I mean, you raise of 7 percent. Our production is 54 million tons of rice. So, I mean—so when compared to the rice that is… yeah, we have 32 million ton. Every year, we surplus about 2 million ton.

So this is why our focus is how to increase production capacity. Diversify product. It’s not only the rice but also the other source of food.

Thank you very much.

ADAM SCHWARZ: Kasdi, thank you very much. It’s a very useful way to end this session and move us on to the next one with that emphasis on food resilience. Thank you very much.

Gaurav, did you want to just close it off briefly?

Thank you.

GAURAV SRIVASTAVA: Thank you. Hello?

ADAM SCHWARZ: Got you. There you go.

GAURAV SRIVASTAVA: Thank you.

I think the underlying theme of the conversation so far is we’re all connected. Every—all these events—food security, energy security—is all connected to, ultimately, national security and the stability of human beings. And the ambassador from Ukraine, he—you know, he very well described the plight in Ukraine because of the conflict.

We can take it one step further and remember that while the—we see the physical impacts of what’s going on these are multi-generational impacts because once there is weapons on that land that land may not ever be able to plant again. They may not be able to grow any more crops again.

And it goes back to remembering that countries in Asia, countries in Africa, their challenges are immediate and we need to regulate those, and the risk is if it is not regulated the business that is—that is will go underground and that creates the—a larger issue, which is it puts money in the hands of bad state actors like, you know, Iran and Venezuela, and we definitely do not want that.

But I’m—but thank you so much for shedding the light on this conversation, and I think as we talk through this I hope we can find a solution. And it is important to remember that we are the custodians of blessings and be able to pass it on from one generation to the next.

So thank you very much.

ADAM SCHWARZ: Thank you, Gaurav.

Well, that brings us to the end of Panel I of the Global Food Security Conference.

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Nancy Pelosi and Kathy Castor at COP27: The US won’t abandon its climate leadership, regardless of who controls Congress

Katherine Walla — Thu, 10 Nov 2022 21:28:59 +0000

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Online Event Thu, November 10, 2022 • 6:15 am ET

Speaker Nancy Pelosi on climate and resilience at COP27

AN #ACFRONTPAGE EVENT – How can the US and allies bolster climate action and change the trajectory of global warming?

Climate Change & Climate Action Energy & Environment United States and Canada

The United States is officially back “in the game,” leading the fight against climate change, said US Representative Kathy Castor, chair of the House Select Committee on the Climate Crisis. “And we’re not leaving the playing field ever again.”

Castor and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi spoke on Thursday about how the United States is addressing the climate crisis at an Atlantic Council Front Page event hosted by the Adrienne Arsht-Rockefeller Foundation Resilience Center at the United Nations Climate Change Conference of the Parties (COP27) in Sharm el Sheikh, Egypt.

While the United States—which withdrew from the Paris Climate Accords in 2019 but rejoined the agreement in 2021—has seen its climate leadership questioned, Castor said the country now has the tools to meet its emissions reduction goals. Those tools, she explained, include the bipartisan infrastructure law and the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA), the latter of which she deemed the “most important climate bill” in US history.

At COP27, Pelosi hopes that US and global leaders will “find common ground” to address climate change, especially because of how pervasive the effects will be on health, economies, and even security globally. “The competition for habitat and resources can cause conflict,” Pelosi noted. “We have to avoid that.”

Below are highlights from the event moderated by Kathy Baughman McLeod, senior vice president and director of Arsht-Rock:

Armed and ready

Speaking as votes are still being tallied from Tuesday’s midterm elections, Pelosi, a Democrat, recalled how Republicans have called the climate crisis a “hoax.” “We have to get over that,” Pelosi said. If Republicans do take over the House of Representatives—the outcome was still up in the air as of Thursday with many races too close to call—they will “nix the climate committee,” Castor said.
But with legislation to fight climate change in place, Castor said that the United States is arriving at COP27 with “not just talk anymore but with real concrete action.” At the convening, Castor said she hopes that allies and partners will see that the United States “is ready to participate in a much higher level through science, technology, resilience.”
Castor pointed out that the United States has “cutting-edge science” at its disposal to assist in that participation. She recalled the infrastructure law’s and IRA’s investments in the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, which studies and tracks the planet’s changing climate, and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, which gathers data on climate change’s impacts and building resilience. Pelosi praised the agencies, saying “science… will get us to where we need to go,” to adapt to and mitigate climate change.
Castor asked if the United States wasn’t going to lead on science and technology, “who is? We’re not willing to cede that to another country.” Pelosi agreed, saying that US leadership in science and technology “can be a resource to [other] countries.”

Resilience for all

Pelosi explained that the IRA has a focus on “justice, fairness, inclusiveness, [and] diversity.” She added that the law provides sixty billion dollars strictly to “build infrastructure that unites communities.” She also pointed to an emphasis on STEM education across both laws that “enables everyone to participate” so that the country has access to the “best thinking” on climate change solutions “wherever it springs from.”
Accessing the best thinking on climate change will also require “a commitment globally to the education of women,” Pelosi argued, because women bring “brainpower” and make a “big difference” in their communities. “We have to have a systemic way for that to happen” for women across the world, she explained. Castor pointed to research showing that improving access to education and family planning for young girls is “one of the clear climate solutions.”
Pelosi noted that supporting women entering the workforce through child tax credits and family and medical leave will “enable women to be in the game” of developing climate solutions. The United States, Castor added, must work with its partners “around the globe to do better by girls and women, no matter where they live.”

What next?

Now that the United States has passed an “historic” package of investments in climate solutions, Castor said that there’s “a whole lot more left to do,” especially for the private sector, which now needs to develop technology to adapt to and mitigate climate change. She explained that private companies will be able to leverage tools such as tax credits to develop clean-energy technologies.
Pelosi noted that she’s seen companies shift to more green practices because “it’s a moneymaker” or it “honors their responsibility to their shareholders.” But she pointed out that they should be doing so because it is good for their stakeholders: “the community, their employees, [and] their customers.”
In the end, Castor said, the government’s goal is to boost US technological capacity and then transfer it to the rest of the world, and especially to developing countries. For example, she said that “Africa wants to modernize and develop,” but countries there need to choose between powering that development with cheap, but destructive, coal and gas or with sustainable, clean energy. The United States leadership in the latter could help them “pivot,” Castor argued.
From floods in Pakistan to hurricanes in her home state of Florida, “no one is immune to the cost of the growing risk of the climate crisis,” Castor said. And since the atmosphere is already full of greenhouse gases, there’s a bleak future ahead, she added, “unless we act now.”

Katherine Walla is an assistant director of editorial at the Atlantic Council.

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The post Nancy Pelosi and Kathy Castor at COP27: The US won’t abandon its climate leadership, regardless of who controls Congress appeared first on Atlantic Council.

Live updates from COP27 as leaders battle climate change amid global crises

Atlantic Council — Mon, 07 Nov 2022 18:35:14 +0000

Activists, experts, and leaders flocked to the beaches of Egyptian resort town Sharm el Sheikh for the United Nations Conference of the Parties (COP27). Over the two-week convening, global leaders discussed topics ranging from ways to finance their emissions-reduction goals to new ambitions to keep global warming below 1.5 degrees Celsius.

Dubbed the “African COP,” this year’s conference was expected to see Global South countries rally together to press rich countries on their role in driving climate change. For the first time, global leaders promised to set up a “loss and damage” reparations fund, paid for by wealthy countries, to help low-income countries pay for the consequences of the climate crisis.

COP27 took place after a season of extreme weather events and natural disasters that saw catastrophic flooding in Pakistan, droughts across Africa, and more. And as the conference unfolded, leaders kept their eyes on the global energy crisis spurred by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, which has pushed energy security to the fore—sometimes at the expense of the climate.

Have countries heeded this year’s wake-up calls with bold commitments at COP27? Our experts—many of whom were in Sharm el Sheikh—dispatched their insights and recommendations for world leaders throughout the course of this critical conference. This post was continuously updated as their reactions streamed in.

Check out all our work on COP27 here.

The latest analysis from Sharm el Sheikh

COP27 readout: The good and the bad as COP27 concludes
The big success and bigger failure of COP27
Read our experts’ analysis from earlier in the conference

NOVEMBER 23, 2022 | 3:30 PM WASHINGTON | 10:30 PM SHARM EL SHEIKH

COP27 readout: The good and the bad as COP27 concludes

Requiring an additional thirty-six hours of negotiation, official delegates finally reached a settlement and final communique early Sunday morning. The deal is underpinned by the landmark agreement to create a fund for climate compensation, bringing a nearly three-decade journey for “loss and damage” closer to the finish line. Even if details are sparse regarding contributions to the fund and the criteria for disbursement to vulnerable or impacted nations, bringing forth a commitment from two hundred participating countries is representative of the amount of influence the Global South has wielded throughout the past two weeks.

The disappointing absence of increased emissions reduction targets in the communique is an indicator of how the needs of the developing world have underpinned this COP. Ambitions for economic development amidst a global energy crisis have given enough influence to global oil and gas producing states that room for a significant push to reduce the role of oil and gas in the energy mix has been significantly limited.

EnergySource

Nov 23, 2022

COP27 readout: The good and the bad as COP27 concludes

By Global Energy Center

Global Energy Center experts take stock of two weeks of COP developments in Sharm el Sheikh.

Climate Change & Climate Action Energy & Environment

NOVEMBER 21, 2022 | 8:57 AM WASHINGTON | 3:57 PM SHARM EL SHEIKH

The big success and bigger failure of COP27

Read their takeaways

Fast Thinking

Nov 21, 2022

The big success and bigger failure of COP27

By Atlantic Council

What other surprises cropped up at the conference? Our experts, who were on the ground in Sharm el Sheikh, are here to weigh in.

Brazil China

Stepping up ahead of negotiations

Solutions for achieving net-zero emissions and improving energy access for all
How climate change affects peace and security across the world
Insurance for a climate-safe future
Dispatch from the Resilience Hub: Why countries can’t give up on the 1.5 degree Celsius cap on warming
Will countries step up on loss and damage?
Saudi Arabia’s take on aligning energy security needs and decarbonization goals
How Freetown is addressing extreme heat
Addressing Africa’s rapidly rising energy demand
Why now is the best time to address energy security and climate change in tandem
Read our experts’ analysis from earlier in the conference

NOVEMBER 18, 2022 | 6:18 AM WASHINGTON | 1:18 PM SHARM EL SHEIKH

Solutions for achieving net-zero emissions and improving energy access for all

Our Global Energy Center pulled to the side top thinkers, leaders, and innovators on climate solutions at COP27 to talk about their ideas for achieving net-zero ambitions while ensuring energy access for all.

Watch the full playlist

NOVEMBER 17, 2022 | 9:28 AM WASHINGTON | 4:28 AM SHARM EL SHEIKH

How climate change affects peace and security across the world

By Lama El Hatow

As climate change impacts intensify—fueling migration and competition over scarce resources—so does the risk that conflict that may emerge. That risk has only been exacerbated by recent economic shocks, energy-supply disruptions, and increasing food insecurity.

While climate-linked migration and displacement (or “human mobility”) are discussed extensively at COP27, they are not officially on the agenda. The US Center, as well as several other pavilions at COP27 like the Climate Mobility Pavilion, have hosted series of events discussing the connections between climate change, conflict, peace, and security. At these events, speakers explained how, with assessments by officials from the US Departments of State and Defense, the United States is looking at hotspot zones around the world that are at risk from severe climate impacts—including how fragile and conflict-affected countries are negatively affected by these impacts. The United States is conducting these assessments in an attempt to provide an early warning about which regions are most at risk from climate change.

One of the most concerning ways that climate change will impact these regions is by contributing to increasing food insecurity. According to a report by the UN Food and Agriculture Organization and the World Food Programme, up to 205 million people across forty-five countries are expected to face acute food insecurity, while up to 45 million people across thirty-seven countries are projected to face severe malnourishment that may result in starvation or death. The report also explains that more than 70 percent of people facing acute food security over the last year were living in conflict-affected countries; and in several countries and regions, climate change and extreme weather events are driving increases in food insecurity. Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine has only added to the crisis by elevating prices for food and energy, the latter key to distributing food worldwide.

The report also identified nineteen hotspots—seventeen countries and two regional clusters—that are most at risk of worsening food insecurity over the next few months due to climate change effects, increasing conflict, economic shocks, and more. The 970,000 people who are projected to face the most severe conditions are located in five countries—Afghanistan, Ethiopia, Somalia, South Sudan, and Yemen.

With the number of climate refugees increasing, countries are beginning to assess how to manage this new movement of people, which will likely have spillover effects across regions. Although climate change is impacting the world all over, some countries have more capacity and resilience to manage the crisis than others; hence, migration flows in the Global South are steering toward countries with better resilience. Many at COP27 have argued that developed countries have a moral and ethical responsibility towards the migrants from the Global South, since they are coming from countries that didn’t contribute as much to the world’s emissions problem. Historically, however, there has been a pervasive anti-immigration sentiment that fuels restrictive policies and a general reluctance to provide legal protection to people fleeing their home countries due to conflict or climate change. Additionally, there has not yet been an established finance arrangement or action protocol on climate-linked mobility at the global level. Extensive work with significant cooperation still needs to be done to address this worsening crisis.

—Lama El Hatow is a nonresident fellow with the Atlantic Council’s empowerME Initiative.

NOVEMBER 17, 2022 | 1:55 AM WASHINGTON | 8:55 AM SHARM EL SHEIKH

Insurance for a climate-safe future

With COP27’s focus on climate change adaptation, in addition to mitigation, the insurance sector now has an “absolutely integral role to play” in helping people manage disasters after—and even before— they happen, said Francis Bouchard, Marsh McLennan’s managing director of climate.

In conversation with Jorge Gastelumendi, director of global policy at the Adrienne Arsht-Rockefeller Foundation Resilience Center, Bouchard explained that insurance still has a very “traditional” role in terms of signaling to people the risks they may be acquiring in a new venture and paying claims after events unfold.

But there’s a new way that the insurance sector is helping send those risk signals earlier: Anticipatory finance, in which some companies offer a way to pay before a disaster strikes. “So if you statistically know that at some point [an] event is going to turn into something that would’ve been insured, you can actually put money in peoples’ hands before the event,” Bouchard explained. “They can spend that money to protect their families, their businesses, their cattle, their farms, whatever it is; but they can take steps before.”

Bouchard warned, however, that the idea hasn’t been scaled yet, as companies undergo a “mindset shift” from paying a claim after an event to making a claim never happen. Yet, he added, with momentum sparked by the global focus on risk reduction, which has resulted in new initiatives like the Group of Seven’s Global Shield, “the time is now for the insurance industry to lead.”

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NOVEMBER 16, 2022 | 7:18 PM WASHINGTON | NOVEMBER 17, 2022 | 2:18 AM SHARM EL SHEIKH

Dispatch from the Resilience Hub: Why countries can’t give up on the 1.5 degree Celsius cap on warming

If countries that signed the Paris Agreement agree that we’ll exceed 1.5°C & change the temp, it means accepting more floods, fires & extreme heat+more people vulnerable to climate impacts. We must accelerate solutions that protect people &communities from climate disasters pic.twitter.com/4jIWd2JZgH
— Arsht-Rock Resilience Center (@ArshtRock) November 17, 2022

NOVEMBER 16, 2022 | 12:04 PM WASHINGTON | 7:04 PM SHARM EL SHEIKH

Will countries step up on loss and damage?

By Lama El Hatow

While loss and damage is near the top of the agenda at COP27, it has been a sticky point for many countries as they debate how to finance the loss and damage payments.

Climate mitigation looks to avert climate change through the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions and the development of zero-emission solutions; climate adaptation aims to minimize the chance that climate change impacts a given community. But loss and damage addresses the harms and costs induced by climate change, which is already happening.

In Pakistan, for example, the recent disastrous floods, which put one-third of the country under water, damaged over a million homes, and killed over a thousand people. The damage has been estimated to cost more than thirty billion dollars and it displaced more thirty million people from their homes, raising an immediate need for loss and damage compensation. Overall, while some countries like Belgium and Scotland have been willing to pledge funding for loss and damage, other leading economies, including the United States, showed resistance.

At the same time, climate finance has traditionally been in the form of loans to developing countries. So essentially, developing countries are borrowing money from developed countries for a problem they mostly haven’t caused—and are being asked to pay it back with interest. Additionally, when climate disasters cause significant damage, they bring significant costs for the impacted country and, for developing countries, wipe out their financial resources, so the net outcome of the loan is almost nil. This essentially is why Pakistan has called for debt restructuring and debt relief after the flooding, to change this unfair setup.

At the institutional level, the Vulnerable Twenty Group (V20), a “cooperation initiative” of finance ministers from the countries most vulnerable to climate change, was formed in 2015 to present a unified voice on climate action. V20 members are also members of the Climate Vulnerable Forum, a non-treaty organization of fifty-five member countries which are estimated to have collectively lost $525 billion from 2000 to 2019 due to climate change. These two forums are actively pushing to promote a loss and damage payments mechanism.

While reaching a consensus on loss and damage has been challenging, some developed countries proposed alternative funding mechanisms for vulnerable countries. For example, the Group of Seven-led Global Shield announced at COP27 provides immediate financial support to V20 countries when climate-change-related disasters strike. With Germany’s contribution of $175 million, and with additional contributions from France, Austria, Denmark and Ireland, the total financial coverage of the Global Shield is about $207 million. But the V20 countries also warned earlier this year that they could stop paying their debt service (estimated at about $685 billion) if lenders are not willing to restructure these debts and deduct the climate induced costs. In the words of Ghanaian Finance Minister Ken Ofori-Atta, by leaving nations at the mercy of climate catastrophe, “you could be triggering a global economic meltdown.”

—Lama El Hatow is a nonresident fellow with the Atlantic Council’s empowerME Initiative.

NOVEMBER 16, 2022 | 11:00 AM WASHINGTON | 6:00 PM SHARM EL SHEIKH

Saudi Arabia’s take on aligning energy security needs and decarbonization goals

Global Energy Center Senior Director sat down with Khalid M. Abuleif, chief negotiator for the climate agreements for the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, to talk about Saudi Arabia’s latest plans to meet its commitments in the Paris Climate Accords and the world’s needs for energy security.

The Paris Agreement has the potential to “be very costly for Saudi Arabia,” Abuleif explained. “The countries that will be most impacted… [are] going to be oil producers, developing countries; the reasoning is because their economies are not fully diversified and they rely heavily on limited sectors.”

But now is still the time for global climate action, Abuleif said. So as Saudi Arabia moves forward, it is working on making the country more resilient “to any kind of measures that could be taken,” Abuleif explained.

Watch the full interview to hear about Saudi Arabia’s latest initiatives geared toward improving energy security, boosting the country’s economy, and meeting its climate obligations.

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NOVEMBER 16, 2022 | 9:05 AM WASHINGTON | 4:05 PM SHARM EL SHEIKH

How Freetown is addressing extreme heat

Yvonne Aki-Sawyerr, mayor of Freetown, Sierra Leone, caught up with Kathy Baughman McLeod at the Resilience Hub and explained how her city is using an affordable and “simple solution” to protect women from extreme heat at markets across the city.

Watch the full conversation

We’re coming #TogetherForImplementation with our partner @yakisawyerr! https://t.co/pPQr4to3pO

She stopped by the @COPResHub to chat with @KBMcLeodFLA about how Freetown is building a cooler future with adaptation solutions. Watch our latest #COPChat now! pic.twitter.com/vOdCaHuo7u
— Arsht-Rock Resilience Center (@ArshtRock) November 16, 2022

NOVEMBER 16, 2022 | 2:03 AM WASHINGTON | 9:03 AM SHARM EL SHEIKH

Addressing Africa’s rapidly rising energy demand

The African Development Bank Group’s Kevin Kariuki joined Global Energy Center Deputy Director Reed Blakemore at COP27 to talk about sustainable development and energy access across Africa.

“Africa has endemic energy poverty which must be addressed,” Kariuki said, “and at the same time, we must address the issues of the climate crisis.”

To do that, Kariuki explained that he hopes leaders at COP27 realize that “what is actually required today is synergizing growth in energy demand with climate action.” He said that would help “[meet] the needs of Africa.”

“But we must also be realistic,” Kariuki added, “that renewable energy on its own will probably not be able to provide the security of supply and affordable power that is required to be able to underpin Africa’s social economic development.”

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NOVEMBER 16, 2022 | 1:10 AM WASHINGTON | 8:10 AM SHARM EL SHEIKH

Why now is the best time to address energy security and climate change in tandem

Global Energy Center Senior Director Landon Derentz joined the National Grid’s Rhian Kelly at COP27 to talk about addressing energy security in tandem with the energy transition.

“I think in many ways they’re more aligned than they’ve ever been because if we want to get ourselves off Russian gas, the cheapest form of self-reliant energies are renewables,” Kelly explained. She added that because global politics have changed, she thinks it’s “the best time to be thinking about energy security and climate change together.”

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A strategy for the Global South

How cities in the Global South are adapting to climate change
The first global ambassador for heat action lays out his top priorities
Dispatch from the Resilience Hub: How women are impacted by climate change
How to inhabit an uninhabitable region
Read our experts’ analysis from earlier in the conference

NOVEMBER 15, 2022 | 5:07 PM WASHINGTON | NOVEMBER 16, 2022 | 12:07 AM SHARM EL SHEIKH

How cities in the Global South are adapting to climate change

At the Thailand Pavilion, Mauricio Rodas talked about urban resilience and climate adaptation in cities across the Global South. “Extreme heat is the climate hazard that [effects] more people than any other, and it is particularly severe in cities,” he explained. He pointed out the innovations that are addressing extreme heat, such as the Cool Capital Stack investment portfolio recently launched by the Adrienne Arsht-Rockefeller Foundation Resilience Center and its partners.

See the highlights

Today at @COP27P discussing in different sessions the need to implement Nature based Solutions in cities, and highlighting the importance of the recently launched Cool Capital Stack as an innovative financial mechanism to address extreme heat related risks. @ArshtRock pic.twitter.com/sTtcx5lgtA
— Mauricio Rodas (@MauricioRodasEC) November 15, 2022

NOVEMBER 15, 2022 | 10:05 AM WASHINGTON | 5:05 PM SHARM EL SHEIKH

The first global ambassador for heat action lays out his top priorities

Newly appointed Global Ambassador for Heat Action Felipe Calderón outlined his agenda for tackling extreme heat in conversation with Mauricio Rodas, the senior advisor for heat and city diplomacy at the Adrienne Arsht-Rockefeller Foundation Resilience Center.

“The first thing we need to do is gather information… [and] second, to transmit that information to the right people,” Calderón said.

He said that he believes “the main problem is the lack of awareness about the importance of the problem, about the magnitude of the problem.” But, he added, getting information out to leaders, the media, and other stakeholders can help boost the urgency among leaders to address heat.

Afterall, Calderón explained, “the most cost effective way to avoid human deaths… [is] preventing or taking action on heat waves.”

He also stressed the importance of nature-based solutions like planting trees in cities. That, he said, is an effective one because it “combines an adaptation solution with a mitigation solution.”

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NOVEMBER 15, 2022 | 7:49 AM WASHINGTON | 2:49 PM SHARM EL SHEIKH

Dispatch from the Resilience Hub: How women are impacted by climate change

Arsht-Rock’s Director @KBMcLeodFLA shares that “80 percent of the people displaced by climate change are women, and women are 14 times more likely to die from climate disasters.” Action here at #COP27 is to understand how to better protect them from climate change. pic.twitter.com/RPUx2fN6vW
— Arsht-Rock Resilience Center (@ArshtRock) November 15, 2022

NOVEMBER 15, 2022 | 7:17 AM WASHINGTON | 2:17 PM SHARM EL SHEIKH

How to inhabit an uninhabitable region

By Lama El Hatow

The latest analysis from the United Nations (UN) indicates that we are still nowhere near limiting global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius—the target set by the Paris Accords—and are actually headed towards 2.8 degrees. That means we may see regions around the globe become completely uninhabitable. According to the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, about six hundred million people across the Middle East and North Africa will face heat waves that go beyond the human survivability threshold by 2100. The Middle East North Africa (MENA) region is already a hot arid climate, and it will get hotter and drier with the impacts of climate change—with summertime temperatures that make it dangerous to be outdoors.

In this respect, we are heading toward an uninhabitable world and need to consider how best to adapt to it, particularly during the summer months. The immediate impact will be for people to spend more time indoors with the safety of air conditioning, which increases the demand for energy even further—bringing greater urgency to the search for clean renewable energy to power a smooth green transition. Additionally, within this year’s COP there have been many discussions about the possibilities of heat resilience within cities, including urban reforestation that can create cooler micro climates, shaded areas above bicycle lanes, and holistic urban planning with an eye toward resilience.

Consider the way many cities in Canada and the far north have adjusted to their harsh winters by creating underground infrastructure to minimize outdoor exposure, including public transportation, tunnel systems, and connections to buildings. Similarly, countries in MENA such as the United Arab Emirates and Qatar are already working to enhance their infrastructure to limit outdoor exposure by connecting their metro lines through tunnels to buildings, along with tailoring cultural attractions to the climate from the world’s largest indoor ski slope in Dubai to indoor stadiums and indoor golf courses. The MENA region is already building its cities to adapt to an uninhabitable world. The biggest risk, however, does not lie in wealthier countries that have the capacity to do this, but in the most vulnerable communities that will suffer tremendously in an environment made uninhabitable by climate change.

—Lama El Hatow is a nonresident fellow with the Atlantic Council’s empowerME Initiative.

The future of climate adaptation

Water Day comes to COP27
Delivering on UPS’s emissions-reductions commitments
Here’s what to know heading into week two of negotiations
Dispatch from virtual reality: How games are informing decision makers on climate adaptation
What to make of USAID’s new adaptation and resilience plan
The United States is finally stepping up—but it there are also other climate leaders to watch
Read our experts’ analysis from earlier in the conference

NOVEMBER 14, 2022 | 2:37 PM WASHINGTON | 9:37 PM SHARM EL SHEIKH

Water Day comes to COP27

By Lama El Hatow

Monday was Water Day at COP27; it was a reminder that putting water in the center of the climate debate is imperative, necessary for crucial action, and long overdue.

