tagged w/ Gates foundation
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a crapper that just might work for the rest of the world... maybe
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Alex Jones started this smear campaign against Bono using liberal buzzwords like Monsanto and the Gates Foundation. It's right wing disinformation designed to confuse and divide.
Paul Hewson (Bono) is one of the few people actually doing good in this world. I have closely followed his work and music for 30 years now and can attest that he has made a very positive contribution to healing our planet.
Alex Jones is a big oil whore who equates carbon tax with genocide. Please see through his blatant propaganda people.Alex Jones started this smear campaign against Bono using liberal buzzwords like... more
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Positive action for positive change...
As part of the Global Day of Action to Shut Down Monsanto on Saturday, this action was co-organized by AGRA Watch/Community Alliance for Global Justice, Washington Fair Trade Coalition, Washington Biotechnology Action Council, and GMO-Free Washington. The protest was directed at the Gates Foundation for their efforts to spread Monsanto’s dangerous GMOs throughout Africa.Positive action for positive change...
As part of the Global Day of Action to Shut... more
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My first experience with the perils of large scale seed banks was the scandal that erupted over the Fort Collins collection in the mid 1980s. Journalists had published stories dramatically detailing the grossly negligent manner in which deposits to the seed bank were treated. Numerous seed deposits were spilling out onto the floors of the facility, the facility was woefully understaffed, there was no testing of the seed and a virtually complete failure of required regeneration — in short a seed saving disaster. A legal petition by my organization to rectify the decision seemed to get the United States Department of Agriculture’s (USDA) attention. But when no real action resulted we litigated. I was a very active member of that legal team. As such I reviewed much of the material in the case that documented USDA’s complete disregard for the safety and integrity of the seeds under its care. This litigation ultimately forced a settlement where USDA agreed to do an Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) pursuant to the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) and conditions at the seed bank improved somewhat.
Since that first experience I learned that bigger is definitely not better or safer when it comes to seed saving. As noted elsewhere on this site, the Center for Food Safety (CFS) strongly advocates for in situ protection of plant diversity, and when ex situ seed saving is required it should reside at the most local and ecologically appropriate level. This has been one of the bases for CFS’ longstanding concerns about the Svalbard Global Seed Vault. Not surprisingly these fears have recently been justified. In December 2010 NordGen, the entity overseeing Svalbard, fired its Director Jessica Kathle. Some at NordGen believed that she was a “scapegoat” for the seed bank’s well known problems including continuing deficits, significant understaffing, and failure to do routine tests on the deposited seed to determine viability. (http://dagendresen.wordpress.com/about/Dot.) Sadly it seems like the Fort Collins fiasco redux.
There is however yet another important concern about Svalbard. The Global Crop Diversity Trust (GCDT), which supports the operational costs of Svalbard, has received almost $30 million dollars in support from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. (Global Diversity Trust, “Funding Status 1-1-2011.” http://www.croptrust.org/main/funds.php)This is by far the largest support of any non-governmental entity. As is well known, the Gates Foundation has very close working ties to Monsanto. The Gates Foundation invested $23 million in Monsanto in 2010 to help the company through some financial woes, and has been a determined supporter of spreading Monsanto’s genetically engineered crops throughout the developing world. In 2006 the Gates Foundation hired Rob Horsch, a former Monsanto Vice President and a key scientist involved in the creation of the company’s Round Up Ready crops in the 1980s, as their Senior Program Officer for their International Agriculture Development Program. This Monsanto connection to Svalbard is very troubling as the corporation owns almost a quarter of all the world’s commercial seeds and is the world’s leader in the genetic engineering of crops and the patenting of plant genetics (including plant genes, cells and seeds). Monsanto has also had a decade long history of persecuting and prosecuting thousands of farmers for saving seeds.