Water access is still a challenge for many local communities. While the world leaders are striving to achieve Sustainable Development Goal 6 (clean water and sanitation for all), they are in many ways moving backwards.

For example, in many parts of the world, the privatization of water has shifted communities away from bodies of fresh water hat sustain their livelihoods. Water is a public good, and commodifying water takes away very basic human rights. Private companies have bought the rights to use bodies of water for profits, while poor and marginalized communities struggle to pay the higher prices on water. In many cases, private companies are not only limiting access to this public good but also polluting it further with industrial processes.

Several groups at COP27 have discussed how vital it is to preserve water as a public good. With the impacts of climate change, the world is seeing water scarcity in some regions (such as the Middle East and North Africa), and floods and extreme rainfall in others. The COP27 president and the World Meteorological Organization launched the Action for Water Adaptation and Resilience initiative to focus on the climate and water nexus and on water adaptation.

Climate adaptation and covering loss and damage will require more climate financing, and much of that money needs to go toward water—specifically, toward efforts supporting water security for vulnerable communities. During Hurricane Katrina in 2005, the New Orleans area lacked sufficient access to clean water for days. Similarly, the floods in Pakistan left millions without access to clean water as some of the infrastructure needed to provide it was severely destroyed. Drought-stricken countries are banding together to share their technologies and expertise to manage water scarcity. For example, a group of countries led by Spain and Senegal launched the International Drought Resilience Alliance at COP27 to “shift drought management from emergency response to resilience against climate change impacts.” Spain is committing five million euros to start it off.

As countries continue to partner with one another on water action, it will be crucial to ensure that there is appropriate focus on action for adaptation and resilience.

—Lama El Hatow is a nonresident fellow with the Atlantic Council’s empowerME Initiative.

NOVEMBER 14, 2022 | 10:38 AM WASHINGTON | 5:38 PM SHARM EL SHEIKH

Delivering on UPS’s emissions-reductions commitments

Laura Lane, executive vice president and chief corporate affairs and sustainability officer of the United Parcel Service (UPS), sat down with Global Energy Center Senior Director Landon Derentz at COP27 to talk about UPS’s emissions-reductions goals.

Lane hopes that COP27 ultimately helps foster a “greater sense of collaboration between government, the private sector, and the NGO community. If they all come together, they “can solve a lot of the challenges that lie ahead for companies like [UPS],” that, Lane explained, are part of “one of the… hardest to abate industry sectors.”

She pointed out that while UPS has a goal to be carbon neutral by 2050, global tensions and supply chain shortages are making it difficult to hit key checkpoints. For example, the global shortage of microchips is making it more difficult to electrify their ground fleet.

“And so we are trying to find other ways to be able to get the emissions out of our… operations,” Lane explained. She said that UPS is searching for alternative fuels for its ground fleet and is working with other companies to incentivize the production of sustainable aviation fuel to power its operations in the air.

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NOVEMBER 13, 2022 | 1:16 PM WASHINGTON | 8:16 PM SHARM EL SHEIKH

Here’s what to know heading into week two of negotiations

By the Global Energy Center

As COP27 reaches its midway point, technical discussions are set to gain speed in week two. The twin realities of an energy security crisis and the sweeping impacts of climate change on the developing world remain at the forefront of discussions throughout Sharm el Sheikh. The multi-stakeholder drive to surmount both challenges is drawing stronger linkages between climate action and energy security, opening new avenues for collaboration between governments, civil society, and industry.

After week one, a few things are clear:

US climate leadership is achieving legitimacy through action. Midterm elections at the start of COP27 served only to further energize a US delegation already operating with confidence following passage of the Inflation Reduction Act. President Biden, Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, Special Presidential Envoy for Climate John Kerry, the Director of the National Economic Council Brian Deese, and many others arrived in Egypt emphasizing an optimistic outlook for the energy transition in the United States, while underscoring the need to unlock “trillions” in private financing to replicate US momentum in the developing world. The steadfast presence of US congressional delegations from both sides of the aisle further reinforced the United States’ commitment to addressing the climate crisis.

Next, the narrative at COP27 is no longer Western-led. The introduction of “loss and damage” to the COP agenda illustrates how the global south has successfully used the conversation in Europe and the West around energy security following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine to underscore the need for access to sustainable energy resources that enable economic growth.

And finally, the hard conversations which have often been missed or dodged at prior COPs are now front-and-center.

Overall, the twin realities of a global energy security crisis and a developing world at the forefront of a majority of the worst impacts of climate change have created an opportunity to better integrate the policy spheres of climate action and energy security.

EnergySource

Nov 13, 2022

COP27 readout: Week 1 comes to a close

By Global Energy Center

Global Energy Center react to the first week of COP27 proceedings.

Climate Change & Climate Action Energy & Environment

NOVEMBER 12, 2022 | 3:34 AM WASHINGTON | 10:34 AM SHARM EL SHEIKH

Dispatch from virtual reality: How games are informing decision makers on climate adaptation

Our Director of Extreme Heat Initiatives @KurtShickman & @ACMideast’s Lama El Hatow caught up at Arsht-Rock’s virtual reality booth https://t.co/4YjD37Q4iq

Great to see @AtlanticCouncil representation on the ground at #COP27! #ArshtRockAtCOP pic.twitter.com/iPcxCaSFs8
— Arsht-Rock Resilience Center (@ArshtRock) November 12, 2022

NOVEMBER 12, 2022 | 2:57 AM WASHINGTON | 9:57 AM SHARM EL SHEIKH

What to make of USAID’s new adaptation and resilience plan

At #COP27 @SamanthaJPower, citing the devastating $30+ billion flooding of Pakistan of @USAID announces new push to urgently drive private investment in adaptation & resilience. Big opportunity and vision here – @ArshtRock is ready – let’s go! pic.twitter.com/ITz3hKu5Qb
— Kathy Baughman McLeod (@KBMcLeodFLA) November 12, 2022

NOVEMBER 12, 2022 | 2:33 AM WASHINGTON | 9:33 AM SHARM EL SHEIKH

Experts praise the United States for finally stepping up—but there are also other climate leaders to watch

Global Energy Center Deputy Director Reed Blakemore sat down with the World Resources Institute’s Dan Lashof to talk about the countries taking the lead on climate action.

Lashof explained that while this is the twenty-seventh COP, “it’s COP1 for the United States being able to show up with a transformative climate law in place domestically.” He thinks “that gives President Biden much more credibility,” but he added that the world will be watching whether Congress will be able to sustain the momentum on climate action.

Lashof explained that, while people still pay a lot of attention to how politics in the United States impact the country’s climate leadership, the world is “no longer unipolar.”

“People are also looking to the EU and to China,” he said. So I think those three major players are pushing the wall forward, sometimes together, sometimes not so much. But as long as they’re moving and accelerating action, then we’re seeing progress.”

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Public-private partnerships

COP’s focuses on implementation, emerging economies, and public-private partnerships raise hopes
At the “corporate COP,” a new focus on private-sector solutions
Partnerships to benefit the planet—and the private sector
Gaming and social tech can reorient the world toward a climate-resilient future
Quick take: The attendance at COPs has transformed. Here’s what that means for the energy transition.
Improving clean-energy access for everyone
The energy crisis shows the need to accelerate the energy transition
Read our experts’ analysis from earlier in the conference

NOVEMBER 11, 2022 | 7:12 PM WASHINGTON | NOVEMBER 12, 2022 | 2:12 AM SHARM EL SHEIKH

COP’s focuses on implementation, emerging economies, and public-private partnerships raise hopes

By Roger Martella

In this pivotal moment for global action on climate change, I’m in the full optimist camp regarding COP27 in Sharm el Sheikh—not only for Egypt, but for the precedent Egypt is setting for the future.

Two main reasons drive this enthusiasm. First, COP27 is focused on implementation—putting climate promises into action. Second, the event is committed to highlighting the needs and challenges of emerging economies. This will place a global spotlight on the unique opportunities for countries where most of the 750 million people without reliable access to electricity live.

Another reason to be optimistic about COP27 is the rapidly growing role of public-private partnerships between policymakers and corporate stakeholders. The growing role of companies to be part of the solution and partner with governments, nongovernmental organizations, and other companies in industrialized and emerging markets is leading to unprecedented collaborations, some already having an impact.

The pursuit of public-private partnerships is perhaps the top undercurrent at COP27, as many collaborators and odd bedfellows alike come together for bold pronouncements of projects and initiatives together. These examples demonstrate how emerging economies, through public-private partnerships and tangible proof points, are addressing the energy transition by blending different approaches, technologies, and perspectives. Additionally, they illustrate how emerging economies are positioning strategically to build climate resilient infrastructure that grows access to energy at the same time. The lessons learned from each will help inform the many ongoing discussions and negotiations in Sharm el Sheikh.

Roger Martella is the chief sustainability officer of GE. GE is a presenting partner of GEC at COP27: Ambitions for All.

EnergySource

Nov 11, 2022

Partner perspectives: In emerging markets, partnerships and proof points are key to driving the energy transition

By Roger Martella

COP27 is an opportunity for emerging economies to lead the energy transition. Public-private partnerships can help drive progress towards their goals.

Energy & Environment Energy Transitions

NOVEMBER 11, 2022 | 12:37 PM WASHINGTON | 7:37 PM SHARM EL SHEIKH

At the “corporate COP,” a new focus on private-sector solutions

By Lama El Hatow

The private sector has an immense presence at COP27 in all the various zones within Sharm El Sheikh, earning this conference the label of the “corporate COP.” The business role comes in several forms.

First, there is a growing recognition that the private sector will have to close the gap in the unfulfilled one hundred billion dollar per year climate finance promise made by developed countries. We already know that one hundred billion is insufficient, with reports now claiming that two trillion dollars per year is what’s needed for the Global South. UN Climate Change High-Level Champion for Egypt Mahmoud Mohieldin and US climate envoy John Kerry have argued that various modes of blended finance (using development funds to leverage private capital), as well as regulations on the private sector, are the only way to meet the one hundred billion dollar pledge and move toward the two trillion dollar goal. Kerry even announced that the US Energy Transition Accelerator would be carried out in partnership with Bezos’ Earth Fund and the Rockefeller Fund, solidifying the role of the private sector in implementation.

Second, fossil-fuel and high-polluting companies are frightened and lobbying quite strongly. During decarbonization day today, their viewpoints were expressed in various sessions discussing how they are shifting their practices to renewable energy and phasing out fossil fuels. However, they are concerned, as Prime Minister of Barbados Mia Mottley and other island state leaders opened COP27 by stating that fossil fuel companies should pay a global carbon tax on profits to fund loss and damage for the Global South. The massive third quarter profits recently reported by Saudi Aramco ($42.4 billion), Exxon ($20 billion), and Chevron ($11.2 billion) alone show why this could be an attractive option for policymakers seeking loss and damage funds.

Third, businesses along with banks are under new pressure from investors to meet environmental, social, and governance (ESG) goals, and they are trying to catch up and understand what needs to be done. The Net Zero Banking Alliance, which is one of the four pillars of the Glasgow Financial Alliance for Net Zero that emerged at the last COP, has been convening to see how to enable as well as enforce banks to transition to net zero. CEOs of top commercial and investment banks including Blackrock, Citibank, and Standard Chartered are skipping the summit as they focus more on issues such as the fallout from Russia’s war in Ukraine, energy crises, rising inflation, and the threat of recession. It is no secret that many large-scale corporations produce more greenhouse gas emissions than many countries. The argument is that these companies should be liable for compensation, not only to their consumers and board of directors, but also to the Global South and the world’s most vulnerable people.

—Lama El Hatow is a nonresident fellow with the Atlantic Council’s empowerME Initiative.

NOVEMBER 11, 2022 | 11:23 AM WASHINGTON | 6:23 PM SHARM EL SHEIKH

Partnerships to benefit the planet—and the private sector

Global Energy Center Senior Director Landon Derentz hosted Dorothy McAuliffe, the US State Department’s special representative for global partnerships, to talk about how governments can work with the private sector to develop climate solutions.

“Governments can’t tackle this challenge alone,” McAuliffe explained. “We have to be in this all together.”

While there are major benefits for the planet to be reaped from this partnership, McAuliffe explained that there are benefits for the private sector too: “There are jobs and opportunities that come along with this clean energy transformation… and finding these solutions.”

Watch more

NOVEMBER 11, 2022 | 10:43 AM WASHINGTON | 5:43 PM SHARM EL SHEIKH

By increasing awareness of climate adaptation measures, gaming and social technologies are creating impact on the ground in many countries.

On Friday, the Adrienne Arsht-Rockefeller Foundation Resilience Center hosted an event at the COP27 Resilience Hub that brought together gaming and technology experts to talk about innovative solutions to build resilient communities.

For example, games like Garden Story help users acquire the knowledge and skills they need to take climate action in their communities. Similarly, Meta aims to help users understand the types of climate-adaptation tools that are available to prevent future damage and loss.

See top moments from the event

“Gamers are ahead on the curve on climate & we’re seeing this permeate the industry a little faster than others,” says @ChanceGlasco. Arsht-Rock’s VR pilot & games like @gardenstorygame integrate climate solutions, equipping players w/knowledge & skills for climate action. pic.twitter.com/aF6XSVyNv3
— Arsht-Rock Resilience Center (@ArshtRock) November 11, 2022

NOVEMBER 11, 2022 | 11:12 AM WASHINGTON | 6:12 PM SHARM EL SHEIKH

Quick take: The attendance at COPs has transformed. Here’s what that means for the energy transition.

#COP27 quick take: As uniform acceptance of the #EnergyTransition takes hold, an increasing number of energy and finance executives – many for the first time – are gravitating to the conference. A post-denial posture is empowering a groundswell of new solution-oriented actors.
— Landon Derentz (@Landon_Derentz) November 11, 2022

NOVEMBER 11, 2022 | 7:30 AM WASHINGTON | 2:30 PM SHARM EL SHEIKH

Improving clean-energy access for everyone

As the energy transition gets underway, experts are searching for ways to bring clean energies to everyone—and particularly low-income and developing countries.

Doing so will require focuses like improving financing, making the energy supply chain more efficient, and turning toward cooling solutions, said panelists at an Adrienne Arsht-Rockefeller Foundation Resilience Center event at the Resilience Hub.

“We need to make sure that access to energy is resilient,” said Lavinia Bauerochse, global head of ESG at Deutsche Bank. “Climate change-induced weather extremes like floods and heat must be factored in. Without a resilient infrastructure, our efforts will be short lived.”

See top moments from the event

“One billion people have no access to cooling… & are considered highly vulnerable to heat events,” says @jmcurtin of @RockefellerFdn.

But traditional cooling contributes to emissions. We must bring cooling to vulnerable communities w/o further exacerbating climate-driven heat. pic.twitter.com/rAw06gdiAo
— Arsht-Rock Resilience Center (@ArshtRock) November 11, 2022

NOVEMBER 11, 2022 | 6:46 AM WASHINGTON | 1:46 PM SHARM EL SHEIKH

The energy crisis shows the need to accelerate the energy transition

Global Energy Center Senior Director Landon Derentz sat down with HIF Global’s Meg Gentle to talk about decarbonization ambitions at COP27.

“There are so many incredible ideas here in Egypt this year, and we can show that eFuels, this synthetic fuel, this is happening now,” Gentle explained. HIF Global produces eFuels in countries like Chile and Australia.

EFuels, which are fuels created by renewable energies and carbon capturing from the air, have potential now, added Gentle. “These are fuels that can be used immediately; this is a solution for today.”

Watch more

The innovative solutions at play

Gaming and virtual reality set out to change how decision makers tackle climate change
Investments in climate technologies must begin with software
Nancy Pelosi and Kathy Castor at COP27: The US won’t abandon its climate leadership, regardless of who controls Congress
Energy security and the energy transition are “mutually reinforcing,” says US official
Read our experts’ analysis from earlier in the conference

NOVEMBER 10, 2022 | 2:08 PM WASHINGTON | 9:08 PM SHARM EL SHEIKH

Gaming and virtual reality set out to change how decisionmakers tackle climate change

By Lama El Hatow

As climate change becomes the world’s reality, groups are using technology to bring it to virtual reality as well.

With the evolution of technologies over the years and the emergence of the gaming industry, there has been an increase in the number of innovative ways through which people can see how climate change impacts the world and, by association, how to deal with it. The COP27 Resilience Hub, run in part by the Atlantic Council’s Adrienne Arsht-Rockefeller Foundation Resilience Center, has created a VR experience that allows each user to click on various places around the globe to see what would happen in a +2 degree Celsius or +4 degree Celsius world. Based on the Paris Agreement and the science, we need to remain underneath 1.5 degree Celsius of warming to avoid catastrophic climate impacts. In this VR experience, one can see that the city of Miami, for instance, would be completely submerged underwater from flooding. Experiencing this submersion is quite difficult to process.

Additionally in this experience, the user has the option to select from various adaptation measures that can help the city of Miami avoid these catastrophic changes. For instance, after selecting “reforestation,” a nature-based solution, the user can see how Miami is able to withstand floodwaters. Alternatively, users can choose measures that may not be as effective, such as breakwaters in the case of Miami; from that, users can understand that decisions on adaptation must be designed for the particular contexts of each city. This technology allows policymakers to decide what kind of Miami they’d like to plan for in the future based on climate impacts.

Similarly, the video game “Eco” allows users to explore the “tragedy of the commons”—a situation in which users competing over environmental resources act in their own interest and ultimately deplete the resources entirely. Other games show how people’s physical conditions change in response to increased temperatures and heatwaves in certain settings—for example in poorly serviced areas versus in areas with resilient infrastructure. This game can be useful to help users understand how workers who are exposed to the outdoors for long periods of time are impacted by a world that is continuously heating.

The gaming industry and VR have opened up ways to envision the world in the future and how best to live in it. Ultimately, this technology and innovation is important in that it can help decisionmakers decide which adaptation measures to employ.

—Lama El Hatow is a nonresident fellow with the Atlantic Council’s empowerME Initiative.

NOVEMBER 10, 2022 | 12:15 PM WASHINGTON | 7:15 PM SHARM EL SHEIKH

Investments in climate technologies must begin with software

By Scott Reese

The annual United Nations Conference of Parties is underway in Sharm el Sheikh, Egypt, with delegates from around the world gathering to address one of the most urgent of global imperatives: climate change and the energy transition. Central to the conversation is tackling carbon emissions, the leading contributor to planet-wide warming.

During last year’s conference, leaders reinforced the sense of urgency to take action. Since then, important moves have been made to drive progress. Notably, the United States, currently the world’s second-largest carbon emitter, took its biggest step yet in combating climate change with a $369 billion investment via the Inflation Reduction Act that will reduce US carbon emissions to an estimated 40 percent below 2005 levels by 2030. This is in addition to steps to fund a modernized grid and breakthrough technologies in the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act. These two landmark climate change laws not only aim to reduce climate emissions, but they also advance US investments in both energy security and grid resiliency as well as critical breakthrough technologies.

Yet a problem so daunting can leave us all wondering, how does the world move faster?

While it’s critical to invest in long-term, high-impact levers like renewable energy, hydrogen, and carbon capture and sequestration technologies, software is an investment that can pay dividends today and accelerate our ability to embrace electrification and decarbonization tactics.

EnergySource

Nov 10, 2022

Partner perspectives: The next unlock: Why software is key to the energy transition

By Scott Reese

The energy transition requires scale, but it also requires speed. Through the marriage of human ingenuity with data and computing power, software integration can enable the acceleration of electrification and decarbonization, moving the world closer to loftier climate ambitions.

Energy & Environment Energy Transitions

NOVEMBER 10, 2022 | 9:00 AM WASHINGTON | 4:00 PM SHARM EL SHEIKH

Nancy Pelosi and Kathy Castor at COP27: The US won’t abandon its climate leadership, regardless of who controls Congress

By Katherine Walla

COP

Nov 10, 2022

Nancy Pelosi and Kathy Castor at COP27: The US won’t abandon its climate leadership, regardless of who controls Congress

By Katherine Walla

The US House speaker and the chair of the climate committee appeared at an Atlantic Council Front Page event in Sharm el Sheikh, Egypt.

Climate Change & Climate Action Energy & Environment

NOVEMBER 10, 2022 | 6:52 AM WASHINGTON | 1:52 PM SHARM EL SHEIKH

Energy security and the energy transition are “mutually reinforcing,” says US official

On Thursday, Global Energy Center Senior Director Landon Derentz sat down with US Assistant Secretary of State for Energy Resources Geoffrey Pyatt to talk about global energy security.

“Energy is at the white hot center of international affairs in a way that it has not been in a long time,” Pyatt said. But despite countries scrambling for cheaper and more destructive energy sources like coal amid global gas shortages, Pyatt argued that energy security and the energy transition “are not in conflict with each other; in fact, they’re mutually reinforcing.”

“We need to continue to work… to build an energy system internationally which helps our allies and partners to advance their economies [and] to deliver results for their citizens,” he said. “But we also need to keep working on the energy transition.”

Watch more

Protecting the planet—and people

For COP outcomes that benefit the groups most vulnerable to climate change, representation must improve
Reasons to be optimistic about the “implementation COP”
The health sector’s role in climate change and ambitions
The newest advocate of heat resilience: The world’s first global ambassador for heat action
Cash for cooling
How cities are taking the lead on heat action
Read our experts’ analysis from earlier in the conference

NOVEMBER 9, 2022 | 12:30 PM WASHINGTON | 7:30 PM SHARM EL SHEIKH

For COP outcomes that benefit the groups most vulnerable to climate change, representation must improve

By Lama El Hatow

Looking around to see who is present at COP27, there’s a lot of diversity and an array of ethnicities, cultures, and backgrounds across groups that aim to represent their communities and share their stories about how climate change impacts them. But not everyone has the privilege to be able to attend this COP and convene in an effort to inform policymakers of the realities on the ground. In fact, the most vulnerable and impacted communities around the world are often the ones that face the most hurdles in attending these conferences. Hence, these communities’ stories oftentimes never make it to the ears of the decision makers in the negotiating rooms deciding the world’s fate.

It thus becomes the international community’s responsibility to inform those decision makers for the sake of those not present at COP27. Within Egypt, minority groups such as the Nubian communities in Aswan and the Bedouins of Sinai will not be present at this COP. In November 2021, a severe storm hit the city of Aswan, destroying homes, flooding small islands, and decimating the already limited agriculture—and the community there is still healing from this disaster today. They report that such a storm has not hit Aswan in the last forty years. As these communities rely on the Nile River for their daily livelihood, the impacts of climate change, including lower water levels in rivers, are acute and detrimental for them. There are other examples of detrimental impact worldwide, most recently with floods in Pakistan destroying over a million homes and killing over a thousand people.

As leaders discuss the financial mechanisms for loss and damage payments in the negotiating rooms, it is important to know how and where these losses and damages are taking place across the globe. The Global Stocktake launched at COP26 requires countries to report on local- and community-level participation in nationally determined contributions, thus making the participation more feasible but still far from what is needed. That is why representation matters; and having local communities, tribes, indigenous peoples, and minority groups present at such a convening as COP is not only necessary but vital so that any outcomes of negotiations are holistic and take into consideration the needs of those most vulnerable to climate change. To ensure the inclusion of these groups, they must be allowed access to funding as well as partnerships with local and international civil-society organizations.

—Lama El Hatow is a nonresident fellow with the Atlantic Council’s empowerME Initiative.

NOVEMBER 9, 2022 | 10:41 AM WASHINGTON | 5:41 PM SHARM EL SHEIKH

Reasons to be optimistic about the “implementation COP”

COP27 has, to date, been scarce on tangible results, with the majority of action occurring outside of the negotiating room as a diverse coalition of industry and nongovernmental organizations descends on Sharm el Sheikh.

But there are clear signs emerging that should offer optimism as technical groups dominate the balance of the next two weeks:

Finance remains center stage. Financing both energy transitions and climate adaptation has, at least thus far, remained front-of-mind for policy leaders over the past two days. Commitments from a handful of European countries seeking to accelerate international climate adaptation finance are one such bright spot, despite the relative lack of optimism for progress leading up to the COP this year. Yet this box is still largely unchecked.
Private sector participation. COP’s transition from a largely technocratic convening to an increasingly multifaceted climate convention filled with corporations and civil society continues. Observers should be encouraged that the dialogue is moving past simple greenwashing, in favor of efforts to establish a widespread coalition of parties engaged in the climate conversation.
Implementation is in limbo. Though COP is meant to focus on acting on the pledges laid out in COP26 and the Bonn intersessional, homing in on details that expose the current tension between energy security and climate ambitions is proving to be more difficult than gaining commitments from governments for these pledges in the first place.

Significant work remains to be done in the coming days.

EnergySource

Nov 9, 2022

COP27 readout: Days 1 and 2

By Global Energy Center

Global Energy Center experts are on the ground at COP27. Here’s what they observed over the first two days.

Climate Change & Climate Action Energy & Environment

NOVEMBER 9, 2022 | 10:30 AM WASHINGTON | 6:30 PM SHARM EL SHEIKH

The health sector’s role in climate change and ambitions

Global Energy Center Deputy Director Reed Blakemore sat down with John Balbus, acting director of the Office of Climate Change and Heath Equity at the US Department of Health and Human Services to talk about health equity and decarbonizing the health sector.

“Health is often mentioned as a reason to be acting on climate change, but the health community isn’t present,” Balbus explained. But over the last year, he added, “the health sector has mobilized in a way that it has not over the last twenty-six COPs.”

“So what we’re hoping is that by mobilizing the health sector,” Balbus said, the sector can provide health information to national leaders that convinces them to increase the urgency to tackle climate change.

According to Balbus, the health sector is responsible for about 5 percent of global carbon emissions, but no countries focus on the decarbonization of the health sector. He said they should include the health sector in both reducing emissions and adapting to climate change.

Watch more

NOVEMBER 9, 2022 | 7:16 AM WASHINGTON | 3:16 PM SHARM EL SHEIKH

The newest advocate of heat resilience: The world’s first global ambassador for heat action

On Wednesday, the Adrienne Arsht-Rockefeller Foundation Resilience Center unveiled a new leader in climate adaptation. At COP27, Felipe Calderón, former president of Mexico, took the reins as the first-ever global ambassador for heat action with a mandate to raise the issue of extreme heat among the world’s leaders to protect people, jobs, and the economy.

Watch the unveiling

Agradezco enormemente a @ArshtRock Resilience Center la invitación para ser Embajador Global para la Acción frente a las “Olas de Calor”. En el marco de la #COP27 en Egipto. Las “olas de Calor” mata muchos más personas en el mundo que el resto de los eventos climáticos extremos. https://t.co/Vxxps9fJy1
— Felipe Calderón (@FelipeCalderon) November 9, 2022

NOVEMBER 9, 2022 | 10:05 AM WASHINGTON | 5:05 AM SHARM EL SHEIKH

Cash for cooling

As the temperature goes up, it’ll be vital to protect people, communities, and local economies from extreme heat and its effects.

The Adrienne Arsht-Rockefeller Foundation Resilience Center and partners including the Rockefeller Foundation, JP Morgan Chase & Co, ClimateWorks, Marsh McLennan, and IFC, gathered together at COP27 to launch the Cool Capital Stack, the first investment portfolio dedicated to supporting cooling solutions for the world’s most vulnerable.

Watch top moments from the launch

Cities are taking the lead in implementation, like Freetown’s market shading project. https://t.co/eplPzcyxkT

But it’s hard to scale. “There just is not enough [money] flowing to the Global South,” says @yakisawyerr. “The difference between the rhetoric & the reality is huge.” pic.twitter.com/I2CnmMZMzi
— Arsht-Rock Resilience Center (@ArshtRock) November 9, 2022

NOVEMBER 9, 2022 | 1:15 AM WASHINGTON | 8:15 AM SHARM EL SHEIKH

How cities are taking the lead on heat action

On Wednesday, Luis Donaldo Colosio Riojas, mayor of Monterrey, Mexico, recounted watching his city’s temperature rise ten degrees over the last thirty years. “We are ill-prepared for this silent killer and people are facing the consequences,” he said.

The mayor gave his thoughts at an Adrienne Arsht-Rockefeller Foundation Resilience Center event focused on what cities are doing to take the lead on heat action. Earlier this year, the city of Monterrey appointed a chief heat officer committed to reducing the threat of extreme urban heat for vulnerable people.

Global Chief Heat Officer Eleni Myrivili explained that the way cities are built makes them “death traps” of heat for people. It is important to listen to cities, she added, as they know “where the problem is and what they really need to do to respond to it.”

Watch top moments from the event

“The way cities are built are death traps for people, that’s why it’s important to listen to cities.” We know that people don’t have to die from #ExtremeHeat.

Global Chief Heat Officer @leniomyrivili explains why cities need a seat at the policy table to protect people. #CoP27 pic.twitter.com/QB1NtbeA87
— Arsht-Rock Resilience Center (@ArshtRock) November 9, 2022

Takeaways as negotiations get underway

NOVEMBER 8, 2022 | 6:47 PM WASHINGTON | NOVEMBER 9, 2022 | 1:47 AM SHARM EL SHEIKH

Dispatch from the World Leaders Summit: The most fundamental plan for adaptation in a decade

LIVE FROM #COP27 Director of Global Policy @Gasteluj gives you an inside look at the newly launched Sharm El Sheikh Adaptation Agenda, with 30 adaptation outcomes to accelerate climate resilience. Watch now #cop27egypt pic.twitter.com/ddo4DP4OkZ
— Arsht-Rock Resilience Center (@ArshtRock) November 8, 2022

NOVEMBER 8, 2022 | 2:45 PM WASHINGTON | 9:45 PM SHARM EL SHEIKH

Some MENA countries are under-represented at COP27. Here’s what that means for the negotiations.

By Lama El Hatow

The delegates at COP27 face the challenging and daunting dilemma of tackling the world’s climate crisis in the midst of a series of global political and economic crises.

The world is still feeling the brunt of the COVID-19 pandemic with supply chain stalls from China and insufficient resources elsewhere. Add to that Russia’s war in Ukraine has pulled a plug on global gas flows—raising Europe’s worries about staying warm this winter—and has also generated concern about wheat-supply shortages and food insecurity globally.

The compounded effect of all of these issues has led to broadening global inflation. So not only are the least developed countries becoming more vulnerable to the worsening global economic outlook, but even some of the wealthier countries have difficulties staying afloat. In the Middle East and North Africa (MENA), several countries face their own economic and political turmoil with Syria still at war, Sudan reeling from political instability after a coup last year, and Lebanon facing the worst economic crisis in its history with power outages and bank closures that put the Lebanese people in unforeseen circumstances.

Without ignoring political and economic turbulences like these, how will the delegations at COP27 deal with global crises while also asking the world to commit to more ambitious pledges and enforce the execution of them? The limited representation of many delegations from MENA countries at COP, including some of the most water-scarce countries in the region, raises concerns about the outcomes of the negotiations. Since the conflict-affected MENA countries are very consumed with their local economic and political challenges, the capabilities of these countries to address the climate crisis at COP27 are certainly going to be limited.

While some countries are being represented by delegations made up of several dozens of negotiators and experts, conflict-afflicted countries from the MENA region only have a few delegates to cover an agenda with so many key topics. They’ll likely, therefore, have less negotiating power to tackle and influence the outcomes of the more controversial topics on the agenda, including climate financing and loss and damage.

—Lama El Hatow is a nonresident fellow with the Atlantic Council’s empowerME Initiative.

NOVEMBER 8, 2022 | 11:17 AM WASHINGTON | 6:17 PM SHARM EL SHEIKH

Public capital is key to funding solutions to the “energy trilemma”

By Susan Flanagan

It is abundantly clear that achieving net-zero carbon emissions by mid-century is necessary to avoid the worst climate outcomes. However, the path to decarbonizing the energy sector is not “one-size-fits-all” between developed and developing markets. Given the historical tensions between developed economies, which modernized with fossil fuels, and developing economies, now being asked to forgo this route, it is evident that sustainable, long-term global cooperation will require addressing the ”energy trilemma”—the need for the people to have access to sustainable, reliable, and affordable energy.

Sustainability is more urgent for countries hardest hit by climate change and often exposed to greater environmental risks. Reliability remains an elusive goal in many countries still working to bring basic electricity to their citizens in a secure and dependable way. Many of these developing economies also face roadblocks to electricity affordability due to weak government finances and credit, and the corresponding higher cost of capital for infrastructure development.

To drive global decarbonization and increase electrification in developing countries, policymakers and financial institutions must partner with project sponsors to tailor capital solutions that best fit each region and country.

Susan Flanagan is the president and chief executive officer of GE Energy Financial Services. GE is a supporter of the Atlantic Council Global Energy Center.

EnergySource

Nov 8, 2022

Partner perspectives: With COP27 underway, there’s no time to waste—public capital is a key conduit to a just energy transition

By Susan Flanagan

The sheer scale of needed investments to enact the energy transition will require an unprecedented mobilization of capital. Given its unique capabilities, public capital must play a significant part in this effort.

Energy & Environment Energy Transitions

NOVEMBER 8, 2022 | 3:35 AM WASHINGTON | 10:35 AM SHARM EL SHEIKH

Ensuring both a just energy transition and access to affordable energy

Global Energy Center Senior Director Landon Derentz sat down with General Electric’s Roger Martella to talk about ensuring a just energy transition and decarbonization while ensuring access to reliable, affordable, and sustainable power for everyone.

“We want to help countries, particularly in emerging economies achieve these goals by focusing on bespoke solutions for each country. There’s no one-size-fits-all approach here,” Martella said. He explained that while solutions may be different in each country, they’ll all need to have the “same tools in the toolbox”: a combination of renewable energy, gas, and grid.

General Electric is a presenting partner for the Global Energy Center’s Ambitions for All project, which you can read about here.

Analysis as leaders assembled

NOVEMBER 7, 2022 | 1:43 PM WASHINGTON | 8:43 PM SHARM EL SHEIKH

What’s happening beyond official negotiations?

Alongside other @AtlanticCouncil colleagues, Arsht-Rock’s Director of Global Policy @Gasteluj set the scene for COP27 and the work that goes on beyond the official negotiations https://t.co/BKdk4GBGs3 @PoliticoRyan pic.twitter.com/y1CMuml9N2
— Arsht-Rock Resilience Center (@ArshtRock) November 7, 2022

NOVEMBER 7, 2022 | 12:36 PM WASHINGTON | 7:36 PM SHARM EL SHEIKH

The private sector holds a lot of the cards at COP27

By Lama El Hatow

As COP27 gets underway, various platforms of engagement are taking place.

In the blue zone, countries’ official delegations are coming together to meet and negotiate on the agenda items put forth and agreed upon with the support of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change and Glasgow, the COP26 host. These agenda items include increasing ambition on pledges for greenhouse gas emission reductions by all countries to limit global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius, making progress on climate adaptation and ways to propel it forward, boosting climate finance and pushing developed countries to meet their financing commitments of $100 billion per year, and discussing a mechanism for loss and damage payments. The delegations agreed on Saturday to include the loss and damage fund as part of the agenda; it’s considered a huge win for the Global South that is most vulnerable to and at risk from climate change impacts.

Meanwhile, the green zone is designated for civil-society pavilions, where various ministries from Egypt elsewhere can showcase their work; it is also a culture and arts hub for participants to network and have side events outside the negotiation rooms.

Additionally, there is a third zone this year: The Climate Action Innovation Zone, which has been set up as a private-sector hub for companies and corporations from around the world to showcase their work through exhibitions, side events, and networking sessions. Many of the region’s largest players including Saudi Arabia’s ACWA Power and Neom, the United Arab Emirates’ IRENA, and Egypt’s TAQA Arabia are all present on the sidelines of COP27 to discuss technology and innovation that sets the stage for a smoother green transition. Adjacent to the climate innovation zone is the Saudi Green Initiative, which also has its own designated area to showcase its work.

While the world focuses on the blue zone with government pledges and commitments, it appears the private sector holds a lot of the cards in this convening. As UN Climate Change High-Level Champion for COP27, Mahmoud Mohieldin reiterated that nonstate actors need to lead the way with regard to climate finance. It appears the role of the private sector and the deals happening on the outskirts of the COP may help set the stage for advancement in climate technology, innovation, and even financing.

—Lama El Hatow is a nonresident fellow with the Atlantic Council’s empowerME Initiative.

NOVEMBER 7, 2022 | 11:23 AM WASHINGTON | 6:23 PM SHARM EL SHEIKH

Dispatch from the Singapore Pavilion: How to build cities resilient to heat

Kurt Shickman, director of Extreme Heat Initiatives at our Adrienne Arsht-Rockefeller Foundation Resilience Center, shared his readout from an event with the Mayor of Monterrey, Mexico, Luis Donaldo Colosio and Athens Chief Heat Officer Eleni Myrivili about the best solutions for managing extreme heat in cities.

Watch more

Live from #COP27 ! @ArshtRock‘s Global #ChiefHeatOfficer @LenioMyrivili & City Champion for Heat Action Mayor @colosioriojas joined @RCitiesNetwork to share climate resilience lessons from cities. Our Director for Extreme Heat @KurtShickman shares his key takeaways. Watch now pic.twitter.com/XPw0lsEtvT
— Arsht-Rock Resilience Center (@ArshtRock) November 7, 2022

Gearing up for COP27

NOVEMBER 5, 2022 | 3:13 PM WASHINGTON | 10:13 PM SHARM EL SHEIKH

How a lack of energy security will impact the speed and impact of the energy transition

As today’s energy crisis intensifies, Global Energy Center Senior Director Landon Derentz points out that a lack of energy security will slow the energy transition and spell trouble for ensuring affordable energy is accessible for all. “The world is short energy,” he writes, “now and over the next decade.” That calls for investment across the board—in zero-carbon energy sources and also oil and gas, he argues.

Read the thread

Policymakers must accept the path to climate progress starts with inclusivity. Unlike in prior decades, the bulwark of industry now accepts that the energy transition is real. They are engineers, put them to work. 8/x
— Landon Derentz (@Landon_Derentz) November 5, 2022

NOVEMBER 4, 2022 | 3:30 PM WASHINGTON | 10:30 PM SHARM EL SHEIKH

The new partnership financing a just energy transition in emerging economies

By Christopher Cassidy, Rainer Quitzow, and Maia Sparkman

As the global community convenes for COP27, Just Energy Transition Partnerships (JETPs) are poised to play an expanded role in financing the energy transitions of emerging economies. Conceived as multi-donor agreements to accelerate the phase-out of coal-fired power plants, JETPs first gained attention at COP26 with the announcement of the Just Energy Transition Partnership with South Africa, an $8.5-billion venture between the governments of South Africa, the United States, the United Kingdom, France, Germany, and the European Union. Since then, several other countries have expressed interest in their own JETPs, presenting an opportunity to drastically reduce global coal emissions. Nonetheless, while JETPs may represent an avenue for increased climate engagement with high-emitting emerging economies, they also face several key challenges moving forward.

Despite those challenges, JETPs bear the potential to represent a turning point in the climate finance agenda. By combining funding from several major Group of Seven (G7) donor countries, they not only offer substantial financial support to partner countries, but they also send an important political signal. To be sure, the sums under discussion only represent a fraction of the capital needed to reach the needed scale of investment to place these countries on a pathway that is compatible with the 1.5 degree Celsius target. Nevertheless, the hope is that they can lend additional momentum to ongoing reform efforts.

EnergySource

Nov 4, 2022

Just Energy Transition Partnerships: Will COP27 deliver for emerging economies?

By Christopher Cassidy, Rainer Quitzow, and Maia Sparkman

The JETP model is poised to deliver results in South Africa. Now, at COP27 and beyond, the true test will be translating the model to other country contexts.

Energy & Environment Energy Markets & Governance

NOVEMBER 4, 2022 | 9:30 AM WASHINGTON | 4:30 PM SHARM EL SHEIKH

The West must rethink its development strategy to help electrify the African continent

By William Tobin and Maia Sparkman

Electricity access in Africa is in a dire state, and progress is being reversed. Outside of North Africa, around half of the population is electrified, and the electrification rate has decreased by 4 percent since 2019.

This problem is self-perpetuating. When energy infrastructure is weak, there is less signal to invest as individual projects are less viable and are deemed riskier, particularly by the private sector, which has historically provided around 10 percent of infrastructure funding across the continent. Infrastructure, in this sense, should be expanded beyond the state of electricity grids or gas pipelines to include public services such as trained utility workers, water resources, public safety and security forces, and much more.

It is becoming clearer that the paradigm of “aid,” which has underpinned Western countries’ development strategies in the African continent, is increasingly insufficient. Providing aid alone to African nations will not provide the tools and enablers of self-sustaining, endogenous growth. For that, the continent needs investment, not just aid.

EnergySource

Nov 4, 2022

To meet energy security and climate goals, Africa needs investment in infrastructure

By William Tobin, Maia Sparkman

To this point, Western engagement in Africa has primarily taken the form of aid. For the continent to achieve widespread electrification and form the foundation for robust economic growth, that engagement will need to morph into investment and partnership.

Africa Energy & Environment

NOVEMBER 3, 2022 | 9:00 AM WASHINGTON | 4:00 PM SHARM EL SHEIKH

What leaders at COP27 should take away from the World Energy Outlook

By Emily Burlinghaus

The International Energy Agency World Energy Outlook (WEO), released last week, is historic in its first-ever presentation of a scenario where fossil fuels peak or plateau based on prevailing policy settings. But despite the cause to celebrate, the global transition to net-zero carbon emissions remains precarious. Developing countries are most vulnerable to the effects of both climate change and capital and resource restrictions. Meanwhile, global conflict and supply chain disruptions threaten national efforts to ensure food security, meet energy demand, and deploy resilience and adaptation measures. The WEO serves as a roadmap for where and how countries can allocate money at COP27 to maximize impact and ensure that no country is left behind.

EnergySource

Nov 3, 2022

The IEA World Energy Outlook 2022 highlights climate finance needs ahead of COP27

By Emily Burlinghaus

The new IEA World Energy Outlook 2022 should be used as a roadmap at COP27 for the allocation of climate-oriented resources. Doing so would better enable developing nations to ride the wave of interest in clean technologies amid the global energy crisis and share in the benefits of the transition.

Climate Change & Climate Action Energy & Environment

NOVEMBER 1, 2022 | 10:04 AM WASHINGTON | 5:04 PM SHARM EL SHEIKH

How Europe can reclaim international climate leadership at COP27

By Michał Kurtyka and Paddy Ryan

COP27 will be uncomfortable for Europe. The continent’s energy crisis following the Russian invasion of Ukraine has upended the lofty objectives set at COP26. In Glasgow, the European Investment Bank and over a dozen European states pledged to cease financing fossil fuel projects abroad. Now, Europe is scouring the globe for new gas supply, pricing out poorer nations while maintaining opposition towards their development of reserves for domestic use. Europeans stand accused of climate hypocrisy, charges likely to be echoed at a COP notable for taking place in Africa.

Europe needs gas, and will for some time. The continent must reconcile short-term efforts to source new imports with long-term climate ambitions. Through more constructive gas diplomacy with the developing world and by accelerating domestic decarbonization, Europe can begin to repair its damaged climate credibility in Sharm el Sheikh. Doing so, Europe can reclaim international climate leadership by advancing low-carbon, energy-secure growth with partners in Africa and the developing world.

EnergySource

Nov 1, 2022

How Europe can salvage its climate credibility at COP27

By Michał Kurtyka and Paddy Ryan

Europe’s recent energy policies have begotten accusations of climate hypocrisy, as the continent blocks access to financing for gas projects in developing countries yet scours those countries for gas supplies for its own use. At COP27, Europe can—and should—responsibly reconcile those contradictions.

Climate Change & Climate Action Energy & Environment

NOVEMBER 1, 2022 | 4:00 PM WASHINGTON | 11:00 PM SHARM EL SHEIKH

Will the West’s competition with China get in the way of a clean-energy future?

By Joseph Webster and William Tobin

China uneasily straddles both sides of the energy transition. On the one hand, China is indisputably a world leader in numerous clean energy technologies, including electric vehicles, renewable generation, and supply chains. On the other hand, it is also the world’s largest carbon emitter and coal producer, and is constructing over half of the world’s new coal-powered electricity plants. With Western-China tensions rising and Beijing increasingly focused on energy security, there is a shrinking scope for climate cooperation. Perversely, however, US-China political competition could deliver climate benefits, as both sides will face pressure to provide clean energy leadership at COP27 and beyond.

At COP27, Western leaders will need to grapple with the emerging reality that two competing climate camps may be forming, one led by the West and another by China.

Not only will this dynamic unfold as a competition between economies in China and the West, but as a paradigm of global engagement and investment on climate mitigation and adaptation, particularly with respect to engagement with the developing world. For instance, in Africa, China’s trade volumes exceeded the United States’ by a factor of four. Moreover, China has not shied away from financing fossil fuel projects that rank high on the priority list of less developed countries with limited energy access. This has been welcomed by many African nations, as 43 percent of all people on the continent do not have access to modern energy services.

As the developing and developed world seek to resolve key issues on the agenda at COP27 such as loss and damages, closing the climate finance gap, and financing for natural gas projects in Africa, Western leaders will need to keep in mind that competition with China is likely to become a more prominent feature of climate negotiations.

EnergySource

Nov 1, 2022

China’s energy security realities and COP27 ambitions

By Joseph Webster, William Tobin

China will enter COP27 firmly playing both sides of the energy transition. The country is a global leader in clean technologies, but it is also pouring money into new coal plants and production. Beijing may have to choose between its climate aspirations and its coal realities to compete successfully with the West.

China Energy & Environment

OCTOBER 13, 2022 | 8:28 AM WASHINGTON | 3:28 PM SHARM EL SHEIKH

Cairo’s next steps forward on climate adaptation and human rights at COP27

By Shahira Amin

Skeptics are questioning Egypt’s leadership of COP27, citing human rights concerns and unideal environmental policies. Others are doubtful about the choice of Sharm el Sheikh as the host city. They argue that the holiday resort may not be the most suitable venue for a global conference of this magnitude and scale, given the logistical, organizational, and managerial challenges of hosting such a gathering.

Nevertheless, the opportunity to host COP27 has incentivized Cairo to take steps forward in regard to climate adaptation and human rights, even if a lot more needs to be done to show that authorities are serious about political and environmental reforms. Meanwhile, continued financial and moral support from the United States and other development partners—and further scrutiny of human rights violations committed—would ensure there’s no backtracking on the country’s progress in the past year.

Cairo needs to keep the momentum going and show that it is actually committed to continuing the progress made so far. To do this, it needs to speed up its green transition, taking steady and concrete steps to lower its emissions and shift towards renewables. Moreover, Cairo needs to free all political detainees, many of whom are imprisoned for nothing more than exercising their right to free speech and free expression. By doing so, it can expect to reap the rewards of its serious efforts: greater support from the international community and prosperity and stability for Egypt and all Egyptians.

MENASource

Oct 13, 2022

Egypt has made some progress on human rights and the environment in preparation for COP27. But there’s still more to be done.

By Shahira Amin

Skeptics are questioning Egypt’s leadership of the climate talks, citing human rights concerns and unideal environmental policies.

Economy & Business Energy & Environment

SEPTEMBER 22, 2022 | 8:28 AM WASHINGTON | 3:28 PM SHARM EL SHEIKH

What Egypt’s COP presidency means for how this conference may play out

By Lama El Hatow

Egypt has a huge role to play during its presidency of COP27, as all eyes will be geared towards how the country can lead by example. To put things in perspective, with 1.3 percent of the world’s population, Egypt accounts for only 0.6 percent of global greenhouse gas emissions (GHG) and ranks twenty-eighth on the global list of polluters. This number appears to be relatively small from a global perspective. Regionally, however, Egypt contributes 31 percent of the overall GHG emissions from North Africa and 13 percent of the overall GHG emissions from the entire African continent. Thus, Egypt has a great responsibility to establish a pathway towards a green energy transition.

This year, Egypt’s presidency for COP27 is very important as a middle-income, African, and Middle Eastern country hosting this event. Egypt may, therefore, be able to influence the agenda items and bring more focus to Africa’s increasing needs for adaptation and mitigation financing.

There are four main items at the top of the agenda: climate finance, adaptation, loss and damage, and increased ambition. Egypt has a significant role to play in all of them.

MENASource

Sep 22, 2022

Egypt is hosting COP27. What are the expectations?

By Lama El Hatow

As the host country for the 2022 United Nations Climate Change Conference, Egypt has a huge role to play during its presidency of the event, as all eyes will be geared towards how the country can lead by example.

Energy & Environment Middle East

The post Live updates from COP27 as leaders battle climate change amid global crises appeared first on Atlantic Council.

Wieslander in Carneige Europe’s “Judy Asks: Is Europe taking resilience seriously?”

Eric Adamson — Fri, 14 Oct 2022 12:47:00 +0000

Full article

“Resilience, the ability for society to bounce back after a major shock, is increasingly important not only because of extreme weather effects on society but also because of the ability of adversaries to conduct hybrid warfare during peacetime, which puts societal resilience at the forefront of any efficient deterrence measure….Sweden and Finland are interesting in this regard, with reputations of having strong resilience. The foundation for this is the notion of total defense, developed during the Cold War—a concept that Ukraine also has studied carefully.”

The post Wieslander in Carneige Europe’s “Judy Asks: Is Europe taking resilience seriously?” appeared first on Atlantic Council.

How Niger’s safety net helps its most vulnerable citizens thrive amid crises

Ouhoumoudou Mahamadou and Mamta Murthi — Fri, 07 Oct 2022 13:07:10 +0000

Nearly every country around the world is grappling with more than one crisis: the still-simmering pandemic and continued vulnerability to future health emergencies; historic spikes in food insecurity, exacerbated by supply shortages arising from the war in Ukraine; fragility, conflict, and violence; and the steadily rising tide of climate change’s assaults on the environment.

Neutralizing even one of these crises can be confounding and perilous. Some countries, unfortunately, face them all at once, fighting on multiple fronts. That usually keeps them from attending to the longer-term task of giving people the knowledge, skills, access to health care, and opportunities they need to live out their full productive potential. Investing in resilient, shock-responsive systems is critical to protect human-capital gains and improve resilience to future shocks.

Niger is an example of a country that faces many complex and interconnected challenges. Shocks and crises are increasingly frequent and overlapping in Niger, disrupting efforts to sustain broad-based growth, build human capital, and reduce poverty. Regional instability has led to the displacement of families and the closure of schools, threatening social stability and increasing insecurity; that, in turn, complicated Niger’s efforts to respond to the COVID-19 pandemic and worsened the food insecurity that is now affecting more than 4.4 million of the country’s people. Climate shocks have triggered localized flooding, while steady rises in temperatures threaten the more than 80 percent of Niger’s citizens who depend on agriculture for their nourishment and livelihoods.

The government of Niger is determined not to lose any ground in its steady climb to protect and invest in all its citizens by pressing ahead with programs and reforms that are having transformational impact on people’s lives. A great example of this is the Wadata Talaka safety-net program, a partnership between Niger and the World Bank that focuses on poverty reduction, resilience building, and women’s empowerment. The program provides monthly cash transfers to extremely poor households to smooth their consumption expenditures and improve their ability to cope with shocks. It also provides “economic inclusion” support—life and micro-entrepreneurship skills training, coaching, and support to village savings groups—and helps poor children get essential mental stimulation in their early years. Such programs can respond quickly to help poor and vulnerable families prepare for, cope with, and adapt to shocks such as the COVID-19 pandemic: As the virus spread, the program expanded to four hundred thousand households to protect them from the pandemic’s adverse economic consequences. The program is well-placed to assist poor households with rising food insecurity and climate shocks.