Svalbard’s ties to the Gates Foundation and Monsanto are not the only issue. Only two private corporations have donated to the GCDT. Dupont/Pioneer Seeds has donated $1 million as has Syngenta. (Global Diversity Trust, “Funding Status 1-1-2011.” http://www.croptrust.org/main/funds.php)Together these two companies own another 25% of the world’s commercial seeds and are also among the leaders in agriculture biotechnology and in patenting of plant genetics. So a major question looms. Why this interest by these biotech companies and their surrogates in paying the operational costs of Svalbard? These companies have no record of altruistic concern for the integrity and diversity of seeds and have in fact been destroying that diversity through genetic engineering and patenting for decades. The most obvious hypothesis is that these corporations see in Svalbard an opportunity to gain further control of the world’s plant genetics — being able to utilize the seed bank as a resource for germplasm that can be used for creating patentable hybrid or genetically engineered seed varieties.
To test that hypothesis I requested that the CFS legal team investigate the deposit agreements at Svalbard. The point of this analysis was to see if in some way the contract between Svalbard and depositors created an advantage for these corporations in their efforts to control and patent seed genetics. As the legal memorandum reveals, the answer to the question is “yes.” The Svalbard agreement does provide corporations seeking to patent plant genetics additional advantages in their efforts.
cont.My first experience with the perils of large scale seed banks was the scandal that... more
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Today as thousands march in Cancun for climate justice, Seattle-based AGRA Watch and La Via Campesina North America are joined by 60 organizations and 40 academics and scientists from around the world who call on the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation to support real solutions to climate change, hunger and poverty.
In a letter to the Foundation, the signatories state their concern that the Foundation and its private sector partners are pushing to industrialize agriculture and commercialize genetically engineered crops in Africa at the expense of small farmers and the environment. Over one thousand individuals from more than 30 countries and 48 states in the US to date have also signed a separate online petition in support of the letter.
The letter to the Foundation condemns the industrial approach to agriculture and high-tech 'fixes' like genetic engineering because they undermine sustainable, resilient food systems that are controlled by local populations. Local systems actually mitigate climate change while the spread of industrial agriculture is one of the heaviest contributors to greenhouse gas emissions and loss of plant biodiversity worldwide, thus directly fueling the climate crisis.
AGRA Watch and La Via Campesina North America are sending the letter to the Gates Foundation as thousands of peasant farmers, rural women and men, indigenous peoples, and activists from all sectors of society mobilize in Cancun to reject corporate-driven, market-based solutions to climate change being promoted at the UN climate negotiations. "Both the UN climate negotiators and the Gates Foundation must recognize that false solutions such as GMOs and agrofuels that threaten our biodiversity will further Africa's exploitation, not salvation. We need to see real solutions to reduce climate emissions instead of more pressure on Africa," explained Anne Maina of the African Biodiversity Network, currently present at the talks.
Signatories of the letter and social movements in Cancun assert that real solutions to hunger and climate change are rooted in food sovereignty, the right of peoples and communities to define and control their own food and agriculture systems. La Via Campesina affirms that, "We need millions of peasant communities and indigenous territories to feed humanity and cool the planet" and "thousands of peoples' solutions." Echoing this statement, the sign-on letter calls on the Foundation to redefine its funding priorities in favor of small-scale agroecological agriculture, citing the findings of the 2008 International Assessment of Agricultural Knowledge, Science and Technology for Development (IAASTD) report. The letter further advocates for an authentically participatory process that involves African farmers, farmer organizations, and civil society in decision-making from beginning to end, and urges the Foundation to restructure its grant-making to ensure transparency and accountability to farmers.Today as thousands march in Cancun for climate justice, Seattle-based AGRA Watch and... more
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NOTE: The Gates Foundation is increasingly being forced to deal with criticism of its more dubious activities and programmes. With Via Campesina, the AGRA Watch campaign group (AGRA = The Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa, an initiative of the the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and its the biggest grantee) based, like the Gates Foundation, in Seattle, has initiated both a letter for sign on and an electronic petition to the Gates Foundation. Please sign on, and also circulate to other groups and individuals.
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1. Help us reach 1000 signatures on our online petition to tell the Gates Foundation to support Real Solutions for Hunger!