A successful response will need to include supporting women and innovation. Because women are the primary beneficiaries of Wadata Talaka, the program is an important vehicle for their empowerment. Evaluations of the economic inclusion program show that in the eighteen months since it began, it improved household consumption and food security. The total income of women beneficiaries has increased (by 60 to 100 percent, much of it from non-farm businesses), and there is strong evidence of gains in their mental health and social wellbeing.

To develop such systems reaching the poorest and most vulnerable, countries will need strong social registries and good enrollment, delivery, and payment systems, often leveraging technology. The government of Niger is fully committed to these efforts. For example, responding to climate change, Wadata Talaka was the first program of its kind in West Africa to use satellite data to quickly anticipate drought hotspots and provide emergency funds more quickly than usual (three months ahead of the traditional response) to help people before they entered the lean season. Research is currently underway to measure the impact of that speed.

At a time when countries are forced to contend with the ebb and flow of shocks like climate change, pandemics, conflict, or food price increases, investments in social protection systems are more critical than ever. Niger’s programs serve as an example of just how impactful such adaptive systems can be.

Ouhoumoudou Mahamadou is the prime minister of Niger.

Mamta Murthi is vice president for human development at the World Bank.

The post How Niger’s safety net helps its most vulnerable citizens thrive amid crises appeared first on Atlantic Council.

A conversation with H.E. Chandrikapersad Santokhi, president of Suriname, chair of the Caribbean Community

ffmendez — Fri, 23 Sep 2022 18:49:27 +0000

Caribbean Community (CARICOM) countries are on the frontlines of the impacts of climate change, the energy crisis, inflation, and food insecurity. Inflation has reached more than 6 percent, electricity costs for Caribbean citizens are double the average for US citizens, and climate change is expected to cost the region almost $22 billion annually by 2050. Many of these issues were top of the agenda when five Caribbean Presidents and Prime Ministers met with Vice President Harris last week and as Caribbean Heads traveled to New York for the UN General Assembly this week.

How should new initiatives such as PACC2030 address energy, climate, and food security in the Caribbean? What are the priorities for Caribbean leaders even following the UN General Assembly? And what specific opportunities exist for US and Caribbean leaders to expand partnership beyond today and into the next decade?

You are invited by the Caribbean Initiative at the Atlantic Council’s Adrienne Arsht Latin America Center to watch a discussion recorded on the sidelines of the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) with H.E. Chandrikapersad Santokhi, president of the Republic of Suriname and chair of CARICOM.

Speakers

H.E. Chandrikapersad Santokhi
President
Republic of Suriname;
Chair
Caribbean Community

Melanie Chen
Board Member and Founder of the Caribbean Initiative
Atlantic Council

Jason Marczak
Senior Director, Adrienne Arsht Latin America Center
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#AtlanticDebrief – Will Jean Monnet’s vision for Europe win out? | A Debrief from Nathalie Tocci

nlawler — Fri, 23 Sep 2022 16:09:15 +0000

IN THIS EPISODE

What is the current scene in Europe on the struggle between European integration and Euroscepticism? What do Italy and Sweden’s elections mean for European unity and cooperation, particularly in the face of Russian aggression? Should Europe be expecting a resurgence of populism or the far-right in Europe?

For this episode of #AtlanticDebrief, Europe Center Senior Fellow Damir Marusic sits down with Dr. Nathalie Tocci, Director of the Istituto Affari Internazionali, to discuss these issues and answer the “Jean Monnet” question: if Europe can be adaptable and resilient in the face of crisis.

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Goldwyn in New York Times: South African Villagers Win Suit to Halt Shell’s Oil Exploration

lbowen — Fri, 02 Sep 2022 15:32:00 +0000

original article

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#BritainDebrief – What future for Hong Kong? | A Debrief from Nathan Law

Ben Judah — Wed, 27 Jul 2022 20:42:58 +0000

What future for Hong Kong?

As the 25th anniversary of the handover of Hong Kong is marked by the ascension of John Lee to the position of Chief Executive, Senior Fellow Ben Judah interviewed Nathan Law, a Hong Kong democracy activist currently in exile in London. Was the current repression in Hong Kong inevitable under the Chinese Communist Party, or under Xi? How have Britain and the United States aid in the plight of Hong Kong against this repression? How has the UK’s visa offer to the majority of the population benefited Hong Kongers’ attempts to flee the territory?

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#BritainDebrief – What does the Tory leadership contest say about race in Britain? | A Debrief from Tomiwa Owolade

Ben Judah — Wed, 27 Jul 2022 20:28:36 +0000

What does the Tory leadership contest say about race in Britain?

The candidacies of Rishi Sunak, Sajid Javid, Suella Braverman, and Kemi Badenoch for the leadership of the UK Conservative Party (and the UK premiership by extension) have demonstrated the potential for ethnic minority politicians to break “the glass ceiling” of political leadership. To understand these dynamics further, Senior Fellow Ben Judah spoke with Tomiwa Owolade, contributing writer to the New Statesman magazine, on how the political advancement of ethnic minority politicians reflects on British society at large. Are American ideological frames on race misapplied to British realities? Why is a party of social conservatism open to the possibility of an ethnic minority leader? Will there be an ethnic minority prime minister in the near future?

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#BritainDebrief – Bye Boris Special: Now what? | A Debrief from Tom McTague

Ben Judah — Wed, 27 Jul 2022 20:10:09 +0000

As Boris Johnson announces his resignation from the premiership, the question on everyone’s mind is: now what?

To get to the potential outcomes of Johnson’s departure from No 10, Senior Fellow Ben Judah interviewed Tom McTague, Staff Writer at The Atlantic, to discuss what to watch out for in both the Conservative Party and British politics in the near future. Who are the frontrunners to replace Johnson? Will the Conservative party retain its Johnsonian inertia? Will Labour benefit from dysfunction in the Conservative party? What does it say about Britain and its post-Brexit trajectory?

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Maliha Khan quoted in Top Africa News: Women Deliver announces WD2023 conference theme and opens registration at One-Year-Out

Atlantic Council — Wed, 27 Jul 2022 14:41:00 +0000

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How to beat the extreme heat

Atlantic Council — Thu, 21 Jul 2022 19:19:30 +0000

HOT OFF THE PRESSES

It’s the new, broiling normal. Europe’s brutal heat wave this week—which notched the highest temperature ever recorded in the United Kingdom at 104 degrees Fahrenheit—has buckled airport runways and fueled scorching wildfires. It’s also racking up a death toll in the thousands. This is the reality of the changing climate—and it will only get worse from here. Even as they work to reduce carbon emissions, how can societies and individuals adapt to this extreme heat? Our climate-resilience experts bring the light rather than the heat.

TODAY’S EXPERT REACTION COURTESY OF

Kathy Baughman McLeod (@KBMcLeodFLA): Director of the Adrienne Arsht-Rockefeller Foundation Resilience Center (Arsht-Rock)

Eleni Myrivili (@leniomyrivili): Global chief heat officer for UN-Habitat and heat advisor for Athens, Greece

Larry Kalkstein: President of Applied Climatologists, Inc. and chief heat science advisor for Arsht-Rock

More than a hot day

The biggest hurdle for civic leaders trying to keep people safe is hammering home the dangers of these heat waves, Kathy says. “We have this nostalgia of summer that is long gone. It is not a hot day: It’s a health crisis, it’s an infrastructure crisis, it’s an economic crisis, it’s an equity crisis. And there are solutions, but we have to acknowledge it for what it is: deadly.”

Research by Arsht-Rock published last year found that heat kills more Americans than any other natural disaster and costs the economy $100 billion per year. And Europe is experiencing many of those same impacts, even though Eleni sees evidence of complacency in Greece. “In the south of Europe we have people who have been used to being in a hot climate so they don’t take heat very seriously,” she says.“It’s hard for them to recognize that right now we are talking about a different type of heat.”

But measuring the hazards of these heat waves, Larry notes, is about more than just numbers on a thermometer. He has been working on categorizing heat waves—as is commonly done now for hurricanes. Factors such as humidity come into play, but also the relative change in temperature. “Heat waves that follow cool periods are more dangerous than those that follow hot periods where we’re acclimatized,” he says. That means you are likely to see more deaths in heat waves that arise in May or June than those that occur in August or September.

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How to stay (relatively) cool now

Athens is part of the pilot program for heat-wave categorization. Eleni is anticipating highs around 100 degrees tomorrow, which is borderline but just short of a Category 1 heat wave because it is mitigated by wind and low humidity. “We are going to open the cool [air-conditioned] spaces but not do much more than that,” she says.

Larry was quick to note that Category 1 heat waves are still “dangerous” while the highest level, Category 3, is “catastrophic.” And the best advice is to avoid prolonged exposure. “Most people consider themselves too healthy to be affected by heat,” he says, but that’s a faulty and perilous assumption.

For Athens and Seville, Spain, which are participating in the pilot program, more severe heat waves result in stronger warnings from the government about the need to avoid working outdoors or other kinds of prolonged exposure, along with additional actions to check on the most vulnerable communities. In Athens, Eleni says she works closely with the Red Cross to serve those most at risk.

How to build for a hotter future

“Gray” infrastructure such as roads and buildings currently dominates cities. But city planners should more fully integrate “green” infrastructure, such as parks and forests, and “blue” infrastructure, such as canals and ponds, into urban design. “There’s so much infrastructure being built right now, especially in the Global South,” Eleni says. It needs to be “the right type of infrastructure for our new temperatures.”

The solutions can be surprisingly low-tech and low-cost. Consider Freetown, Sierra Leone, where Chief Heat Officer Eugenia Kargbo is installing reflective shade covers over three open-air markets to protect vulnerable women selling fruits and vegetables in the heat.

In the United States, President Joe Biden on Wednesday announced $2.3 billion in funding for local communities to prepare for heat waves and other natural disasters. And there’s bipartisan support for a heat-wave categorization system in California. “There’s some small evidence that this is transcending the politics” around climate change, Kathy says. “It’s hot. You can’t deny that the pavement is buckling and that airplanes can’t fly starting at 120 degrees… People are living it.”

Watch the full briefing

Heat is killing us—and the economy too

Most people know the knock-on effects of global warming by now, but heat itself is too often overlooked as a destructive force in its own right.

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How can Europe prepare for its next heatwave?

Europe’s first Chief Heat Officer and the the first-ever Global Chief Heat Officer, Eleni Myrivili, shares her three approaches in a TED Talk

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Cities worldwide begin to name heatwaves

Arsht-Rock is working with international partners to pilot a heat-health warning system that categorizes and names heatwaves.

Learn more

The post How to beat the extreme heat appeared first on Atlantic Council.

Reading between the lines of the world’s top human-trafficking report

John Cotton Richmond — Wed, 20 Jul 2022 22:45:07 +0000

Survivors of human trafficking lack the necessary assistance from governments, while offenders continue to operate with impunity. Victim identification is down—but bans on the import of goods made by victims of forced labor are on the rise. Survivor leadership matters, and more countries than ever are listening to victims.

These are just some of the facts revealed in the US State Department’s 2022 Trafficking in Persons (TIP) Report, released Tuesday, the gold standard when it comes to actionable information on human trafficking. It provides an account of 188 countries’ efforts to hold perpetrators accountable, provide survivors services, and prevent trafficking.

As the former US ambassador dedicated to combating human trafficking, I led and served a team that wrote multiple TIP reports. This one reveals a mix of progress and setbacks. Far too often, governments prioritize human trafficking with their rhetoric but not their resources. This must change.

Here are seven key takeaways from the report and what they mean for the fight against this economically motivated crime that strikes at the heart of human dignity.

1. Declining global prosecutions

In the battle between traffickers and governments, traffickers are winning. Around the world, authorities aren’t making progress; they are losing ground. Since 2015, according to the TIP Report, governments have reported a 45 percent drop in global prosecutions. Although governments’ responses to COVID-19 exacerbated this decline, the entrenched pattern existed before the pandemic. Even in the United States, the number of convicted traffickers has fallen from 526 in 2018 to only 203 over the past year. Although prosecutions alone are not sufficient to stop trafficking, they are a necessary and essential component of an effective public justice response.

2. Falling rates of victim identification

According to the TIP Report, governments around the world collectively identified 90,354 human-trafficking victims—a 24 percent decrease from the high-water mark of 2018. Using the International Labor Organization’s internationally accepted estimate that there are a total of 24.9 million victims globally, that means governments identified less than half of one percent of all victims. Governments must do much more to identify, protect, and serve the 99.6 percent who remain under the control of traffickers. This calls for far more than slight or modest increases in government efforts and resources.

3. Meaningful survivor engagement

The State Department noted that the number of survivor advisory councils, and the involvement of survivors in policy and funding discussions, increased from seven to thirty-four countries over the past year. One prominent example is Albania’s Advisory Board for Victims of Trafficking. Composed of survivors, it advises residential shelters on identifying victims, protection services, and best practices. Survivors are experts in their traffickers’ unique use of coercion as well as the trauma they experienced during their exploitation. Their increasingly prominent roles in leadership, employment, decision-making, and policy development is an encouraging trend.

4. Ranking highlights

The TIP Report ranks each country from Tier 1 (the highest) to Tier 3 (the lowest), and countries with a Tier 3 ranking are barred from receiving certain types of foreign assistance. This year’s report contains several notable rankings.

Germany was upgraded to Tier 1, after three years on Tier 2, based in part on increased prosecutions and convictions of traffickers and the opening of several new shelters, including shelters to serve male victims. These positive actions overcame the fact that 66 percent of convicted traffickers received suspended sentences, further perpetuating the sense of impunity traffickers enjoy.

Ireland used its human trafficking law for the first time in nine years and obtained two convictions. It also addressed the persistent problem of governments prosecuting victims for the unlawful acts their traffickers force them to commit. Ireland expunged more than six hundred criminal convictions for commercial sex offenses that will allow survivors to move forward without the burden of a criminal record. These positive factors lifted Ireland from the Tier 2 Watch List to Tier 2.

South Korea dove off the elite Tier 1 for the first time since 2001 (the first year of the TIP Report). In addition to fewer investigations and prosecutions, South Korea did not identify any victims in its migrant workers programs despite numerous credible reports. It also let the majority of convicted traffickers off the proverbial hook by sentencing them to less than a year in jail or mere fines. The TIP Report also highlighted the fact that South Korea did not take steps to stop prosecuting trafficking victims for criminal activity directed by their traffickers.

Other notable upgrades included Iceland, Belize, Romania, Thailand, and Uganda. Meanwhile, seven new countries joined fifteen others on Tier 3 (Belarus, Brunei, Cambodia, Curacao, Macau, St. Maarten, and Vietnam).

5. Too few forced labor cases

Across US administrations, there has been consistent concern about the lack of forced-labor cases in the United States, which amount to just seven prosecutions this year. This suggests that authorities are not cracking down enough. Increasing forced-labor prosecutions has been the TIP Report’s number-one recommendation to the United States for the last seven years, and remained so this year. But globally, there’s some good news: Governments reported prosecuting the largest number of cases (1,379) since data was first collected in 2008. Although a relatively small increase, it represents progress.

During the reporting cycle, the United States increased its overall number of human-trafficking prosecutions and victims identified; but it also decreased the number of labor-trafficking prosecutions—dropping from fifteen cases in 2021. There are specific ways to significantly increase forced-labor cases, including establishing and resourcing specialized investigative units and providing greater services for survivors.

6. State-sanctioned forced labor

When most people think about human trafficking, they imagine individuals, groups, and companies engaging in the crime. But governments can also be traffickers—a particularly troubling development, since the criminal-justice system is not available to provide relief when the government itself is the perpetrator. Think China’s exploitation of its Uyghur minority, North Korea’s systemic mistreatment of foreign laborers, and Cuba’s forcing of medical professionals to work in its lucrative foreign medical missions. In total, the 2022 TIP Report concludes that the same eleven countries have a government “policy or pattern” of human trafficking as the 2021 TIP Report did. The question for policymakers is how to use a combination of diplomatic carrots and sticks to get these countries to stop forcing people to work.

7. Stopping forced labor in supply chains

The TIP Report highlights the United States’ serious and sustained efforts to stop goods made by forced-labor victims from entering its ports, competing with market-based products, and leaving consumers as tacit enablers of nefarious companies’ human-trafficking schemes. For example, last year’s Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act made revolutionary strides in shifting the burden from governments to businesses to prove the absence of forced labor in imported goods. Moving beyond mere transparency requirements, businesses are now shouldering an additional burden to map their supply chains, identify the presence of forced labor, and rectify the problem. Both in government procurement and through private-sector sourcing, economic purchasing power is pressing down through supply chains to root out forced labor.

What is clear from this year’s TIP Report is a sense of urgency that more must be done to combat all forms of human trafficking. In the United States, Congress can begin by swiftly reauthorizing the Trafficking Victims Protection Act and confirming the next ambassador-at-large to monitor and combat trafficking in persons. They can also scale funding for specialized investigative units, victim services, and measurable prevention efforts. This is a cause which unites people across the political spectrum. Our intellectual commitment to freedom from sex trafficking and forced labor must result in practical actions and measurable results.

John Cotton Richmond is a nonresident senior fellow in the Atlantic Council’s Scowcroft Strategy Initiative and served as the US ambassador-at-large to monitor and combat trafficking in persons from 2018 to 2021, and currently is a partner at Dentons where he focuses on forced labor in supply chains and sex trafficking in workforces.

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The West must take urgent steps to prevent Ukrainian economic collapse

Bate Toms — Tue, 19 Jul 2022 00:42:26 +0000

Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has devastated the country. In addition to thousands of military and civilian casualties, the war has also inflicted grave damage on the Ukrainian economy.

In response, the international community is helping to arm Ukraine and is also providing emergency financing in a bid to keep the Ukrainian economy afloat. However, far more comprehensive measures are required in order to prevent what could become a much greater economic collapse. If implemented without delay, the right steps could help safeguard Ukraine’s battered economy and set the stage for a strong post-war recovery.

Many Ukrainian companies currently face a lack of working capital and other business finance. This is in part due to the absence of political or conflict risk insurance (PRI), as well as the current shortage of ordinary business or property insurance. As a result, many Ukrainian businesses far from the frontlines are having to close or drastically reduce their activities.

Recent talk of a Ukrainian Marshall Plan for the post-war period is certainly welcome but Ukraine needs immediate action from the West on PRI, general insurance and business finance to avoid a further deterioration in the country’s already dire economic situation. Rebuilding Ukraine’s economy after the war will cost much more and take far longer if the necessary emergency measures are not adopted as a matter of urgency.

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While the recent Ukraine Recovery Conference in Switzerland focused on what is necessary for Ukraine’s future reconstruction, not enough emphasis was placed on what needs to be done now to halt the ongoing degradation of Ukraine’s economy.

To begin with, it is clear that Ukraine desperately needs PRI. This is not news. Indeed, there have been repeated calls for PRI from the BUCC, ICBAC and other international business associations ever since the 2014 Russian invasion of Crimea and eastern Ukraine. Ukraine is currently one of the few countries experiencing conflict that lacks a PRI program. Without PRI to protect Ukrainian property, there will not be much lending for private rebuilding or new investment into Ukraine.

The leading multinational provider of PRI is the World Bank’s Multilateral Investment Guarantee Agency (MIGA). While MIGA has an existing PRI program that can theoretically insure projects in Ukraine, this does not work for Ukraine currently because the actual allocation of insurance is subject to MIGA risk evaluations developed using non-war criteria, so PRI applications for Ukrainian projects are generally refused.

Ukraine requires a tailored PRI program that should cover not just major investments but also those by SMEs and individuals who wish to invest or continue to do business in Ukraine. Partners including the US, UK, Canada, Japan, Sweden, Norway and the EU could fund this MIGA administered Ukraine trust, ideally with at least USD 5 billion to begin with. Other multinational organizations like the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, the World Bank’s International Finance Corporation, and the EU’s European Investment Bank should also be involved, with such PRI facilitating their ability to increase lending in Ukraine.

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Although the current problem of insuring property and businesses in Ukraine receives little media attention, it is important to acknowledge that ordinary property and business insurance is no longer generally available in Ukraine from reputable insurers. Such insurance is a basic financial support for investment and business and is ordinarily required to obtain lending for the private development of real estate, facilities and other core investments. Without this insurance, it seems unlikely that many existing and potential private investors will want to be in Ukraine, or that much finance for construction and other purposes will be made available.

Unfortunately, most reliable Western insurers have recently mostly pulled out of Ukraine. Consequently, Ukraine now lacks the basic insurance capacity needed to support existing and new investment along with reconstruction finance. While there are still some local Ukrainian insurers, many have reputations for unreasonably refusing to pay valid claims so international lending institutions and Western-owned banks and businesses in Ukraine often refuse to work with them.

Multinational organizations need to urgently work with Ukraine’s government to develop the Ukrainian insurance sector so that it becomes better capitalized and more reliable. A special fund or guarantee system should be created, ideally funded by the World Bank, to provide financial support to encourage more insurers to act on the Ukrainian market despite the current war and perception that Ukraine is now a riskier place.

In the meantime, Ukraine needs to immediately open up the Ukrainian insurance market by relaxing its restrictive licensing requirements. This could be done most quickly by exempting reputable foreign insurers, such as those licensed in the EU, EFTA or G20 countries (other than Russia), from the requirement for a Ukrainian insurance license. It should also be permitted for insurance proceeds to be paid by such foreign insurers to foreign insured parties in foreign currency to bank accounts in the investor’s or lender’s country in the event of a loss, so as to eliminate the current risk inherent in requiring payments to be made only in Ukraine.

The world cannot afford to wait until Russia is militarily defeated before beginning the work of rebuilding Ukraine and reviving the country’s economy. Instead, immediate action is needed to provide access to PRI as well as general property and business insurance along with business and property finance. Vladimir Putin seeks to destroy the Ukrainian economy as part of his plan to turn the country into a failed state that cannot afford to support or defend itself. If the international community is serious about preventing a Russian victory in Ukraine, it must take urgent steps to ensure Ukraine’s economic survival.

Bate C Toms is Co-Chair of the Council of Business Associations and Chambers of Commerce in Ukraine (ICBAC), that represents approximately 10,000 businesses in Ukraine. He is Chair of the British Ukrainian Chamber of Commerce (BUCC) and manages a business law firm in Ukraine.

Metropolises matter

Cities are hubs of economic growth and innovation that punch above their weight and attract the next generation of talent. The economies of many US cities are larger than those of entire countries: New York City’s gross domestic product (GDP) in 2021 was larger than the combined GDP of all of Mexico and Central America, while the GDPs of Ecuador and Jacksonville, Florida were nearly the same in 2020. In the United States, four in five people live in urban areas, and that number is expected to rise to almost nine in ten people by 2050. In Latin America and the Caribbean, city populations have also quickly expanded: Over the past two decades, the region’s urban population increased by 34.6 percent. As people flock to metropolises, mayors will represent an increasing percentage of a country’s GDP and population.

Mayors across the country are taking global issues head-on, with projects supported by their cities’ economic heft and innovation. At the start of the pandemic, the C40 Cities Climate Leadership Group, a network of major global cities established to confront the climate crisis, launched the C40 Global Mayors COVID-19 Recovery Task Force which responded to global economic shocks by creating a plan for a sustainable and equitable economic recovery. Similarly, at the 2021 United Nations climate change conference, C40 Cities—led by Los Angeles Mayor and then C40 Cities Chair Eric Garcetti—ran the Race to Zero campaign, committing over one thousand cities and local councils to go carbon neutral by 2050. It was one of the most substantial contributions towards lowering emissions made at the conference. The Biden administration’s new announcements would similarly tap into the power of city diplomacy by convening mayors and boosting their capacity to address shared challenges.

The move to elevate subnational government officials in US foreign policy will help connect local communities and commerce across the Western Hemisphere. These new city-focused initiatives announced by Blinken acknowledge local leaders’ abilities to provide a bridge between national policies and everyday citizens. This is particularly relevant following the Summit of the Americas, as mayors can demonstrate to the public how actions discussed at the summit can benefit local communities. However, these initiatives should go hand-in-hand with efforts to train and coordinate local leaders from a diverse array of metropolises.

The US State Department should formalize its approach to subnational engagement by creating a blueprint for international offices at the citywide level, with resources and coordination from Washington. The federal government should first conduct a widespread review of the current international engagements of each state and city to gain an accurate view of the current strengths and weaknesses of US subnational diplomacy. Next, the State Department should work with current offices to outline a set of best practices for local officials who lack the resources and training to prioritize international collaboration. This guide should also outline the economic benefits of collaborating with international partners, which could be used by elected officials and candidates as they reach out to voters. These resources will make clear the benefits of international partnership—but they’re not enough.

The United States should also consider creating a central office in the State Department to coordinate and improve cohesiveness between US regional initiatives. Currently, Congress is considering the bipartisan City and State Diplomacy Act to create a one-stop-shop in the State Department, headed by an ambassador-at-large for city and state diplomacy, that would include more federal resources to support subnational relationships. The ambassador would be able to send experienced career foreign-service members to support new statewide offices, leverage the State Department’s expertise in informing federal policy, and coordinate the policy goals of the myriad of subnational networks—from C40 Cities to the US Conference of Mayors. And if congressional action slows, the State Department can always create the proposed office unilaterally.

Mayors need a designated city-level team with resources to coordinate the host of new responsibilities and opportunities included in the new US government-led subnational effort. Most US cities are not yet fully equipped to lead their own foreign engagement due to a lack of training and resources. Nina Hachigian, the first US deputy mayor of international affairs, observed that “American cities are almost universally understaffed, and many do not have even one person dedicated to foreign policy.” While a handful of ambitious mayors in large cities such as Los Angeles and New York have taken it upon themselves to create their own specialized approaches to foreign diplomacy, existing action has occurred in a piecemeal and isolated process without streamlined guidance and support from the federal government. Without an intentional effort to assist local leaders from smaller states and cities, the benefits of international collaboration will continue to fall unevenly across states—further exacerbating national inequalities.

Streamlining a fractured environment

Skeptics of subnational diplomacy may fear that creating local offices for international relations will disaggregate and weaken national foreign policymaking, potentially even contradicting national priorities when local leaders are not politically aligned with federal government leaders. This line of reasoning ignores the reality that local leaders will continue to strike out on their own. Instituting local offices alongside a federal office devoted to subnational diplomacy will streamline the isolated approaches of different levels of government. Importantly, it will also avoid sending mixed signals abroad. A well-resourced federal office would further ensure that all cities and states have the ability to capitalize on the benefits of international partnership, no matter whether they are predominantly urban or rural, coastal or land-locked, or growing or stagnating economically.

The Summit of the Americas presents a critical moment to reprioritize both the creation of city-level international offices and a State Department office to coordinate between US regional initiatives. To start, these growing city-level offices could take the lead in following up on summit deliverables, using local policies in pursuit of achieving hemispheric aims. These offices of international affairs can also lay the groundwork for regional economic integration across the hemisphere that supports local communities. US cities need international economic policies on scale with their own growing capacity, and these new offices can lead international trade missions to attract foreign direct investment, boost local tourism, and spur job growth: locally driven commercial exchanges, unlike most international trade agreements, can prioritize small-business development. These bilateral economic relationships would also support US geoeconomic priorities like localizing production and friend-shoring to build more resilient supply chains with a large number of trusted countries.

The White House has a mere seven months until the Cities Summit. In this time, national US government leaders should create the local and national institutions needed to support mayors in their global aims. If mayors arrive in Denver with designated international teams and clearer understandings of their mandates, they will be prepared to set an ambitious agenda. The local leaders at the Cities Summit can then focus on tangible steps for achieving priorities set out at the Summit of the Americas. In doing so, these mayors will establish a solid foundation for continuous collaboration and spearhead a new form of foreign policy that is truly responsive to the people because it is led by locally elected leaders—but only if the national US government is ready to support this bottom-up approach.

Willow Fortunoff is a program assistant at the Atlantic Council’s Adrienne Arsht Latin America Center.

The post Mayors are quickly becoming international diplomats. The US can help them thrive. appeared first on Atlantic Council.

Share the Colombian American dream

John Leguizamo — Tue, 31 May 2022 22:40:02 +0000

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GROWING UP IN THE NEIGHBORHOOD of Jackson Heights, Queens, in New York City taught me an early lesson on being myself. From a tender age, I felt the pressure of “being different,” and experiencing the world through an unusual lens as I witnessed my mother work several exhausting jobs to keep our family afloat in a country that was foreign to us. Soon, I realized that “being different” made me a target to those who did not sympathize with the way I looked or how I spoke. Living in a predominantly Caucasian neighborhood forced me to learn about survival, who I was, and, ultimately, who I was meant to become.

I was born in Bogotá, Colombia, and although I moved to the United States at a young age, I never ceased exalting my identity as a Colombian and a Latino. I don the badge and the title of being an immigrant to the United States with the utmost honor and respect. Throughout my career in the arts––from performing in local New York City venues to opening a show on Broadway and eventually breaking glass ceilings in Hollywood––I have accomplished what might have seemed unimaginable through unspeakable hours of hard work and tribulation, a marvelous quality that all Latino immigrants share.

Making a decent living in the United States as a minority is no simple feat, yet there is no one better than an immigrant with a dream and a purpose to upend that expectation. As a young boy running around the streets of New York, using my humor as a means to stay safe in the urban jungle, I learned to channel the gargantuan resilience of a Colombian American, repurposing life’s difficulties into fuel to keep my dream alive.

Most of the people who once bullied me quickly found me hilarious–– or perhaps I worked at crafting that comedic image better than I could have imagined, and it was precisely that comedy that took me down trails not blazed before. I was aware of being a skimpy little brown kid with a funny speech pattern who could imitate every accent imaginable.

I was a nerd in love with the arts, reading, comic books, plays, movies, and great performers; I used this adoration to empower myself in a place that was not seeing me or my potential. I refer to this source of motivation as “Ghetto Nerd Power.”

It was by the library’s bookshelves and, later, inside the theater where I met my true self and decided to step into my future, no matter the hardships, setbacks, or prejudice. I was ready to do it all: study drama, learn diverse acting techniques, practice tongue twisters, follow elocution lessons, and audition for every single role possible. It was never easy, and sometimes it still feels that way, but failure was and is never an option. I stand by the statement “Latinos must do twice the work to get half the opportunities,” because I have experienced this scenario on several occasions. Nevertheless, Latino tenacity, spiritual fiber, and passion from my Colombian DNA propelled me to search within myself and forge my destiny.

I first won over audiences in 1991 as the star and writer of MamboMouth. I have portrayed seven different Latino characters in sold-out theaters off-Broadway. I have played various characters from different backgrounds, including a lowlife criminal in Carlito’sWay(1993), Luigi in SuperMarioBros(1993), and nineteenth-century French artist Toulouse-Lautrec in Moulin Rouge (2001). And even though I have been blessed with international success, I still source much of my material from my unlikely path to stardom–– from a working-class family in Queens to a renowned artist in theatre, film, and television.

This beautiful nation has offered me life-changing possibilities. I am humbled by the astonishing achievements I have amassed in the United States. My indigenous Chibcha,Muisca(TheMuisca[alsocalledChibcha]are an indigenous people and culture of the Altiplano Cundiboyacense, Colombia), and Afro-Latino identity is deeply-rooted and informs who I am as an artist and human being. I cherish the best of what these identities have granted me––from bilingualism to delicious food to incomparable music to amazing people. I never tire of representing Colombia in this country and in front of the world.

As a Colombian American, I am continuously astounded by the immense talent that treks from Colombia into the United States. I cherish it, and it overwhelms me with unwavering pride. This is why continuous US-Colombia relations signify a beacon of hope, especially when I consider the bond between two nations fighting for the betterment of their people. At the same time, that story and fight do not end here. I may very well be an example to millions of Latino immigrants who are still unsure whether to follow their dream or walk away from it because they have no other choice.

I want to be more than an example. After decades of working in the entertainment industry and sharpening my artistry, I ache to be more than just an image for people to look up to.

Multiplying a Colombian American dream

My experience in this country as a thriving creative and spokesman for positive societal change means that other Colombian Americans can also create a prosperous future where they can empower their careers, livelihoods, and families. This speaks to the need for more programs that foster and enrich the potential of young, brilliant minds who may not have the means to attend top-tier universities or institutions. Pro- grams through which children and young adults can approach educators, resources, and funding are catalysts to spur equity among our youth.

The arts are the most competitive field in the marketplace. Our young Colombian minds should be able to tap into their fullest potential within Colombia and abroad in the United States by participating in cultural and educational residencies to learn how to be great storytellers and collaborators and, ultimately, create their own work with the potential to be seen and commissioned.

Oftentimes, potential is squandered before it can blossom due to a lack of access to opportunities; this is the gap that cultural programs should close. The demand for foundations and artists’ funds at the local level is rising. It is up to established creatives and their teams to champion more tangible opportunities aimed at those who aspire to grow within a career in the arts. Ultimately, it is our responsibility to leverage programs and mentorship.

I wish to gift my message and life experiences to future generations of Colombian Americans, and Latin immigrants everywhere, as a means to inspire. I want to show them that what I have done is not only possible but also attainable; no matter the language they speak, the accent they have, or the color of their skin, they can conceive a beautiful future where they can be seen and celebrated.

This, right here, is what I consider the American dream. And it is now time for it to become a reality for any of mis paisanos (my fellow Colombians) who one day dare decide to claim the extraordinary life for which they have never stopped struggling. I wish for them to open their arms, beam their gorgeous brown smile, and embrace their own Colombian American dream.

Allies US-Colombia Book May 3, 2022

Allies: Video by Carlos Vives

By Carlos Vives

Visual Essay by Carlos Vives in Allies: 28 Bold Ideas to Reimagine the US-Colombia Relationship.

Americas Colombia

In-Depth Research & Reports May 31, 2022

Embrace our shared future

By President Bill Clinton

Colombians have come too far to give up on better tomorrows and brighter futures for their children. The United States must stand with them.

Colombia Latin America

In-Depth Research & Reports May 31, 2022

Recognize the power of music

By Leila Cobo

Colombian musicians have become global leaders. They are the single-most recognized ambassadors of the country’s culture, folklore, and traditions. They are vocal agents of change, thanks to an ever-growing number of artistic collaborations and an increasingly solid business infrastructure.

Colombia Education

May 26, 2022

Allies: Twenty-seven bold ideas to reimagine the US-Colombia relationship

As the United States and Colombia celebrate 200 years of diplomatic relations, it is time to think boldly and creatively about the future of this strategic partnership.

Explore more

The post Share the Colombian American dream appeared first on Atlantic Council.

Invest in diversity and inclusion

Gregory W. Meeks — Tue, 31 May 2022 22:30:31 +0000

download pdf

Allies

THE YEAR 2022 MARKs A REMARKABLE two hundred years of US-Colombia diplomatic relations. Through heartrending struggles and historic advances, Colombia remains one of our top strategic partners in Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC).

I have worked for more than twenty years to shape US policy to deepen our relationship with Colombia and LAC, taking on tough issues like violence, drug trafficking, human rights, and the rule of law while championing trade and peaceful solutions to economic stagnation, persistent inequality, and a lack of access to opportunities. Colombia has overcome tremendous obstacles, emerging from several domestic crises to become a country that now provides refuge to nearly two million Venezuelans fleeing declining economic conditions and political instability. Colombia holds a special place in my policy agenda—so too have the Colombian people and the country’s Caribbean and Pacific communities. In my role on the bipartisan, bicameral Atlantic Council US-Colombia Task Force, I will continue to put forward policy that supports the growth and prosperity of Colombians and LAC.

Despite notable progress in the past two decades, I am concerned about Colombia’s remaining challenges. The COVID-19 pandemic has laid bare deep economic, educational, and health disparities in Colombia, as it has in the United States. It has exposed the persistent inequities faced by those who have experienced centuries of racial and ethnic discrimination and structural inequalities. That is why, as Chair of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, I continue to advocate tirelessly for increased COVID-19 vaccine accessibility and US support for global recovery efforts.

Ignoring opportunities to address root causes and propose constructive solutions to unrest in our countries hinders our ability to open pathways to prosperity and improved quality of life for more people. While I am proud of what we have accomplished together, I place a premium on peace for a sustainable future. We will not achieve lasting peace or any great endeavor with- out the participation of Black and Indigenous communities and women in Colombia and the Western Hemisphere.

Despite making up nearly 33 percent of the population in LAC, people of African descent too often remain “invisible” and underrepresented in places of decision making, influence, and mainstream leadership. Although people of African descent and Indigenous peoples in Colombia have been resilient throughout history, these communities have been some of those most impacted by internal conflict, structural inequality, and all forms of discrimination.

Colombia has the second largest population of people of African descent in Latin America, making up nearly 11 percent of the populace. Yet, according to the United Nations Development Programme, Afro-Colombians experience higher rates of poverty (54 percent) and illiteracy (11 percent), have less access to basic services (42 percent), and face greater food insecurity (59 percent) than the rest of the population.¹ ² Of the 3.4 percent of Colombians who identify as Indigenous, 63 percent live in persistent forms of structural inequality.³ Despite the resilience and potential of these significant Colombian com- munities on the Pacific and Caribbean coasts, the Guajira, and the Amazon, these data sound an alarm. Regardless of the optimism by many in the inter- national community who were hopeful that the 2016 peace agreement with the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) would bring peace, decrease violence, and open opportunities, challenges persist. Despite leading to the demobilization and disarmament of the FARC, full implementation of the peace agreement—particularly the ethnic chapter—remains woe- fully incomplete.

This piece of the puzzle is significant because peaceful and inclusive policies and practices are necessary conditions for attracting investment, creating new jobs, and strengthening supply chains. Most investors “recognize that the viability of business itself depends on the resources of healthy ecosystems—fresh water, clean air, robust biodiversity, productive land—and on the stability of just societies.⁴ They value societies that prioritize the critical roles youth, women, and ethnic minorities play in shaping a country’s future. As one of those main investors, the United States and I, as Chair of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, will continue to work with Colombia to ensure full implementation of the ethnic chapter in the agreement.

Sustainable peace in Colombia requires robust economic development that encompasses an intelligent trade policy and provides necessary assistance to affected communities, especially youth, Afro-Colombian, and Indigenous peoples. Economic empowerment, whether through access to viable employment or entrepreneurship, is key; it requires investment, access to resources, contacts, and capacity.

Many young people are working to change the existing narratives that place people of their communities at the bottom of the pyramid. Young entrepreneurs drive and shape innovation; they speed up structural changes in the economy and introduce new competition, thereby contributing to productivity. US–Colombia cooperation should invest in programs that can leap- frog them into new markets, leadership, and success in areas so often denied them. For this reason, I have been a strong advocate of programs that prepare Afro-Colombian and Indigenous youth for world-class education and global leadership opportunities with programs focused on fostering untapped talent. While women in Colombia have become increasingly active in paid work and elected offices, closing the gender gap at an impressive rate, Afro-Colombian women are neither experiencing similar growth nor present in positions of traditional decision making. Instead, women of African descent encounter higher levels of social and economic vulnerability, extreme poverty, and limited access to education and quality health services.⁵ Most enter the labor market at an early age in low-income, unskilled jobs, many experience early motherhood, and others are subjected to racial and gender-based violence. Our partnerships with Colombia can and should exchange good practices and identify ways to provide targeted support for women, especially women in rural areas and ethnic communities. African descendants and Indigenous women should have access to the resources they need to build businesses, expand cooperative economic empowerment initiatives, and innovate using new and ancestral technologies. I have supported programs—funded through the Inter-American Foundation—that strengthen existing grassroots and community efforts by investing in locally-led initiatives and exchange programs, targeting resources, and providing needed sup- port for these communities beyond workshops. These efforts can and should be enhanced using public-private partnerships.

I am also committed to supporting the 2010 US-Colombian Action Plan on Racial and Ethnic Equality, an important policy complement to development assistance programs and the work and mandate of the Race, Ethnicity, and Social Inclusion Unit at the US Department of State. I am dedicated to increasing funding for State Department and US Agency for International Development (USAID) diversity hiring, retention, and promotion initiatives, and expanding opportunities for minority-owned businesses, Historically Black Colleges and Universities, and other minority-serving institutions to compete for State Department contracts and grants. I support US government efforts to hire from and build relationships with local communities, including Afro-Colombian, Indigenous, and women-led organizations and businesses.

In addition to these efforts, I have advocated for and supported USAID funding for the Afro-Colombian and Indigenous Peoples package, totaling nearly $92 million from 2011 to 2021, and the program’s successor, the Indigenous Peoples and Afro-Colombian Empowerment Activity 2021-2026, focused on the Caribbean, Pacific, and Amazon regions. I urge my colleagues on both sides of the aisle in the US Congress to prioritize these efforts and provide the necessary support to ensure targeted objectives are achieved to strengthen further the foundations of inclusive and equitable development efforts in Colombia.

Despite the many concerns facing us worldwide, the Western Hemisphere remains a central priority for the Biden Administration and Congress. We are leading through diplomacy, promoting democracy, ensuring inclusive, sustainable development, and reaffirming our firm commitment to diversity as a valuable and undeniable asset of our foreign and civil service. Democracy is precious and fragile. If it is not inclusive and we do not consider the challenges facing those at the margins, growth and prosperity for the whole are fleeting.

Throughout my career in Congress, I have encouraged an open space for new voices where regional and global power meet. In 2021, I was inspired by the launch of the Afro-Interamerican Forum on Climate Change during COP26, with leaders and scientists of African descent from twelve countries in the Western Hemisphere. The forum introduced the concept of an Afro-Descendant Natural Belt of the Americas and developed a Strategy for Environmental Equity and Racial Justice in the Amazon, inclusive of the unique perspectives and culturally-sourced solutions from African descendant communities and advocates.

In Glasgow, it became clear that without the participatory contributions of the African descendant, Indigenous communities, and women in Colombia and throughout LAC, it is unlikely we will meet our global climate goals.⁶ While the people who have historically inhabited the Western Hemisphere and native communities worldwide are among the most vulnerable to the climate crisis, they are also the key to our planet’s survival. It is the responsibility of those in power—including those in Congress—to make the systemic change needed to empower those most affected by climate change to be at the core of its solution.⁷. I believe in the tremendous potential of Colombia and the powerful ties between our nations. Colombia, its institutions, and its people are stronger when we work together to prioritize inclusive and sustainable economic development, respect for human rights, and the democratic values we cherish and aspire to uphold. I am critically optimistic about the future of Colombia because Colombia, like the United States, can elevate and lever- age the talent of our diverse populations and build relationships that tap into the cultural bonds that exist in so many communities across our nations— bonds that extend beyond borders.

* * *

Representative Gregory Meeks (D-NY) has been the congressional representative for New York’s 5th District since 1998 and is the first Black member of Congress to serve as chair of the House Foreign Affairs Committee. He is also a senior member of the House Financial Services Committee and chair- man of the Subcommittee on Consumer Protection and Financial Institutions. He is member of the Atlantic Council’s US-Colombia Task Force.

Allies US-Colombia Book May 3, 2022

Allies: Video by Carlos Vives

By Carlos Vives

Visual Essay by Carlos Vives in Allies: 28 Bold Ideas to Reimagine the US-Colombia Relationship.

Americas Colombia

In-Depth Research & Reports May 31, 2022

Embrace our shared future

By President Bill Clinton

Colombians have come too far to give up on better tomorrows and brighter futures for their children. The United States must stand with them.

Colombia Latin America

In-Depth Research & Reports May 31, 2022

Recognize the power of music

By Leila Cobo

Colombia Education

Explore more

1 “Social Movements” in Comparative Perspectives on Afro-Latin America, eds. Kwame Dixon and John Burdick (Gainesville: University Press of Florida, 2012), 135-155.

2 Colombia: Inclusive Economic Development, United Nations Development Programme, accessed March 1, 2022, https://www.undp.org/content/dam/undp/library/Poverty%20Reduction/MDG%20Strategies/colombia.pdf.

3 “Colombia Population 2022 (Live),” World Population Review, accessed March 1, 2022, https://worldpopulationreview.com/countries/colombia-population.

4 ”Yvon Chouinard, Jib Ellison, and Rick Ridgeway, “The Sustainable Economy,” Harvard Business Review (October 2011), https://hbr.org/2011/10/the-sustainable-economy.

5 Julie Goldscheid, “Gender Violence Against Afro-Colombian Women: Making the Promise of International Human Rights Law Real,” Columbia Human Rights Law Review (May 27, 2020), http://hrlr.law.columbia.edu/hrlr-online/gender-violence-against-afro-colombian-women-making-the-promise-of-international-human-rights-law-real/.

6 Rep. Gregory Meeks, “Those on the front lines of climate change should be empowered to be central to its solution,” The Hill, December 1, 2021, https://thehill.com/blogs/congress-blog/energy- environment/583934-those-on-the-front-lines-of-climate-change-should-be/amp/.

7 Ibid

The post Invest in diversity and inclusion appeared first on Atlantic Council.

Declaración por la igualdad de género en el proceso de construcción de la democracia y la paz en Venezuela

Angela Chavez — Tue, 24 May 2022 18:52:42 +0000

English

Spanish

En español

Apoya Nuestra Propuesta

Cumbre de Mujeres Por Venezuela

firmantes a la Propuesta

24 de mayo de 2022 – Hoy, las mujeres de la Red de Apoyo, activistas sociales, actores políticos democráticos y organizaciones no gubernamentales dentro y fuera de Venezuela y quienes suscriben la presente declaración, proponen un plan de acción conjunto, y en sintonía con la resolución 1325 del Consejo de Seguridad de la Organización de Naciones Unidas, para exigir la garantía de la participación plena y efectiva de las mujeres venezolanas en los procesos de toma de decisiones y en su liderazgo en la redemocratización y cambio político sostenible en Venezuela.

En el marco de la primera “Cumbre de Mujeres por Venezuela,” un encuentro organizado por el Centro para América Latina Adrienne Arsht del Atlantic Council y la Universidad Católica Andrés Bello con el apoyo del Gobierno de Canadá, este grupo de mujeres presenta una propuesta de acciones que buscan avanzar concretamente hacia la redemocratización con una visión plural, amplia, paritaria e igualitaria de Venezuela y que tiene como firmes objetivos:

Garantizar la participación plena y efectiva de las mujeres y expandir significativamente su representación en la política, la sociedad civil y todos los espacios de poder y decisiones en el camino hacia la reinstitucionalización en Venezuela;
Asegurar que la agenda política incluya una perspectiva de derechos, de género e interseccional en las estructuras de liderazgo, en las políticas públicas y todas las instancias de toma de decisiones.

En función de estos objetivos, quienes respaldan esta declaración, se comprometen a promover, acompañar y avanzar en las siguientes acciones en el plazo de un año, a más tardar el 24 de mayo de 2023:

Propuesta de Acciones Iniciales

Exigir a las juntas directivas de los partidos políticos que garanticen el liderazgo igualitario de las mujeres en las decisiones políticas incorporando propuestas programáticas específicas que deben ser incluidas como parte del proceso de renovación de estos partidos y la democracia en Venezuela.
Elaborar un reglamento modelo dentro de estos partidos que asegure la inclusión y el liderazgo femenino, así como la igualdad, la no discriminación y eliminación de todo tipo de violencia por razones de género, y crear un grupo de trabajo encargado de implementar, monitorear y dar seguimiento a este reglamento.
Agrupar y coordinar movimientos de mujeres, dentro de Venezuela y en la diáspora, con sectores y partidos políticos comprometidos con principios democráticos, la sociedad civil y aliados internacionales para promover las reivindicaciones de las mujeres venezolanas.
Establecer mecanismos de monitoreo y seguimiento de la participación igualitaria y la perspectiva de género en todos los procesos de diálogo, negociación y construcción de acuerdos con representación de la diversidad de sectores políticos, económicos y sociales.
Liderar acciones afirmativas de incidencia ante la comunidad internacional para impulsar los objetivos de esta declaración.

Se comprometen en avanzar estas acciones las siguientes personas y entidades:

Firmantes a la Propuesta

English

Declaration for gender equality in the process of building democracy and peace in Venezuela

Support the Summit Proposal

vENEZUELA wOMEN’S lEADERSHIP sUMMIT

May 24, 2022 – Today, the women of the “Red de Apoyo,” social activists, democratic political actors and non-governmental organizations inside and outside Venezuela, and those who subscribe to this declaration, propose a joint plan of action, and in tune with UN Security Council Resolution 1325, to demand the guarantee of full and effective participation of Venezuelan women in decision-making processes and in their leadership in the redemocratization and sustainable political change in Venezuela.

In the framework of the first “Venezuela Women’s Leadership Summit,” a meeting organized by the Adrienne Arsht Latin America Center of the Atlantic Council and the Universidad Católica Andrés Bello with the support of the Government of Canada, this group of women presented a proposal of actions that seek to advance towards redemocratization with a plural, broad, balanced, and egalitarian vision of Venezuela, with the following objectives:

To guarantee the full and effective participation of women and significantly expand their representation in politics, civil society and all spaces of power and decision-making on the road to reinstitutionalization in Venezuela;
Ensure that the political agenda includes rights, gender, and intersectional perspective in leadership structures, public policies, and all decision-making bodies.

Based on these objectives, those who endorse this declaration, commit to promote, accompany, and advance the following actions within one year, no later than May 24, 2023.

Proposal for initial actions

Demand that the boards of directors of political parties guarantee the equal leadership of women in political decisions by incorporating specific programmatic proposals that must be included as part of the renewal process of these parties and democracy in Venezuela.
Elaborate a model regulation within these parties that ensures female inclusion and leadership, as well as equality, non-discrimination, and elimination of all types of gender-based violence, and create a workgroup in charge of implementing, monitoring, and following up on this regulation.
Bring together and coordinate women’s movements, within Venezuela and in the diaspora, with political sectors and parties committed to democratic principles, civil society, and international allies to promote the demands of Venezuelan women.
Establish mechanisms to monitor and follow up on equal participation and the gender perspective in all processes of dialogue, negotiation, and building of agreements with representation from the diversity of political, economic, and social sectors.
Lead affirmative advocacy actions before the international community to promote the objectives of this declaration.