Sign the petition at Change.org:
http://www.change.org/petitions/view/tell_the_gates_foundation_to_support_real_solutions_to_hunger
http://bit.ly/bw8eB3
2. Organizational Sign-on Letter, co-sponsored by AGRA Watch & La Via Campesina: See the text of the letter pasted below, and linked here; We welcome organizations and individual scientists or academics working in related fields to sign on by sending an email to agrawatch@seattleglobaljustice.orgThis e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it by the end of the Week of Action, this Sunday, 17 OCTOBER.
If you have any questions or concerns, please email us at agrawatch@seattleglobaljustice.orgThis e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it , or call 206-405-4600.
Thank you!
In solidarity,
AGRA Watch, a campaign of Community Alliance for Global Justice
*************
Petition: http://www.change.org/petitions/view/tell_the_gates_foundation_to_support_real_solutions_to_hunger
Sign-on letter: http://www.seattleglobaljustice.org/agra-watch/organizational-sign-on-letter/NOTE: The Gates Foundation is increasingly being forced to deal with criticism of its... more
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"The SOYA MODEL implies a war against the population, the emptying of the countryside, and the elimination of our collective memory in order to shoehorn people into towns and convert them into faithful consumers of whatever the market provides. The impacts of this model go beyond the borders of the new Soya Republics. The dehumanisation of agriculture and the depopulation of rural areas for the benefit of the corporations is increasing in the North and in the South." - Javiera Ruli in United Soya Republics. The Truth about Soya Production in Latin America
Read the Press Release here...
http://www.biosafetyafrica.net/index.html/index.php/20100901329/The-Gates-Foundation-and-Cargill-push-Soya-onto-Africa/menu-id-100025.html
The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation has announced a new project to develop the soya value chain in Africa in partnership with American NGO, TechnoServe and agricultural commodity trading giant Cargill. The US$8 million project will be implemented as a four year pilot in Mozambique and Zambia with the intention of spreading the model to other regions in the future.
The Gates Foundation continues to back agricultural strategies that open new markets for strong corporate interests while assisting in the creation of policy environments to support foreign agribusiness’ interests. The programme will yoke African farmers into the soya value chain and open the door for major agribusiness players such as Cargill, while displacing African agricultural practices and traditional crops. In addition, there is a very real threat that this project could be a foot in the door for the introduction of genetically modified soya onto the Continent.
Since the green revolution of the 1960s, the soya bean has become the number one forage crop on the international market. About 85% of the world’s soybeans are processed into soya bean meal and oil, about 98% of that meal is further processed into animal feed, the balance is used to make soya flour and proteins. Approximately 95% of the oil is consumed as edible oil with the rest being used for industrial products such as fatty acids, soaps and agrofuel. In the last 40 years, production of soya bean has increased by over 500%, driven by the growing affluence of Chinese consumers, who are now eating more meat than ever before, as well as a significant increase in demand for soya beans as feedstock for biodiesel. In addition, soya beans fix nitrogen in the soil, thereby improving soil fertility and making it an excellent rotation crop.
The United States, Argentina and Brazil are the three major producers of soya in the world. The aggressive expansion of soya monocrops in Latin America has wreaked socio-economic and environmental disaster - in 2008 over 30 million hectares of soya was grown in Brazil and Argentina, where soya monocrops are notorious for displacing rural populations and causing mass deforestation. In April 2006, Greenpeace announced that in the 2004/2005 growing season, 1.2 million hectares of the Amazon rainforest was deforested as a consequence of soya expansion.
The vast majority of global soya crops are genetically modified to withstand applications of herbicides. (Approximately 93% of soya production in the USA is GM, 98.9% in Argentina and 70.7% in Brazil). The introduction of herbicide tolerant soya has created a sharp increase in the use of highly toxic herbicides – in the USA the use of herbicides has increased by 382.6 million pounds over the past 13 years, with herbicide tolerant soya beans accounting for 92% of that increase.