The following individuals and entities are committed to advancing these actions:

Firmantes de la propuesta / Proposal signers

Individuos / Individuals

Abraham Pedraza
Adriana Adrián
Adriana D’Elia
Adriana Pichardo
Aime Nogal
Alessandro Longoni
Alexis Paparoni
Alfredo Ramos
Alinis Aranguren
Ana Rosario Contreras
Ana Mercedes Aponte
Andrea Merlo
Andrés Velásquez
Ángel Alvarado Rangel
Ángel Alvarez
Ángel Álvarez
Angel Caridad
Ángel Medina
Ángel Torres
Armando Armas
Auristela Vásquez
Bibi Borges
Brian Fincheltub
Carlos Paparoni
Carlos Prosperi
Carlos Valero
Carlos Vecchio
Carmen María Sisvoli
Castor Rivas
Cesar Alonso
Cesar Cardenas
Cristofer Correia
Daniel Antequera
David Smolansky
Delsa Solorzano
Denncis Pazo
Diana Merchán
Dianela Parra
Dinorah Figuera
Edgar Vidao
Edinson Ferrer
Eduardo Battisini
Elias Matta

Elissa Trotta Gamus
Elizabeth Castillo
Emilio Graterón
Evelyn Pinto
Fabiola Zavarce
Fernando Aranguren
Fernando Feo
Francisco Sucre
Franco Casella
Freddy Castellanos
Freddy Guevara
Freddy Superlano
Gabriel Diaz
Gerson Pernia
Gilber Caro
Gilberto Sojo
Gladys Guaipo
Guarequena Gutierrez Silva
Guillermo Palacios
Gustavo Marcano

Gustavo Tarre
Héctor Cordero
Hector Vargas
Henrique Capriles
Hernando Garzón Martínez
Hildemaro Lisboa
Hugo Valera
Indira Urbaneja
Ingrid Serrano
Isaac Gaskin
Isadora Zubillaga
Ismael García
Ivlev Silva
Jairo Bao
Jesús Abreu
Jesus Antonio Avila M
Joaquin Aguilar
Jony Rahal
Jose Antonio Rodriguez
Jose Briceño Pulido
Jose Gregorio Oliveros
Jose Hernandez
Jose Ignacio Guedez
Jose Manuel Olivares
José Trujillo
Josmary Querales
Juan Miguel Matheus

Juan Vilera
Julian Diaz
Julio Borges
Julio Igarza
Karim Vera
Katherine Barrera
Lawrence Castro
Leopoldo Lopez
Lester Toledo
Liliana Pérez
Lisbeth Cordero García
Liz Carolina Jaramillo
Liz María Márquez
Lucrecia Morales Garcia
Luigi Pulcini
Luis Barragan
Luis Bueno
Luis Emilio Rondon
Luis Florido
Luis Omaña
Luis Trincado
Mabelli León- Ponte
Macario González
Manuel Rodriguez
Manuel Teixeira
Manuela Bolivar
Marco Aurelio Quiñones
Marco Bozo
Maria Alejandra Ochoa
Maria Beatriz Martinez
Maria Concepcion Mulino
Maria Fatima Soares
Maria Gabriela Hernandez
Maria Luisa Ortega
María Paris
Maria Teresa Belandria
Maria Teresa Perez
Maria Teresa Romero
Marianela Fernandez
Mariela Magallanes
Mary Mora Morales
Mary Ponte
Mauglimer Baloa
Mauro Zambrano
Mayela Carrillo
Milagro Paz Fuenmayor

Milagros Sánchez Eulate
Mildred Carrero
Nano Avila
Nelson Dordelly
Nirma Guarulla
Nora Bracho
Ofelia Alvarez Cardiee
Olivia Lozano
Omar Barboza
Oneida Guaipe
Pedro Pablo Peñaloza
Piero Maround
Rafael Guzmán
Rafael Veloz
Ricardo Aponte
Ricardo Racini
Richard Mardo
Roberto Marrero
Roberto Patino
Rodrigo Campos
Romel Guzamana
Rosa Petit
Rosmit Mantilla
Sandra Flores
Sergio Garrido
Sergio Vergara
Sevy DiCione
Sonia Medina
Tamara Adrian
Teodoro Campos
Tomas Guanipa
Tomas Saez
Tony Geara
Verónica Arvelo
Verónica Colina Rivas
Verusca Hernández
Virgilio Ferrer
William Barrientos
Yolibel del Valle
Yolima Arellano
Rafael Ramirez
Avilio Troconis

Organizaciones / Organizations

A.C. Consorcio, Desarrollo y Justicia
Acción Positiva
Ave Mujeres
Cauce
Centro de Investigación Social Formación y Estudios de la Mujer (CISFEM)
CEPAZ
Cerlas
Empoderame
EmpoderaRSE
Entretejidas
Feminismo INC
Frente Amplio de Mujeres
FreyaCh
Fundación para la Prevención de la Violencia contra las Mujeres (Fundamujer)
Fundación Vayalo
Hombres por la Equidad e Igualdad

Mujer y Ciudadanía
Mujeres para el Mundo
Mujeres Radio Net
Mujeres sin Fronteras
NIMD
No Permitas Malos Tratos
Nosotras por Todas
Observatorio Venezolano de Derechos Humanos de las Mujeres
Red Naranja
Red Sororidad – Pacto Entre Ellas Venezuela
Red Venezolanas Globales
Redac
Reunificados
Sin Mordaza
ULA Mujer
Voces Vitales

Apoya la propuesta de acciones iniciales como resultado de la Cumbre de Mujeres por Venezuela y suscríbete en el formulario:

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El Centro para América Latina Adrienne Arsht amplía la comprensión de las transformaciones regionales y propone soluciones constructivas para informar como los sectores públicos y privados pueden promover la prosperidad en el hemisferio.

Entienda más

The post Declaración por la igualdad de género en el proceso de construcción de la democracia y la paz en Venezuela appeared first on Atlantic Council.

#BritainDebrief – What future for Northern Ireland? A Debrief with Kellie Armstrong MLA

Ben Judah — Sun, 22 May 2022 20:20:15 +0000

What future for Northern Ireland?

As Stormont remains paralyzed by the Democratic Unionist Party’s refusal to nominate a new speaker, Senior Fellow Ben Judah spoke with Kellie Armstrong, Alliance MLA for Strangford, to discuss how the crisis may be defused. How has Northern Irish society changed since the Troubles? Is a more liberal Northern Ireland emerging?

You can watch #BritainDebrief on YouTube and as a podcast on Apple Podcasts and Spotify.

Explore the #BritainDebrief series

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The post #BritainDebrief – What future for Northern Ireland? A Debrief with Kellie Armstrong MLA appeared first on Atlantic Council.

For Finland, the Cold War never ended. That’s why it’s ready for NATO.

Paul R.S. Gebhard — Fri, 20 May 2022 08:00:00 +0000

This article is part of the Transatlantic Security Initiative’s Stronger with Allies series, which charts the course forward for the Alliance in conjunction with the 2022 NATO Summit.

Since its founding, NATO’s key challenge has been ensuring that its members have the military means to fulfill their political commitments to each other. With Finland, which filed its application along with Sweden this week, the Alliance can rest easy: The Nordic nation not only meets the threshold criteria of defense capability for membership, but exceeds it.

The country’s experience since it secured independence from Russia in 1918 has forged a national policy of defense and resilience that would make it both a net contributor to Alliance security and a model for other NATO nations. For Finland, the Cold War never really ended; whereas many in the West divide the late twentieth century into the Cold War and post-Cold War periods, history there is not so easily parsed. Today, the Finns defend an 830-mile border with Russia—the same one with which they gained independence, then successfully defended through sheer force of national will during the Winter War with the Soviet Union.

In response to the reality of Finland’s geographic position, the Finns have developed a clear eyed, determined perspective. As a Finnish diplomat put it to me: “We are concerned, but not afraid.”

That mindset was translated into policy. When the Cold War ended, the United States and its NATO allies slashed their defense budgets, ended conscription, and reduced their total armed forces to cash in their peace dividends. But Finland never had that luxury. Reliant on its own resources for its national security, its defense spending as a percentage of gross domestic product (GDP) has, on average, been remarkably consistent for the last fifty years. It reduced its active-duty military force from 39,000 in 1989 to 23,000 today, but retained its policy of universal conscription for males over 18. It also increased its ability to field a fully equipped force through rapid mobilization from 250,000 to 280,000.

More recently, Finland embarked on a campaign to modernize its fighter aircraft. Last November, the government announced that it would spend nearly ten billion dollars over eight years on sixty-four F-35 fighter jets—a figure more than three times the size of Finland’s entire annual defense budget at the time. Given this investment, the country’s defense budget will exceed the NATO target of 2 percent of GDP and, at 46 percent, will be well above the (arguably more salient) 20 percent target for defense funding on procurement. Shortly after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, Finland appropriated a more than two-billion-dollar, multi-year fund to accelerate procurement of defense materiel. This funding will push Finland’s defense spending even further above NATO’s targets.

Strong people, sound policy

Throughout the Cold War and thereafter, Finland spent around 1.5 percent of its GDP on defense—a seemingly low amount, given the challenge of providing security for a country of 5.5 million that neighbors Russia, which has a population more than twenty-five times as large. Its answer was to develop a policy of national resilience articulated as Comprehensive Security.

It brings to bear all elements of society—business, education, civil society, the national government, and the armed forces—with the objective of preserving Finnish society in the event of an attack from Russia. Enabled by its policy of universal conscription, the country has developed a nationwide plan for national economic and military mobilization that extends throughout society. Should Finland be attacked, the thinking goes, the entire nation goes to war.

Finland is able to mobilize rapidly to become one of the largest military forces in Europe, putting 5 percent of its population under arms. By comparison, the United States military accounts for only 0.6 percent of the population when fully mobilized; in France, the United Kingdom, and Germany, that figure hovers around roughly 0.3 percent. Already impressive on its own, the Finnish ratio underestimates the full force of the national mobilization of all aspects of society and the economy as represented by the Comprehensive Security policy.

Politically, Finland boasts a robust, multi-party democratic establishment that is firmly grounded in a social spirit of consensus. For the past forty years, its parties have led multi-party coalition governments and have peacefully traded national leadership seven times for an average tenure of 5.7 years—of which none has held control for fewer than three years, and none for longer than eight years.

This kind of relative stability, consensus, and national commitment to defense, has helped prepare Finland for this moment. Against the backdrop of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, some NATO members are playing catch-up with their defense spending by attempting to recoup underinvestment over the past three decades. These are crucial developments that, if carried through, will strengthen the Alliance significantly.

But Finland has little need to play catch-up: It has persevered for decades on its own, protecting its national security—and now NATO has the opportunity to benefit.

Paul Gebhard is a nonresident senior fellow at the Atlantic Council’s Scowcroft Center for Strategy and Security and a vice president at the Cohen Group in Washington, DC.

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Event Recap: “Cooperation in the Arctic: Ways forward in a Changed Security Environment”

Eric Adamson — Thu, 19 May 2022 08:05:33 +0000

On April 28th, 2022, the Atlantic Council’s Northern Europe office, in cooperation with the US Embassy Stockholm, held the conference “Cooperation in the Arctic: Ways forward in a Changed Security Environment.”

Convening as Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine entered its third month, the future of Arctic governance was in question. Joint research projects on climate change had been put on hold, diplomatic ties in the Arctic Council temporarily paused, local cross-border trade stopped under economic sanctions, and NATO’s northern most borders were about to be reshaped by the expected Swedish and Finnish application to the Alliance.

Swedish Foreign Minister Ann Linde stated in her keynote address that “it is still too early to fully comprehend the wider consequences of Russia’s aggression, but there is a before the 24^th of February and an after the 24^th of February—including for the Arctic.” She underlined that “Sweden remain[ed] committed to the Arctic Council as the preeminent forum for Arctic Cooperation” and its partners had an interest in contributing to “sustainable, stable, and a prosperous Arctic.” However, the Arctic’s history of low tension and international cooperation could not be taken for granted. “The global geostrategic situation affects the region,” Foreign Minister Linde said. “The Arctic has resumed its military strategic importance.”

However, even before the war in Ukraine, Arctic governance had been put to the test as the region continued to undergo an unprecedented transformation.

Rising temperatures and melting ice caps had created potential opportunities but also put local societies at risk. Greater access to hard-to-reach resources, such as oil and gas, could grow local economies but increased the risk of environmental disaster. Warmer weather had the potential for year-round shipping but put stress on indigenous livelihoods. Infrastructure development could improve the quality of life for local communities but also be used for military purposes. For every upside of a changing Arctic there was a serious downside.

Given all these challenges, how could Arctic states navigate the changed security environment? The tension between the need for international cooperation and governance, while protecting national interests as great power competition increased, was of central concern. Panelists were split on whether Arctic governance could and should continue as it had before February 24^th or if an Ice Curtain would divide the region into a US-European Arctic and a Sino-Russian Arctic.

The Changing Setting in the Arctic

Arctic Ambassador of Sweden Louise Calais described the Arctic as a “donut,” with the eight Arctic states surrounding the Arctic Sea. Each Arctic state had a sovereign right to their portion of the donut. It was the “donut-hole,” the empty space with growing navigational access, where non-Arctic states had an interest in gaining a foothold in the region and challenging the exclusivity and norms of Arctic governance.

The Ambassador made clear that none of the Nordic states have taken Arctic cooperation for granted—it was a conscious choice. Despite the “Arctic Seven” (Sweden, Denmark, Norway, Finland, Canada, Iceland and, the United States) “temporarily pausing participation in all meetings of the Council and its subsidiary bodies” in response to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the Ambassador believed it was too early to draw any long-term conclusions about the war’s implications for the Arctic.

How Arctic Council projects would continue without Russia’s involvement was a difficult balancing act. Yet, the Ambassador was confident that, with a mindful approach, many projects could be implemented without Russia and that the Arctic Council would reconvene at a future date.

The Arctic Security Officer at the US Department of State, Kathleen Larkin, argued that Arctic “exceptionalism,” the notion that the Arctic is a unique region of peace and cooperation unaffected by global security developments, did not exist and never had. Geopolitical threats simply did not disappear north of the Arctic Circle. Low tensions had been a direct result of a strong, rules-based international order. Now, as Moscow and Beijing sought to reshape the international order, Arctic governance was also being challenged. These changing geopolitical dynamics had recalibrated US policy from cooperation and collaboration towards a greater focus on security and great power competition.

Timo Koivurova, Professor of Arctic Governance at the University of Lapland, argued that the thesis of Arctic “exceptionalism” had been tested since 2014. Important to remember, however, was that there were no real dangers arising from the Arctic itself; there were no clear Russian military objectives for the Arctic in and of itself.

Rasmus Bertelsen, Professor of Northern Studies & Barents Chair in Politics at the Arctic University of Norway argued that the Arctic reflect the rest of the world order. During the Cold War, there was an “Ice Curtain” with very little cooperation between Soviet Arctic and the European and North American Arctic. After the collapse of the Soviet Union, Arctic governance reflected American global hegemony. Now, the unipolar moment was coming to an end.

Professor Bertelsen expected the coming global Sino-American polarity to be reflected in the Arctic with an American and European order vs a Russian and Chinese order. The re-establishment of the Ice Curtain was occurring much faster than expected due to a breakdown of the European security order over events in Ukraine. The Arctic Council, the professor argued, “was dead and gone.”

Military Dimensions of the Arctic

From a military-strategic perspective, described Niklas Granholm, Deputy Director of Studies at the Swedish Defense Research Agency (FOI), the Euro-Atlantic Arctic did not stop at 66.33 degrees north but stretched down through the British Isles. For Russia, the nuclear forces on the Kola Peninsula were an existential capability and Moscow had committed significant resources to protect these assets and create a sea-denial zone. Russian naval and military buildup inside the Arctic therefore had affects far beyond the polar circle.

Conversely, Russia’s war in Ukraine had impacted security in the Arctic, said Commander Stefan Lundqvist, Director of Studies & Military Lecturer at the Swedish Defense University. The war had pushed Sweden and Finland towards NATO, with the potential to reshape the alliance’s northernmost border. Moreover, the lack of dialogue on the military and political levels had increased the risk of misinterpretation, unintended escalation, and accidents.

One potential source of conflict was the Northern Sea Route, a heavily fortified and key national interest of Russia. Due to conflicting claims to the route, there was a need to reestablish dialogue from a position of strength, with increased deterrence capabilities and situational awareness. The commander noted, however, that Russia had interfered less in the March 2022 Cold Response exercise than in previous years. There was disagreement on whether this was signaling the intention to maintain low tensions in the Arctic or simply due to a lack of capacity with forces tied down in Ukraine.

In response to increased great power competition in the Arctic, the US, UK, and France had all adapted their Arctic strategies to improve force capabilities and presence in the region, said Anna Wieslander, Director for Northern Europe at the Atlantic Council. The UK, while not an Arctic state, had been playing a more active role as a security provider in the North Atlantic with the West having major interests in safeguarding the GIUK gap, a strategic access point for the Russian Northern Fleet. France, a major European actor but non-Arctic state, had emphasized that any threat to stability and security in the Arctic would affect French interests, such as energy security and access to minerals critical to the high-tech defense sector.

The United States, as an Arctic state and governing member of the Arctic Council, had become increasingly vocal on Russian and Chinese activities and military presence in the region. The US had therefore updated its Arctic strategy, first adopted in 2013, to enhance national and economic security while the Air Force, Navy, and Army had all begun implementing Arctic strategies to improve multidomain operations and deterrence capabilities.

A new security order without Russia was being built, concluded Niklas Granholm.

Adapting Multilateral Formats to the Changing Arctic

It had become clear that the Arctic’s future risked becoming both more complicated and uncertain. Just a few short months prior, Petteri Vuorimäki, Finnish Ambassador for the Arctic and Antarctic Affairs, was a staunch defender of constructive cooperation with Russia in the Arctic Council. As late as December, he had taken part in a productive Arctic Council meeting in Russia. Under current circumstances, however, partaking in such meetings was impossible.

The statement made by the Arctic Seven pausing work was carefully constructed and balanced, with the ambassador remaining a believer in the importance of the Arctic Council and the good it has produced since its establishment in 1996: From groundbreaking reports on the impact of climate change to providing the only format for indigenous peoples to be represented in equal partnership with the other nations involved.

If Arctic nations lost sight of the issues of climate change, environmental protection, sustainable development, and indigenous rights, the region would be completely dominated by security concerns, making life in the Arctic very difficult.

For Marie-Anne Coninsx, Senior Associate Fellow at the Egmont Institute and former EU Ambassador at Large for Arctic Affairs, a dual-track approach towards Russia (i.e. cooperating on issues of shared interest while isolating in others) was no longer an option. Moscow could not be relied on for anything, including cooperation on non-sensitive issues such as climate change.

Moving forward, Ambassador Coninsx saw two solutions for the future of Arctic governance. First was to strengthen cooperation between “the willing” (i.e. Western nations). Second was to adapt multilateral forums and international organizations. With the Arctic Council on pause, there was an opportunity to adapt governance structures to include friendly partners. Additionally, NATO and the EU could no longer ignore security on their Northern frontiers.

In the short- to medium-term, the chance of spill-over from Ukraine to the Arctic was very low, argued Chris Skaluba, Director of the Transatlantic Security Initiative at the Atlantic Council. Russia had little capacity to escalate with forces tied down in Ukraine.

More long-term, the situation had changed completely. Recent statements by the US indicated that “there is no way back until Putin is off the stage.” The longer the current standoff went on, the more fundamental the changes would be for the Arctic. If the conflict lasted another 10 years, for example, the Arctic Council would be “done.”

Ambassador Vuromäki did not agree that everything had changed. Finland still had a 1300 kilometer border with Russia, the Arctic remained existentially important for Russia, and climate change had not disappeared.

Concluding Remarks

The Arctic Council had contributed to the region’s peace, stability, and predictability, said US Deputy Chief of Mission Pamela Tremont. The pausing of the Council’s work had “shaken us to our core,” as the West considered what Russia’s war in Ukraine meant for security structures. Putin could not be allowed use mechanisms such as the Arctic Council to demonstrate that he was a respected leader with status in the world. A clear message needed to be sent to the Russian people over the unacceptability of events in Ukraine and it was simply impossible to go on with business as usual.

“Temporarily paused” was a very deliberate choice of words. It was neither a withdrawal nor an attempt to reconstitute the Arctic Council, but a pause in light of events in Ukraine. The US remained committed to the Arctic Council and would work with like-minded partners to ensure the promotion of indigenous rights and representation, climate research, economic development, and international security cooperation would continue.

This publication was made possible through support provided by the United States Department of State, under the terms of Award No. SSW80021GR3001. The opinions expressed herein are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of the United States Department of State.

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Nia quoted in the Middle East Eye on legal accountability mechanisms for Shireen Abu Akleh

Atlantic Council — Fri, 13 May 2022 13:20:00 +0000

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‘A nation where hundreds of thousands fight and millions help.’ Read President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s tribute to the people of Ukraine.

Atlantic Council — Thu, 12 May 2022 00:34:17 +0000

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy delivered a special video message at the Atlantic Council’s 2022 Distinguished Leadership Awards, which included an award for the Ukrainian people. Watch his moving address and read the full transcript below.

Flagship Event Wed, May 11, 2022 • 7:00 pm ET

2022 Distinguished Leadership Awards

This year’s edition of the Atlantic Council’s premier gala honored Italian Prime Minister Mario Draghi, business leader Claudio Descalzi, Ukrainian singer Jamala, and the Ukrainian people for their commitment to the Council’s mission of shaping the global future together.

Ladies and gentlemen, on behalf of all Ukrainians, I would like to thank you for this award. It is a fair and correct gesture to honor with this award all the people of Ukraine, because courage is our national trait of character.

Today the whole world witnesses this and admires the heroism of Ukrainians. At the same time, I want it not to become something ordinary for everyone. And for this we must say and remember that behind the courage and wisdom of our people, there are thousands of real stories, names, and heroic feats. The world should know about them and to have a clear idea and understanding about the people of Ukraine.

First of all, we are the nation of the best defenders. These are our ground forces, air and naval forces, airborne-assault troops, special operations forces, the National Guard, intelligence, border guards, and territorial-defense fighters. This is Vitalii Skakun, who blew up a bridge, sacrificing himself to stop a column of Russian tanks. This is twenty-one-year-old lieutenant Vitalii Sapilo, who neutralized thirty units of equipment of the enemy and died from an air strike. Serhiy Pantelyuk, who was injured while repelling the attack and died at the hospital while his first daughter was being born. These are the border guards of Zmiinyi Island who were not afraid of the flagship of the Russian fleet—the cruiser Moskva—and sent a Russian ship in a direction that became world-famous. These are the indomitable defenders of Mariupol and Azovstal, who have been holding the line there for several months. These are all our fighters who died defending Ukraine, hence defending Europe. I would like to ask you to honor their memory with a moment of silence.

Thank you. The Ukrainian people are people who do not spare themselves for the sake of others. This is combat medic Diana Kukurudziak, who pulled sixteen wounded soldiers off the battlefield in one day. Paramedic Serhiy Chernobryvets in Mariupol, who has been on duty for twenty-two days since the beginning of the war. The Ukrainian people are a nation of courageous children. This is eleven-year-old Maksym, who said nothing to his mother, ran away from home, and came to ask for permission to be a part of territorial defense. This is seven-year-old Varya from Kropyvnytskyi, who gave her money saved for a smartphone to buy bulletproof vests, and then sold flowers and drawings. This is a fifteen-year-old girl from the Luhansk region who was driving a car with shot legs and took out four wounded. A fifteen-year-old boy who carried his wounded mother in his arms for three kilometers to the evacuation point.

Our people are also elderly people who have experienced too many ordeals. This is Borys Romanchenko, who passed through the hell of Buchenwald and died at the age of ninety-six at home during the shelling of Kharkiv by the Russian Federation. This is Vanda Ibedkova, who was a child hiding in the basement, survived the Holocaust and the Nazi occupation in Mariupol, saw the second occupation of the city in 2014, and the third this year. At the age of ninety-one, she had to hide in the basement again where she died on the fortieth day of the war. This is eighty-seven-year-old Halyna Kotubey from the Mykolaiv region, who remained the only and last resident of her village but refused to leave.

The Ukrainian people are a nation where hundreds of thousands fight and millions help. This is a business that has shifted to the needs of the country. Clothing designers sew military uniforms, restaurateurs feed free lunches, bakeries bake bread for IDPs [internally displaced persons] and lonely people. This is a university professor who continues to lecture to his students in the trenches. A violinist playing for people during an air alarm in a bomb shelter. These are civilians of Ukrainian cities and villages, who became a living wall on the way of the occupiers—stopping military machines and turning tanks in the opposite direction. These are inhabitants of Demydivka, who flooded their own village not to let the occupier into Kyiv. Those who despite threats, shots, and stun grenades go to peaceful rallies, reminding the occupants that this is Ukraine: Kherson, Melitopol, Berdyansk, Enerhodar, Mariupol and all the other cities and villages of Ukraine occupied not for a long time.

These are millions of Ukrainians who are now defending their homeland and the whole world. Do not be afraid and come to Ukraine. Hear thousands of similar stories about us, Ukrainians. Look into their brave eyes, shake their strong hands, and you will see that they are doing all this not for glory, that they need not only awards, but also concrete help and support. Weapons, equipment, financial support, sanctions on Russia, and the most important: the feeling that in this difficult struggle, they are not alone, that they are supported by you, by the whole world—free states and free nations of our planet. Thank you for your attention! Thank you for your support! Thank you for the award! And welcome to Ukraine!

Watch the video

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The Hill covered the Israel Initiative’s event with Ambassador to Israel, Thomas R. Nides

Atlantic Council — Thu, 05 May 2022 14:20:00 +0000

original source

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Brahimi in Carnegie Middle East Center: The Lebanese Armed Forces and its leadership have taken a conscious decision to give women much more important roles

Atlantic Council — Thu, 05 May 2022 13:44:00 +0000

original source

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Video message from Michael R. Bloomberg

elardizabal — Tue, 03 May 2022 15:07:47 +0000

Michael R. Blomberg, Founder of Bloomberg LP & Bloomberg Philanthropies and Chair of the Climate Finance Leadership Initiative (CFLI), discusses environment and climate mitigation cooperation between Colombia and the United States.

On June 1st, the Adrienne Arsht Latin America Center published its first book Allies: Twenty-Seven Bold Ideas to Reimagine the US-Colombia Relationship. To view book contents and watch more visual essays, click here.

May 26, 2022

Allies: Twenty-seven bold ideas to reimagine the US-Colombia relationship

As the United States and Colombia celebrate 200 years of diplomatic relations, it is time to think boldly and creatively about the future of this strategic partnership.

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Allies: Video by Carlos Vives

Carlos Vives — Tue, 03 May 2022 14:59:57 +0000

Carlos Vives, singer-songwriter, actor, businessman, and member of the Adrienne Arsht Latin America Center’s Advisory Council, discusses cooperation in the arts between Colombia and the United States.

On June 1st, the Adrienne Arsht Latin America Center published its first book Allies: 28 Bold Ideas to Reimagine the US-Colombia Relationship. To view book contents and watch more visual essays, click here.

May 26, 2022

Allies: Twenty-seven bold ideas to reimagine the US-Colombia relationship

As the United States and Colombia celebrate 200 years of diplomatic relations, it is time to think boldly and creatively about the future of this strategic partnership.

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Khoury quoted in Politics Today on Emirati-Israeli relations amidst aggression in Jerusalem and Arab public opinion on normalization

Atlantic Council — Sun, 01 May 2022 13:17:00 +0000

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Arbit quoted in The Dispatch on escalations in the Palestinian-Israeli conflict

Atlantic Council — Wed, 27 Apr 2022 22:13:00 +0000

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Ferziger in the Jewish Insider: Israeli defense chief hosts Iftar for Arab ambassadors

Atlantic Council — Tue, 26 Apr 2022 11:59:00 +0000

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Farrand quoted in Qantara on Algerian pushback against French language

Atlantic Council — Mon, 25 Apr 2022 22:04:00 +0000

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Episode 1: “Living in the Arctic”

rcasberg — Fri, 22 Apr 2022 15:09:43 +0000

Anu Fredriksson, Executive Director for Arctic Frontiers, gives a local perspective on living in the Arctic. “There is a danger of our stories being sidetracked,” Ms. Fredriksson said. As climate change and global powers reshape the Arctic, “people of the Arctic will need to have a say in the development of our region. And what we are experiencing at times, is that we struggle to get our own stories across.”

Anu is originally from Oulu in Northern Finland and has worked with Arctic issues for over a decade. She has previously served as Director at the Arctic Economic Council and as an Arctic Policy Advisory at the Finnish Embassy in Norway.

more episodes

europe center

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Asat mentioned in iNews on Saudi Arabia’s deportation of Uyghur migrants to China

Atlantic Council — Wed, 20 Apr 2022 20:13:00 +0000

original source

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Farrand quoted in Sued Deutsche on changing views on French language in Algeria

Atlantic Council — Wed, 20 Apr 2022 20:09:00 +0000

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Nia joins the Associated Press to discuss the classification of crimes in Ukraine as a ‘genocide’

Atlantic Council — Tue, 19 Apr 2022 19:59:00 +0000

original source

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Qaddour joins the Mehdi Hasan Show to discuss similarities between Russian aggression in Ukraine and Syria

Atlantic Council — Thu, 14 Apr 2022 13:39:00 +0000

original source

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Heat pumps and tipping points: Weaning the world off Russian energy

Laurie Laybourn — Fri, 08 Apr 2022 15:19:32 +0000

For years, climate activists have called for a war-like mobilization to drive a rapid transition to clean energy. Today, these demands have taken on a new urgency: Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has been a relentless demonstration of just how much fossil fuels threaten the world’s shared security.

The brutality of Russia’s military, the Kremlin’s leverage over NATO, and the resulting global impact of the crisis have, to a large extent, all been made possible by the fossil fuels powering Russian President Vladimir Putin’s war. Most recently, Josep Borrell, the European Union’s (EU’s) foreign policy chief, pointed out that while the EU has sent one billion dollars in aid to Ukraine, it spends roughly that same amount each day on fossil fuel imports from Russia.

Just days after the invasion began, the connection between Russia’s fossil-fueled aggression and the climate crisis was underscored by the experience of Ukraine’s delegates to the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change—who had to break from finalizing a report to shelter from bombs. “Climate change and the war on Ukraine have,” said Ukrainian climate scientist Svitlana Krakovska, a member of the delegation, “the same roots: fossil fuels, and our dependence on them.”

The transatlantic reliance on fossil fuels can—and must—be broken.

For their part, the United States, United Kingdom, and EU are united in recognizing the need to wean themselves off Russian oil and gas. Their strategies have three broad components: phase out or ban imports from Russia and make up the shortfall from (expensive) non-Russian sources; reduce energy use through increasing insulation and other efficiency measures; and rapidly increase clean-energy investments to replace fossil fuels entirely.

But this course faces big political hurdles, especially because it will take time to rally a crash mobilization of clean energy and insulation. So fossil fuels will bridge the gap: Europe will import more gas from the United States to make up for the Russian shortfall, and coal power plants slated for decommissioning may see their lifespan extended.

For one, this provides Western oil and gas majors with an opportunity to leverage their position, acting as energy saviors in the short-term, while seeking to water down the longer-term green transition. These firms have always excelled at influencing political agendas, exercising their vast lobbying power to slow the shift toward clean energy. Recent years have seen the political tide turn against them, but Russia’s war may open up fresh opportunities for fossil CEOs.

Meanwhile, living standards are nosediving because of rising fuel prices, with households already hurting from the knock-on effects of the COVID-19 pandemic. A group I would call “fossil populists” are exploiting this opportunity: These are influential politicians who rose to prominence in the culture wars of the past decade and are using their anti-elite playbook to call for a fossil-fueled solution to the energy crisis.

In the United Kingdom, for example, the leading pro-Brexit politician (and now broadcaster) Nigel Farage is recasting himself in this mold, using high gas prices to call for a reboot of Britain’s moribund fracking industry and campaigning for a referendum on the government’s climate target of net-zero emissions by 2050. Neither of these demands makes economic, political, or environmental sense—but in a time of hardship for millions, the Brexit-inspired language of suffering people versus out-of-touch elites is as familiar as it could be persuasive.

Smart politics—and policymaking

These threats can be neutralized by putting households first. Just as many European countries offered emergency support to families during the pandemic, future investments in insulation and clean energy should target households on the frontline of the squeeze. The energy war can be won by giving people warm homes, cheap bills, and security of supply.

Environmentalist Bill McKibben’s idea of “heat pumps for peace and freedom” is an example of how this can be done. Harking back to the Lend-Lease arrangements of World War II, the US government could provide guaranteed federal contracts for heat pump manufacturers in the United States to rapidly increase production and provide these at, or below, cost to European nations.

The International Energy Agency estimates that rolling out heat pumps could cut Europe’s reliance on Russia gas by two billion cubic meters (bcm) in just one year, all while building longer term energy security. Since European manufacturers have limited capacity to meet a massive increase in supply, the shortfall could be made up by US manufacturers: President Joe Biden could bypass Congress and use the Defense Production Act to provide loans and purchasing guarantees to heat-pump producers (much like his predecessor did when mandating ventilator production in response to COVID-19).

This would be smart politics, reflecting the abrupt convergence of shared agendas across the Atlantic: the geopolitical necessity to stand up to Putin, the geoeconomic effort to slow his war machine, and the environmental imperative to reduce emissions. It would also provide clear gains to households, attenuating the siren call of fossil populism. No wonder the White House is reportedly interested.

Even more so, it would be smart policymaking. Targeted investment and acceleration in production can help trigger “tipping points,” an abrupt change in the price of technologies and their maturity in markets. For example, Norway has used its tax system to make electric vehicles cheaper than petrol alternatives, leading to electrics surging to become a majority of new car sales in 2020.

Tipping points can also be intentionally triggered to phase out unwanted technologies. In the 2010s, for instance, the British government helped increase the cost of energy production from coal, pushing it above the price of using gas, which—along with the falling price of renewables—eventually made coal plants unprofitable. As a result, coal use collapsed 75 percent in five years.

So far, tipping points have largely been identified and triggered by individual countries. But a transatlantic plan to rapidly roll out heat pumps could accelerate tipping points: reductions in the price of heat pumps, their widespread rollout, and a collapse in the use of gas boilers.

This principle can be applied to a raft of other technologies where the US has a lead over Europe in development and production, particularly grid-scale batteries.

The benefits wouldn’t stop there. A surge in the production and installation of clean technology would bring millions of high-quality jobs in the United States and Europe. Meanwhile, reductions in the cost of clean technologies would spill over into international markets, helping other countries gain access to cheaper alternatives to fossil fuels. This is a pressing need for lower income nations that are on the frontline of the climate crisis and need support to ditch fossil fuels.

The events of the past two months, as well as the growing threat of the climate crisis, are tragic proof of the necessity to aggressively decarbonize. The transatlantic community should seize on this historic opportunity for a definitive shift to a safer, more secure future.

Laurie Laybourn is a visiting fellow at Chatham House and leads the Cohort 2040 project, which explores how emerging leaders can be prepared for a future of deepening environmental crisis. Follow him on Twitter @Laurie_L_L.

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Brooks in the Washington Post on the threat of disease in Ukraine

Atlantic Council — Tue, 05 Apr 2022 19:22:00 +0000

original source

On April 5, Forward Defense nonresident senior fellow Max Brooks co-authored an article in the Washington Post with Lionel Beehner and John Spencer, titled, “Opinion: Ukrainians should be on the lookout for a new battlefield enemy: Disease.” The authors discuss the threat of disease outbreak and biological warfare in Ukraine, and recommend emergency sanitation supplies and hygiene manuals to build up resilience.

If we want to help the Ukrainian resistance, we shouldn’t be sending them only Javelins and body armor.
Max Brooks, Lionel Beehner, and John Spencer in the Washington Post

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Farrand joins Undispatch to discuss recent civilian unrest in Algeria and Algeria’s political future

Atlantic Council — Thu, 31 Mar 2022 19:07:00 +0000

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Marczak quoted in the Boston Globe on using oil as leverage to restore democracy in Venezuela

Angela Chavez — Tue, 29 Mar 2022 18:57:11 +0000

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These island governments are racing to combat climate change amid sea-level rise

Atlantic Council — Tue, 29 Mar 2022 16:38:16 +0000

Watch the full event

Flagship event Mon, March 28, 2022 • 1:30 pm ET

2022 Global Energy Forum

The Atlantic Council Global Energy Forum is the premier international gathering of government, industry, and thought leaders to set the energy agenda for the year. This year’s event took place on March 28-29, 2022 in Dubai.

Event transcript

Uncorrected transcript: Check against delivery

Speakers

H.E. Wavel Ramkalawan
President, Republic of Seychelles

H.E. Gaston Browne
Prime Minister, Antigua and Barbuda

H.E. Aiminth Shauna
Minister of Environment, Climate Change & Technology, Maldives

Moderator

Eleni Giokos, Anchor and Correspondent, CNN

ELENI GIOKOS: Thank you so much. A very good morning to all of you. Fantastic to be with you today.

My name is Eleni Giokos. I’m an anchor and correspondent at CNN. And we’re here to discuss one of the most vital topics not only facing humanity, but also ensuring that even during times of unprecedented crises that might come unknowingly we still have to focus on climate change and the agenda at hand.

We know that last year we spoke about red alert, the incredible urgency to ensure that we don’t take our eye off the ball when it comes to the devastating effects on climate change. And importantly, it’s the most vulnerable communities around the world that are bearing the brunt, most of which have not industrialized yet. And yet, they have to be at the forefront of renewable energy, of decarbonization, and they’re paying an enormous price.

So the question is: Where to from here as we start to divert attention to security issues, for example, geopolitical issues, the concerns about food insecurity and inflation that has now hit most people’s shores?

I’d like to now welcome our guests.

His Excellency Wavel Ramkalawan, the president of the Republic of Seychelles. Please come onstage. A round of applause for His Excellency.

His Excellency Gaston Browne, prime minister of Antigua and Barbuda. Thank you so much.

And Her Excellency Aminath Shauna, minister of environment, climate change, and technology at Maldives.

Welcome. Fantastic to have you with us. I’m really delighted that you could make it today and give us a sense of why we are still in the middle of a devastating situation when it comes to climate change, and all of you are at the coalface. You’re at the forefront of the impact and effects.

I’d like to cast our minds back to a pledge that was made over a decade ago that richer and wealthier nations that are industrialized would be spending over $100 billion in investing in smaller and developing economies to help with the energy transition. And the question is, has that been done? We know that after COP we realized that a lot of the money that was put on the table never really materialized.

So I’d like to start with you, Your Excellency. Seychelles has been very vocal about the impacts, about what this means for your future, and I want you to give me an idea of where we stand today. You know, after Glasgow, lots of pledges and lots of things being sort of signed. Are you seeing anything moving the needle right now?

PRESIDENT WAVEL RAMKALAWAN: Thank you very much. The answer is no. We are still living in high hopes that the pledges will be—will be accomplished. But unfortunately, well, we had Paris, then Glasgow, and the commitments keep being reinforced but, unfortunately, the results are not forthcoming.

And it is very important to note that as a small island developing state or as an oceanic state, we depend on others to help us. And one of the reasons—one of the reasons being that when you’re talking of climate change, we are not—we are not really damaging the planet. On the contrary, our emissions are low and it’s the industrialized nations that are doing all the harm. But on the other hand, we find ourselves mitigating the climate change. We find ourselves giving. And it’s always giving, but when it’s time to receive in order to protect our very—to protect ourselves—and when we say protection, we mean our very survival; I mean the masses that are being destroyed, the islands that are—that will soon no longer be. So we are a bit disappointed, to say—to put it mildly, very disappointed to put it the way it should be said, that the commitments are not –

ELENI GIOKOS: Are you angry? Are you angry that you’re not seeing that commitment on the table?

PRESIDENT WAVEL RAMKALAWAN: Oh, obviously, the anger—the anger is there because with all the—with all the talk, with all the loud speeches and everything else, but when you compare the reality –

ELENI GIOKOS: Yeah.

PRESIDENT WAVEL RAMKALAWAN:—it’s a totally different story.

ELENI GIOKOS: Prime Minister Browne, you have said that COP is just a PR exercise and it doesn’t really amount to anything on the ground. And I mentioned this—I alluded to this in the intro—that we had a red alert. We know that we’re in trouble. And yet, now we again are sitting with another crisis—other crisis that could divert attention. Do you think we’re going to take our eye off the ball here?

PRIME MINISTER GASTON BROWNE: Well, we have to remain resolute that climate change, which is the most significant existential threat facing the planet, that it remains at the forefront and that we continue to advocate for the phasing out of fossil fuels and for us to reduce global temperatures below 1.5 degrees in order to protect human civilization. There is no other priority. In fact, on the current trajectory we are literally facing a situation in which global temperatures could rise about 2.7 degrees, and at that point we could lose a significant portion of our biodiversity and human civilization globally would be impacted.

Unfortunately, small island states like Antigua and Barbuda, the Seychelles, and certainly Maldives and others, we are on the frontlines. So we will be the first to go, but certainly others will follow. So notwithstanding the current instability of the situation with petroleum shortages and so on, we have to remain very resolute in our ambition to cut emissions and to control global temperatures in order not to imperil human civilization.

ELENI GIOKOS: Minister Shauna, we have spoken before and we actually spoke ahead of Glasgow last year. We’re heading to COP in Egypt and we’re hoping to see again some kind of commitment. Some people are feeling very disheartened in terms of what we’re going to be facing in the next year in terms of global instability. We have heard the energy security issue could mean that Europe might need to fire up old coal-fired powerplants, yet it’s accelerating the move towards renewables which will take some time. How are you reading into this situation?

MINISTER AMINATH SHAUNA: Thank you for having the frontline states in a conference such as this.

The Maldives, Seychelles, Antigua and Barbuda, we are all frontline states. And just months after COP-26, where we made incremental progress, we saw the report by the IPCC. AR6 was released and, unfortunately, it did not get the attention it deserved. And it very clearly states that unless we are able to keep global temperatures within 1.5 [degrees], countries like the Seychelles, Antigua and Barbuda, the Maldives, we are going to find it extremely challenging to continue to live in our island nations.

We are very large ocean states, and even in the Maldives we have observed at least about 4.5 inches of sea-level rise. We have observed 1.1 degrees of temperature increases in the Maldives. Our survival, our food, our revenue all depends on ocean resources. If we continue to emit as business as usual, we might—it’s not just us. We are all in this together. It’s not just small island states, but Europe is already experiencing extreme weather events, floods, and they will continue to experience these changes as well. But we are frontline states, so see us as just the first wave of the impacts of it. But it’s coming to everyone, all of us.

ELENI GIOKOS: And this is a big conversation. You know, you’ve got to focus on industrialization, specifically for developing economies that haven’t had the chance to industrialize so therefore they haven’t been the biggest contributors to what we’re seeing right now. So when you have a country that has an abundance of coal, the question is, what does it do? Does it burn it or not? A question was posed to the minister of energy from Saudi Arabia and we heard his answer that he is pro using coal and any fossil fuel that might be available to any country. Mr. President, what’s your reaction to that?

PRESIDENT WAVEL RAMKALAWAN: Well, I must say I was rather surprised to hear such a statement because the world is talking about moving away from fossil fuel and especially burning coal, which is—which is known as the biggest contributor towards the negative effects of climate change.

You see, when such statements are made and when we are also at the same time pushing towards moving to sustainability and away from fossil fuel, we the small island states find ourselves in very difficult situations because not only we don’t have the landmass—I mean, when you—when you compare the three countries that we are talking of, Seychelles is just over 460 kilometers square, Barbuda just under. This morning I realized that we were even smaller than—well, you are smaller than us.

PRIME MINISTER GASTON BROWNE: Right.

PRESIDENT WAVEL RAMKALAWAN: And the Maldives—I mean, we don’t have the—we don’t have the landmass. And yet, we are the ones putting environment protection to the fore, and we are also being pushed to move towards using alternative sources of energy. And this costs a lot. So when those who are in the forefront of using fossil fuel make such statements, then we ask ourselves: What we are supposed to be doing?

And there, again, this is—this is where we go back to us working together as a planet. There’s only one planet. There’s only one planet, and it’s not good for one part to be saying something and for another part to be saying something else.

ELENI GIOKOS: And I have to say, you know, when we look at, for example, Africa, that still desperately needs to industrialize and it’s sitting with a very bad dilemma of having availability of fossil fuels, for example, and yet being put into sort of the same category as everyone else in the world—well, we all have to drop emissions by a certain percentage—Prime Minister, do you think that the richer countries, the countries that have fossil fuels that have industrialized for a long time, should be reducing emissions far more aggressively and still allowing economic development for the countries that need it most? Or do you think we are all in this together, we all have to be aggressive, there is no room to play around with?

PRIME MINISTER GASTON BROWNE: Well, you know, this threat is so significant that it requires an all-of-society approach. And it requires the commitment of all countries large and small, especially the industrialized countries, to reduce emissions and to help developing countries to transition away from the use of fossil-fuel energy and to adopt the new green-energy technologies. This is important, ultimately, to protect human civilization.

And I believe, too, that there are some who are putting, let’s say, livelihoods ahead of protecting lives. Now, clearly, if you’re not alive, they will not be able to protect the economy. So putting the economy ahead of the lives of individuals, I think that the priority is wrong and that ultimately you must understand the threat of climate change, that it represents the most significant threat to humanity and it must be given significant priority. All of the necessary resources should be made available to ensure that the transition can take place in an ordinary manner.

We’re not suggesting that we just transition overnight into fossil fuels—into green energy from fossil fuels. We recognize it will take time, but what is required at this point is greater commitment. I mean, evidently industrialized countries continue to game the system. They make pledges. They do not honor their pledges. We need to see greater commitment and we need to have a situation in which we put our common humanity above economies.

ELENI GIOKOS: Minister Shauna, why do you think we haven’t seen this commitment materialize into action and implementation by the wealthier nations? Can you hear me? Can’t hear me? I think my mic is failing. OK. Why do you think that we can’t—we haven’t seen the commitment made by wealthier nations materializing into action on the ground, where there’s been this reticence and hesitation despite the urgency?

MINISTER AMINATH SHAUNA: Well, developed countries need to take action on the commitments they’ve made, and I think that’s the smartest way to do it as well. And today we are here discussing at the World Government Summit what the future of the world should be, and this is the defining issue of our times. And we are the—we are the generation to be able to address this issue, as well. If we think that we can depend and continue to depend on fossil fuels to build our economies, it’s very wrong. That’s not the right way to do it. Today we are here as leaders to make the right decisions, not the convenient ones.

ELENI GIOKOS: So, Prime Minister, can you hear me? There we go. So we’re having a bit of a malfunction.

Prime Minister, when you hear the Total CEO saying we understand we’re in an energy insecurity situation with supply constraints that are emerging from oil and gas, specifically out of Russia, and then we hear, well, if you want us to help with the supply constraints we need 20-year commitments in investment so that we know that we’re secure in our investments, right, and we can help with the energy transition but we need to be more realistic about what the next 20 years mean because people have shareholder responsibilities, what did you think of that?

PRIME MINISTER GASTON BROWNE: Well, we know that the next decade is a critical decade to get it right, and I cannot see us conscionably agreeing to any significant new investments in fossil fuel energy because, in essence, it will result in significant warming of the planet and, as I said before, it will imperil human civilization.

Now, I understand the urgency to increase energy supplies. I understand increase in pricing. But at the same time, I’m quite sure that the industrialized nations that they have the capacity to further subsidize fossil fuels in the interim to drive down prices, not necessarily to subsidize it to sustain the production of fossil fuels because, ultimately, fossil fuel energy should stay in the ground. That is where it belongs.

ELENI GIOKOS: And for you, Mr. President, do you think the commitments that we’ve seen from oil-producing nations about decarbonization and transition, do you think they’re committed?

PRESIDENT WAVEL RAMKALAWAN: They say they are committed but the reality presents another picture, and here, again, we go back to COP-26, the commitments that have been made and what we, as small island developing states, are experiencing.

You see, again, when we put things in context, and here I’m talking about the African continent, the total emission from the whole of Africa is only 5 percent, and when other countries are saying they’re going to reduce their emissions by 5 percent or whatever percentage, we are not even producing what they will reduce. So this is where we need the serious conversation.

And we’ve been talking this morning about the new world order. So this is also part of the conversation. This new world order is not just about whether there’ll be more wars or what type of currency we’ll be using. As Prime Minister has just said—Prime Minister Browne—we may—we may be talking about all these grand ideas, but if at the end of the day the one planet that we have—planet A, which is planet Earth—is destroyed, then what is left for us?

ELENI GIOKOS: Let me ask you this. I mean, you’re talking about a new economic world order, a shift in powers. We don’t know how this crisis in Eastern Ukraine is going to play out. Do you think that climate will still be on the agenda in a rejigging of the world order?

PRESIDENT WAVEL RAMKALAWAN: Well, it should be and here may I say –

ELENI GIOKOS: But will it be? Because then we’re thinking about East-Southeast, East-East cooperation, Global South and East, China?

PRESIDENT WAVEL RAMKALAWAN: Well, you see, these are the questions that we ask ourselves because we are the less powerful, and when the powerful talk it’s a different story, and I can even use an example. We’re talking about the commitments—the commitments made in Paris, in Scotland—and these commitments are not forthcoming. But when we look at what has been happening since the war in Ukraine, I mean, the billions are pouring.

ELENI GIOKOS: So there’s money, right?

PRESIDENT WAVEL RAMKALAWAN: Yes, there is the money. There is the money but it’s being used for their own personal priorities, interests. And this is where we are talking about our survival, our disappearance. I mean, I was—well, some years back, the prime minister of—the president of the Maldives had an underwater cabinet meeting and the whole world was impressed, but this is what will happen to us. We are already seeing our islands disappear. That’s the reality we are facing.

The coastal erosion, what is today a little hill will soon be part of the coast. This is what we want the world to talk—to understand. We are talking about our very survival, and it’s not just our little survival in the various corners of the world where we are. We’re talking about the survival of planet Earth.

ELENI GIOKOS: So let’s talk about the money that could be flowing to small island developing nations, right, and let’s talk about the reparations that, you know, many developing economies has been calling for. Would the argument be—and I’m trying to play devil’s advocate here—there aren’t investable projects, for example, or money needs to find a home and it’s not that easy to invest? How quickly can we put that money to work, right? Because the money hasn’t been flowing. What are the arguments against, you know, funding this problem immediately?

PRIME MINISTER GASTON BROWNE: Yeah. Well—that’s for me? Thank you. The issue of funding, that has been a very vexing issue. As you know, several years ago the industrialized countries had pledged up to a hundred billion U.S. dollars a year. They have fallen short. But in any event, we’re quite sure that they have the resources to meet the 100 billion [dollars] and even to exceed it.

But what is important is to have this money flow into the new green energy technologies in order to drive down the cost of those technologies so that there can be greater diffusion of the technology, especially within developing countries, especially small states, and by so doing that will help to accelerate our transition into these green energy applications, which have—currently, they have proven to be cost prohibitive.

I mean, even, for example, electric cars. Electric cars are still very cost prohibitive, and what you find is happening within the developing world is that industrialized countries are now dumping the fossil fuel vehicles on developing countries and thereby exacerbating the problem, when, indeed, you know, these developed countries they have an obligation to assist developing countries globally, especially SIDS that are on the front lines of climate change and SIDS that do not contribute much to climate change.

In fact, we have the view, too, that the whole concept that the polluters should pay should be utilized to hold these large polluting countries accountable.

ELENI GIOKOS: So when you come up with these ideas and you have them with, you know, the policymakers from richer nations and you say, this is what we could get assistance with, do they say yes, let’s do it, Prime Minister?

PRIME MINISTER GASTON BROWNE: I missed it. Sorry?

ELENI GIOKOS: Do they—do they agree with you when you say come fraternize, help us with –

PRIME MINISTER GASTON BROWNE: Oh, you know, there are always these long negotiations at these various COPs. We had, what, COP-26, now going to -27, and I’m sure there’ll be -28, -29, and we’ll still be talking.

ELENI GIOKOS: On the same issues.

PRIME MINISTER GASTON BROWNE: On the same issues.

ELENI GIOKOS: Minister Shauna, jump in here for me.

MINISTER AMINATH SHAUNA: A big problem that we face with regards to climate finance and I think also, particularly, that’s important for us as small island states is there’s very little that’s been invested in adaptation. Most of the climate finance has flown into mitigation and investing in energy sector and I think the reason is or, at least, the reason that we’ve been told is that there’s a business case for mitigation and there’s not a business case for adaptation.

But I will say that there is a business case, for if all of our countries will have to relocate because of the impacts of climate change, there will be a much larger crisis than what we are seeing in Europe or even in other countries because of conflict.

This is going to be an issue that is going to keep rising, and that’s what I fear. I don’t want to relocate 500,000 people of the Maldives because we do not want to be climate refugees. We want to live in the Maldives. We want to continue to live in Seychelles. We want to be able to build our lives in Antigua and Barbuda as well.

ELENI GIOKOS: And we want to holiday in your—on your islands as well, importantly, right.

OK. So we’ve got to wrap things up. I’ve been hearing nervous laughs from all of you since we had a discussion behind the stage and here, and I get the sense that, you know, when you’re having these conversations with richer nations they’re telling you one thing and they’re doing another and it’s almost embarrassing them. You know, it is embarrassing to think that the pledges that are put on the table they never—you know, no one’s taking them seriously. You’re not taking these pledges seriously because nothing comes of it.

What more can you say and do for richer nations, the big industrialized economies, to finally act?

PRESIDENT WAVEL RAMKALAWAN: May I just say let’s cut out the hypocrisy, let’s be serious, and let’s be totally engaged in what we pledge.

ELENI GIOKOS: Would you prefer the honesty and them saying, we’re not going to do this?

PRESIDENT WAVEL RAMKALAWAN: Yes.

ELENI GIOKOS: We’re not interested?

PRESIDENT WAVEL RAMKALAWAN: It would be better if the honesty came out instead of just pushing everything for day after tomorrow and next week and the following month. And not only that, but also when it comes to sitting down to negotiating things, I mean, to have consultants and other arrangements, which simply complicate matters, I think the whole way finance is managed is also a problem. We get the impression sometimes that we don’t know anything. It’s only the richer countries that know everything and, therefore, we have to wait, and waiting is bad for the planet.

ELENI GIOKOS: And—yeah. Minister Shauna?

MINISTER AMINATH SHAUNA: I agree with the president as well. I think, for us small island states, it’s been one COP after the other and we don’t want to continue to go to these international forums to beg for money. We know what we need to do in our countries and we are already using our own government funds from revenue generated from our countries to invest in adaptation as well and in mitigation.

But we did not cause the climate crisis and we are at the forefront of it. But we are not going to always talk about the impacts of what’s happening. We will continue to be leaders in the climate debate. We will continue to do whatever we can, and I think small island states are doing much more than the larger states. The Maldives is committed to reaching net zero by 2030. We are phasing out single-use plastics by 2023. We are investing in adaptation, I think, at least about 35 percent, at most 50 percent, of our own government budget on adaptation.

So we are doing it, and I think if the small countries like ours can do it there’s no reason why the larger countries –

ELENI GIOKOS: Everyone else can.

Prime Minister, last word.

PRIME MINISTER GASTON BROWNE: Well, you know, I think that we must continue our global advocacy and even at a national level to hold our policymakers accountable, to also educate our respective populations on the threat associated with climate change so that they can hold their policymakers accountable.

I’m also of the view, too, that we should not rely on these pledges, which almost invariably end up being unfulfilled pledges. But we should also hold these large polluting countries legally responsible. In other words, we must pursue these countries under the various conventions—international conventions. And I would just add here that Antigua and Barbuda and Tuvalu have actually started a SIDS Commission on Climate Change and International Law in which we are now seeking to pursue these large polluters under the ITLOS to hold them accountable and the principle here is that the polluter must pay.

Unless you have that type of legal liability arising from the profligate use of fossil fuels so that these large industrialized countries that there are calls to or call upon to pay, to settle where there’s loss and damage, then I believe that it will continue to game the system and that we will have COP after COP after COP without any real results.

ELENI GIOKOS: Thank you so very much for your insights and your honesty, and we wish you all the best, and thank you very much for being pioneers in this space and for keeping it, you know, in the conversation, in the dialogue and, hopefully, that’s going to turn into action very soon. I wish you all the best.

PRIME MINISTER GASTON BROWNE: Thank you. Thank you very much.

ELENI GIOKOS: Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, a round of applause for my panelists.

Watch the full event

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Qaddour mentioned in Politico National Security Daily on her testimony at the House Foreign Affairs Committee on Syria’s humanitarian situation

Atlantic Council — Tue, 15 Mar 2022 18:08:00 +0000

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Qaddour quoted in Al-Monitor on Ukraine war’s effects on Syrian humanitarian aid access

Atlantic Council — Mon, 14 Mar 2022 17:41:00 +0000

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Israel Initiative’s Abraham Accords Caucus event covered in Israel Hayom

Atlantic Council — Sun, 13 Mar 2022 17:52:00 +0000

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Israel Initiative’s Abraham Accords Caucus event covered by the Jewish News Syndicate

Atlantic Council — Fri, 11 Mar 2022 18:33:00 +0000

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Lipner quoted in Americans for Peace Now on Israeli perspectives on war in Ukraine

Atlantic Council — Mon, 07 Mar 2022 16:44:00 +0000

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Middle East Program’s event with the Abraham Accords Caucus was mentioned in Politico National Security Daily

Atlantic Council — Mon, 07 Mar 2022 16:21:00 +0000

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Asat quoted in Radio Free Europe on asylum-seeker from China fleeing Ukraine amidst Russian invasion

Atlantic Council — Thu, 03 Mar 2022 16:16:00 +0000

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Polymeropoulos in CNBC on information campaigns in Ukraine

Atlantic Council — Tue, 01 Mar 2022 15:45:00 +0000

Original Source

On March 1, Forward Defense nonresident senior fellow Marc Polymeropoulos was quoted in a CNBC article titled “Ukraine is winning the information war against Russia.” Polymeropoulos explains how Ukrainians are utilizing an information campaign and social media to win the hearts and minds of the world.

Zelenskyy was not seen as a very effective leader two weeks ago. Now he is a Churchill-like figure.
Marc Polymeropoulos

Fellow

Max Brooks

Nonresident Senior Fellow

Forward Defense Scowcroft Center for Strategy and Security

Crisis Management National Security

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Nia quoted in The Guardian on Syrian and Iranian officials human rights violations and their potential war crime cases to ICC

Atlantic Council — Mon, 28 Feb 2022 20:25:01 +0000

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Qaddour quoted in the New York Times on correlations between Middle Eastern and Ukrainian refugee crisis

Atlantic Council — Sat, 26 Feb 2022 14:18:00 +0000

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Connable in Real Clear Defense: Will the Ukrainians Fight?

Atlantic Council — Thu, 24 Feb 2022 19:22:00 +0000

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Qaddour joins What Are You Going To Do With That to discuss the experience of being an immigrant and her lessons from policy and research

Atlantic Council — Thu, 17 Feb 2022 14:53:00 +0000

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Asat joins PBS to discuss Uyghur human rights amidst China’s Beijing Olympics

Atlantic Council — Fri, 11 Feb 2022 12:51:00 +0000

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Warrick in USA Today on Super Bowl protests

Atlantic Council — Thu, 10 Feb 2022 22:46:40 +0000

Original Source

On February 10, Scowcroft Middle East Security Initiative senior advisor and Forward Defense nonresident senior fellow Thomas Warrick was quoted in USA Today on a potential anti-vaccine trucker convoy planned for Super Bowl weekend. The article, titled “Truckers convoy in US could disrupt Super Bowl, Joe Biden’s State of the Union, DHS memo says,” includes comments from Warrick on how the convoy exposes vulnerabilities in the US “just-in-time” economy—though he says the greatest concern to domestic security, is that it remains peaceful.

Fellow

Max Brooks

Nonresident Senior Fellow

Forward Defense Scowcroft Center for Strategy and Security

Crisis Management National Security

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Melcangi in Institute for International Political Studies : Egypt and the many knots in human rights

Atlantic Council — Tue, 08 Feb 2022 05:36:00 +0000

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Asat quoted in the Associated Press on China’s and Uyghur olympians in the Beijing Games

Atlantic Council — Sat, 05 Feb 2022 15:17:00 +0000

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Asat quoted in USA Today on China abuse of Uyghurs and Beijing Games

Atlantic Council — Fri, 04 Feb 2022 15:00:00 +0000

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Warrick joins NBC News to discuss the Afghan refugee crisis and the SIV program

Atlantic Council — Thu, 03 Feb 2022 20:25:00 +0000

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Asat quoted in Al-Jazeera on Chinese exiles boycotting Winter Olympics about Uighur genocide

Atlantic Council — Wed, 02 Feb 2022 13:17:00 +0000

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Dagres quoted in Voice of America Persian News Network on human rights and internet freedom in Iran

Atlantic Council — Sat, 29 Jan 2022 14:33:00 +0000

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Engagement Reframed: Introduction

Robert A. Manning, Christopher Preble — Wed, 26 Jan 2022 20:15:54 +0000

The Scowcroft Center for Strategy and Security’s New American Engagement Initiative (NAEI) has a twofold mission: to challenge prevailing assumptions underpinning US foreign policy; and to point to alternative paths, different priorities, and a re-allocation of resources when needed to support new modes of US global engagement with allies and partners to shape the global future.

Our work is premised on the view that the United States—indeed, the world—is at a notably disruptive moment in history. An unprecedented technological revolution has accelerated the redistribution of global wealth and power in a multipolar world. Global institutions have frayed and fragmented, and America’s military and economic preeminence has begun to erode. By questioning underlying assumptions, the NAEI team will stimulate new ways of thinking about US foreign policy and recommend solutions that employ all elements of American power and influence.

NAEI’s Assumptions Testing series of issue briefs delves into major assumptions guiding US policies, including the motivations and behavior of revisionist powers; the US role in sustaining the global order; the effectiveness of coercion and deterrence; and the importance of democracy promotion. These in-depth briefs in turn inform two types of short policy briefs aimed at busy policymakers and opinion leaders:

The first, NAEI’s Reality Check series, focuses on specific flaws in current policy. The series has covered a range of issues—from the US military posture in the Persian Gulf to the provision of security-sector assistance to foreign partners—and identifies specific needed reforms as well as pitfalls to avoid.
NAEI’s newest publication series, Engagement Reframed, will suggest new ways to frame and execute America’s global role. As the title implies, the series will reimagine and reframe US engagement in the world beyond traditional, narrow notions of US military dominance to fashion a viable type of leadership in a world of many capable actors.

The Engagement Reframed series will develop new approaches for nonmilitary engagement with allies and partners, including rethinking the institutions of US foreign policy making and implementation, the specific issues and problems the United States faces, and the ways in which the scaffolding of the international system might be renovated or reengineered. These concise policy briefs will address how to employ the full range of tools at the disposal of the United States and its like-minded network. All follow a basic structure:

What are the challenges and opportunities? What opportunities for engagement are US policymakers currently missing? How might different modes of engagement—or new methods of interacting with others—alter or improve existing US policy?
Why now? The field of debate on US foreign policy is crowded with urgent problems. The Engagement Reframed series will stress important issues, explain the critical need for change, and highlight why a particular opportunity is worthy of policymakers’ attention.
How to make it happen. The United States is no longer the world’s sole dominant power; this series is aimed at operationalizing the concept of primus inter pares (first among equals). Learning how to operate in this multipolar world of many capable actors involves making choices. Engagement Reframed will inform these choices by considering when to take the lead or share burdens with others—solving collective-action problems through diplomacy and identifying how to enfranchise other actors to find a stable balance of interests.

The Engagement Reframed briefs planned for 2022 include:

Vaccinate the world by Mathew Burrows and Evan Cooper

The United States remains the best-positioned country to lead a global vaccination drive to counter the spread of COVID-19. With poor countries in serious need of vaccines, and China’s Sinopharm, Russia’s Sputnik, and the Johnson & Johnson vaccines deemed ineffective in initial trials at fighting the Omicron variant, the United States could reap a significant diplomatic, economic, and public health windfall if it contributes to the global vaccination effort more aggressively by donating its effective vaccines, increasing foreign production capacity of such vaccines, and bringing together donor countries to revamp the global health system. In the short-to-medium term, such measures could significantly help stem the financial costs of the pandemic by preventing economies from shutting down. Over the longer term, such an effort would yield diplomatic gains by establishing the United States as a responsible leader in global health and as the premier developer of medical innovations.

Appoint a European SACEUR by Kelly Grieco

Like every American president for six decades, President Joe Biden has called for Europe to shoulder a larger part of the defense burden. US efforts to press Washington’s European allies to do more have largely fixated on one measure: defense spending levels. At the 2014 NATO summit in Wales, NATO members pledged to spend at least two percent of their gross domestic product on defense by 2024. Despite demanding that its European allies contribute more to their own defense, Washington has thus far refused to seriously consider a more equitable distribution of leading positions in NATO’s military organization. Put differently, the United States cannot have it both ways; it cannot demand that Europe do more yet still retain full military leadership of the alliance. This paper explores arguments for the appointment of a European Supreme Allied Commander Europe (SACEUR) and offers recommendations for rebalancing NATO responsibilities and commands.

Engage on Ukraine’s Future by Emma Ashford

In recent years, Ukraine has become a core flashpoint between Russia on the one hand and the United States, as well as Washington’s European allies, on the other. From the George W. Bush administration’s 2008 attempt to bring Ukraine into the NATO membership process, to the 2014 dispute over a European Union (EU) association agreement that prompted the Maidan Revolution, the question of whether Ukraine will move toward the West or retain its traditionally close ties to Russia has been fraught with controversy. The end result has been a war on Ukrainian soil and political and economic limbo for Ukraine, which cannot benefit fully from its ties with either Russia or the West. This paper steps back from security questions to explore novel ideas for economic integration of Ukraine into Western markets—giving the country the access it desires—while reassuring Russia that this will not necessarily entail full EU membership or the cessation of trade with Russia itself.

Move beyond great-power competition in Africa by Aude Darnal and Ambassador Rama Yade

Following two decades of US foreign policy primarily dominated by the global war on terrorism, Washington’s strategic competition with Beijing has motivated a shift in US engagement with the rest of the world. In Africa, the United States retains its military and security approach toward armed conflicts and instability, but the US government has increasingly framed its exchanges with the continent within the concept of great-power competition. Though the Biden administration recently affirmed that it will not ask African countries to choose between China and the United States, it has also warned some of them about their partnerships with the Asian power. Framing US engagement with the continent through the lens of great-power competition is a mistake because it implies that African countries are merely pawns in the international system. This brief explores opportunities for greater US engagement with African countries in such sectors as diplomacy, technological innovation, trade, global health, and climate change—all issues where they are valuable partners.

Bring back America’s diplomatic superstars by Evan Cooper

American culture has tremendous influence around the world, but successfully leveraging that power for diplomatic gain requires that the US government work strategically with American artists and businesses. The Jazz Ambassadors program of the 1950s and 60s—sponsored by the Department of State to promote US values globally—provides a useful model that should be applied to how the department approaches cultural diplomacy today. By partnering with some of the most popular American artists and companies, the State Department could facilitate exhibitions of American freedom of expression and artistic talent, advancing US values while helping to improve damaged perceptions of the United States abroad.

Rethink space governance by Robert A. Manning

We have entered a new era in space that is racing ahead of the world’s ability to govern it. 2021 marked an inflection point, as US and Chinese rovers explored Mars, and a Russian anti-satellite weapons test created 15,000 pieces of space debris. Private sector activities ramped up, too, including Elon Musk’s Space X activities and the Starlink mini-satellites nearly colliding with a Chinese space station. Not least, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) launched the spectacular Webb telescope. In short, the already explosive growth of activities in space will only accelerate in this decade. Yet the only universally subscribed law governing space is the 1967 Outer Space Treaty, now outdated by both technology and politics. Meanwhile, nations are passing laws to grant claims on moon real estate and resources, the private sector is gearing up to mine asteroids and the moon, and increasing space debris threatens space assets on which the functioning of civilization increasingly depends—from global positioning systems and military command and control to the Internet and automatic teller machines. NASA has embarked on a noble effort to update rules for operations in space, the Artemis Accords, signed by thirteen US allies and partners, but the agreement omits major space powers: China, France, Germany, India, and Russia. All parties should begin with a recognition of their mutual vulnerability and admit the urgent need to manage and remove space debris. Beyond that, the United States has an opportunity to lead efforts with partners and allies to update global space governance before space becomes a Wild West free-for-all.

Expand US relations with the Caribbean by Aude Darnal and Wazim Mowla

In recent years, the United States’ engagement in the Caribbean has been largely inconsistent and limited to only a handful of countries. From the limited and delayed collaboration during the COVID-19 crisis, to the poor response to migration flows from the Caribbean, Washington has shown the limits of its current strategy to partner with the region. In parallel, increased engagement in the region by rival powers has raised the Caribbean’s profile inside the Beltway. Although the Biden administration should not look at Caribbean countries through the prism of great-power competition, it should seize the opportunity to strengthen and redefine, when necessary, a comprehensive strategy grounded in mutual interests. From climate change to trade, investment, and diplomacy, the Caribbean and the United States share common challenges and opportunities that can only be addressed or transformed into gains through cooperation.

Get creative on European security architecture by Emma Ashford

Six months ago, the Biden administration began the process of re-engaging with Russia on questions of strategic stability, including the core issues of arms control and cyber warfare. Talks have been ongoing, and a number of working groups have been set up on specific topics. Recent events, however, suggest the need for engagement on a broader set of issues rather than exclusively on arms control. Repeated Russian military buildups near Ukraine—and Moscow’s proposed outline of a revised European security architecture—suggest that the time might be ripe for revisiting the conversations from the 1990s about conventional security in Europe. Nonetheless, Moscow’s proposed language for such an agreement is likely to be largely unacceptable to Western states. This paper explores the Russian proposal for a new European security architecture and suggests areas where compromise might be found.

Other topics to be explored in the series include demographics and immigration, a plan for improving global infrastructure, relations with North Korea, governance in space, and US public attitudes toward trade, while working with allies and partners to build leverage to reshape world order.

Explore NAEI

Assumptions Testing Series

The New American Engagement Initiative’s Assumptions Testing series explores some of the foundational beliefs that guide US foreign policy. By questioning the conventional wisdom, and exposing these assumptions to close scrutiny, the series aims to open a new seam in the policy debate and generate a more lively, fruitful, and effective strategic dialogue – one that is capable of producing a sustainable, nonpartisan strategy for US global engagement.

Reality Check Series

The New American Engagement Initiative’s Reality Checks are short briefs dedicated to exploring a particular policy or set of policies, assessing their efficacy, and, where appropriate, proposing alternatives. Reality Checks are published regularly and tied to the news of the day or derive from NAEI’s Assumptions Testing series. All are succinct and straight-to-the-point. The briefs are designed for busy professionals anxious for pragmatic and timely policy options.

Engagement Reframed Series

The New American Engagement Initiative’s Engagement Reframed policy briefs reimagine and reframe the US approach to the world beyond traditional, narrow notions of US military dominance to fashion an achievable and sustainable form of US leadership in a world of many capable actors.

The post Engagement Reframed: Introduction appeared first on Atlantic Council.

Dagres’ event on internet freedom in Iran mentioned in Politico

Atlantic Council — Wed, 26 Jan 2022 13:31:00 +0000

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Dagres quoted in Washington Post on internet freedom in Iran

Atlantic Council — Fri, 14 Jan 2022 01:21:00 +0000

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Treat the Mediterranean like the center of the world again. Europe’s climate security depends on it.

Katerina Sokou — Thu, 13 Jan 2022 20:56:42 +0000

When it comes to climate change, the European Union (EU) needs to once again view the Mediterranean Sea as the center of the world.

For millennia, the Mediterranean has facilitated trade and exchanges that made it a crossroads for civilizations. Known as Mare Nostrum (“Our Sea”) at the height of the Roman Empire, it forged the lands around it into a varied yet distinct region, with the coastal environment serving as the common denominator for diverse peoples. Today, the Mediterranean faces rising temperatures and tides in an existential test with sizable socioeconomic and geopolitical implications—and how this crossroads of Europe, Africa, and Asia face these challenges carries consequences for countries and peoples well beyond its shores.

As Mediterranean nations respond to the devastating effects of climate change, their actions may aggravate and alter geopolitical tensions, strain country-level stability, and increase security threats in the region. How the EU addresses civil protection, international cooperation, energy and water availability, and migration flows will determine not only peace and security in its neighborhood, but also its own future. This requires a regional approach to the vulnerable coastal ecosystem, and Greece offers some early signals.

Of course, Europe is not the only area grappling with these challenges. In its first National Intelligence Estimate on Climate Change, the United States warns that no country will be spared from the challenges directly related to climate change. Indeed, the risks are systemic in nature. Natural disasters caused by climate change are upending lives the world over, since natural disasters have longer-term consequences for nature, societies, and economies.

Addressing these systemic challenges needs to top the national security considerations of all countries. It also needs to be the priority of multilateral collaboration not just for national goals of carbon neutrality, but also in rethinking global supply chains, food systems, and economic interdependencies.

Faster warming in the Eastern Mediterranean

But the stakes are especially high for coastal ecosystems: global warming, sea-level rise, and the increased intensity and frequency of major weather events are all predicted to hit coastal nations (such as the Mediterranean countries) particularly hard, raising the urgency for climate change adaptation and resilience. And the Eastern Mediterranean is particularly vulnerable:

High-resolution climate simulations predict that temperature increases will severely affect the Eastern Mediterranean over this century.
Already warming 20 percent faster than the global average, the entire Mediterranean region’s temperature is projected to rise 2.2 degrees Celsius by 2040, reducing precipitation by at least 10 to 15 percent and up to 30 percent in Southern Europe.
Demand for water is projected to at least double (and maybe even triple) by 2050, while coastal zones will face flooding, erosion, and the salinization of river deltas and aquifers.

The socioeconomic implications are significant, as the coastal economy is of primary economic importance for many Mediterranean countries.

Climate change as a geopolitical challenge

For the countries of the Mediterranean, the strain of global warming on energy and food systems is projected to increase the risks of domestic instability, while population growth will add to migration pressures and, in turn, to geopolitical tensions. Environmentalists are looking beyond borders for the answers. Olivia Lazard, a visiting scholar at Carnegie Europe, calls for an approach that exceeds the national boundaries to account for “a new reality that will be defined by geography and climate more than any time in the modern historical experience.”

Although the risks of global climate change cannot be addressed by any country alone, they nevertheless exacerbate a number of risks to national security interests, from physical impacts to security challenges. Those risks need to be assessed by each nation’s intelligence community, including the potential of greater geopolitical tension over an uncoordinated climate response and the geopolitical effects of the energy transition to carbon neutrality.

For the Mediterranean nations, a regional and comprehensive approach to climate change, including the physical and economic effects, will help determine and highlight the security challenges for the area and for the West as well. Currently, the UN Environment Program Mediterranean Action Plan (UNEP/MAP) provides a comprehensive assessment of the state of the environment and development in the region, while the Barcelona Convention adds a framework for climate action.

But the EU also needs to adopt a systemic approach to climate mitigation and adaptation efforts for the whole of the Mediterranean ecosystem, based on its own assessment of the security challenges. This should include an ambitious financing and technology assistance drive to support energy transition in a region largely dependent on hydrocarbons but with a massive potential in renewable energy. Increasing the EU’s stabilizing role in the eastern Mediterranean, the Middle East, and Africa would also help the region counterbalance the influence of other regional powers and China.

A high-stakes role for Greece

Greece, a European country on the EU’s southeastern tip, is at the forefront of this struggle. For one, climate change is an existential threat for Greece’s natural environment and coastal economy, including tourism. As a frontier state, it also bears the burden of protecting EU borders from irregular migration and terrorist threats.

For Greece, potential resources and partners extend beyond the EU. The country can build on its NATO membership to actively grow Europe’s security-related climate response capabilities in the region. The nation also can draw on its traditional ties in the Eastern Mediterranean, and beyond to the Middle East and the Gulf, to expand its partnerships in addressing the effects of climate change through trade and investment.

Indeed, Greece is leading the shift to renewable energy in the region and is planning electricity interconnectors that can bring the untapped green energy potential of the Eastern Mediterranean to Europe; according to the Mediterranean Experts on Climate and Environmental Change network, renewables are projected to nearly triple by 2040 in the Mediterranean basin. In its proactive scenario, they would account for about 70 percent of total installed capacity and more than 50 percent of electricity generation—leading to a drastic restructuring of the power-generation infrastructure that would also allow the export of green energy to Europe. For instance, an agreement signed by Greece and Egypt last October for an electricity interconnector between the two countries could open the European market to renewable energy producers in nations vulnerable to both climate change and the disruption of the energy transition.

Putting the climate crisis at the center of foreign policy and national security, as the Biden administration has done, is the first step for the countries of the region and the EU to put forward and coordinate policy proposals to help mitigate the effects of climate change. A climate action plan that addresses its impact on the Mediterranean as the vulnerable, interdependent ecosystem that it is, while also accounting for its effect on migration, would go a long way to that effect.

The idea of the Mediterranean Sea as a center has currency—for the region, certainly, but also beyond it. Given the physical, economic, and geopolitical stakes, protecting the crossroads of three continents may still define the direction of our world.

Katerina Sokou is a nonresident senior fellow at the Atlantic Council’s Europe Center and the Washington correspondent for the Greek daily Kathimerini and SKAI TV. Follow her on Twitter @KaterinaSokou.

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Pepe Zhang in BBC News Mundo: Los 3 pilares de la expansión china en América Latina y el Caribe en dos años de pandemia

ibernhard — Thu, 30 Dec 2021 21:31:00 +0000

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On December 30, 2021, Pepe Zhang was quoted in a BBC News Mundo article, “Los 3 pilares de la expansión china en América Latina y el Caribe en dos años de pandemia” (“The 3 pillars of Chinese expansion in Latin America and the Caribbean in two years of the pandemic”).

Quoted in Spanish, Zhang’s remarks translate as follows: “Although FDI flows from China have slowed during the pandemic, trade relations remain robust and resilient. It’s likely that 2021 will be another record year for trade between China and LAC.”

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