No multinational on the planet has greater interests in soya production and trade than the American corporation Cargill. Cargill’s business operations include purchasing, processing and distributing grain and agricultural commodities, the manufacture and sale of livestock feed and ingredients for processed foods and pharmaceuticals. Their assets and business operations in Latin America are staggering; it is responsible for over 75% of Argentina’s grain and oilseed production. It also has great interest in fertiliser production, having a two-thirds stake in one of the world’s leading fertiliser companies, Mosaic. Their business interests in Africa are scant in contrast. It has now partnered with the Gates Foundation to introduce a soya value chain in Africa.
cont."The SOYA MODEL implies a war against the population, the emptying of the... more
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Farmers and civil society organizations around the world are outraged by the recent discovery of further connections between the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and agribusiness titan Monsanto. Last week, a financial website published the Gates Foundation’s investment portfolio, including 500,000 shares of Monsanto stock with an estimated worth of $23.1 million purchased in the second quarter of 2010 (see the filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission). This marks a substantial increase from its previous holdings, valued at just over $360,000 (see the Foundation’s 2008 990 Form).
“The Foundation’s direct investment in Monsanto is problematic on two primary levels,” said Dr. Phil Bereano, University of Washington Professor Emeritus and recognized expert on genetic engineering. “First, Monsanto has a history of blatant disregard for the interests and well-being of small farmers around the world, as well as an appalling environmental track record. The strong connections to Monsanto cast serious doubt on the Foundation’s heavy funding of agricultural development in Africa and purported goal of alleviating poverty and hunger among small-scale farmers. Second, this investment represents an enormous conflict of interests.”
Monsanto has already negatively impacted agriculture in African countries. For example, in South Africa in 2009, Monsanto’s genetically modified maize failed to produce kernels and hundreds of farmers were devastated. According to Mariam Mayet, environmental attorney and director of the Africa Centre for Biosafety in Johannesburg, some farmers suffered up to an 80% crop failure. While Monsanto compensated the large-scale farmers to whom it directly sold the faulty product, it gave nothing to the small-scale farmers to whom it had handed out free sachets of seeds. “When the economic power of Gates is coupled with the irresponsibility of Monsanto, the outlook for African smallholders is not very promising,” said Mayet. Monsanto’s aggressive patenting practices have also monopolized control over seed in ways that deny farmers control over their own harvest, going so far as to sue—and bankrupt—farmers for “patent infringement.”
News of the Foundation’s recent Monsanto investment has confirmed the misgivings of many farmers and sustainable agriculture advocates in Africa, among them the Kenya Biodiversity Coalition, who commented, “We have long suspected that the founders of AGRA—the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation—had a long and more intimate affair with Monsanto.” Indeed, according to Travis English, researcher with AGRA Watch, “The Foundation’s ownership of Monsanto stock is emblematic of a deeper, more long-standing involvement with the corporation, particularly in Africa.” In 2008, AGRA Watch, a project of the Seattle-based organization Community Alliance for Global Justice, uncovered many linkages between the Foundation’s grantees and Monsanto. For example, some grantees (in particular about 70% of grantees in Kenya) of the Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa (AGRA)—considered by the Foundation to be its “African face”—work directly with Monsanto on agricultural development projects. Other prominent links include high-level Foundation staff members who were once senior officials for Monsanto, such as Rob Horsch, formerly Monsanto Vice President of International Development Partnerships and current Senior Program Officer of the Gates Agricultural Development Program.
Transnational corporations like Monsanto have been key collaborators with the Foundation and AGRA’s grantees in promoting the spread of industrial agriculture on the continent. This model of production relies on expensive inputs such as chemical fertilizers, genetically modified seeds, and herbicides. Though this package represents enticing market development opportunities for the private sector, many civil society organizations contend it will lead to further displacement of farmers from the land, an actual increase in hunger, and migration to already swollen cities unable to provide employment opportunities. In the words of a representative from the Kenya Biodiversity Coalition, “AGRA is poison for our farming systems and livelihoods. Under the philanthropic banner of greening agriculture, AGRA will eventually eat away what little is left of sustainable small-scale farming in Africa.”
A 2008 report initiated by the World Bank and the UN, the International Assessment of Agricultural Knowledge, Science and Technology for Development (IAASTD), promotes alternative solutions to the problems of hunger and poverty that emphasize their social and economic roots. The IAASTD concluded that small-scale agroecological farming is more suitable for the third world than the industrial agricultural model favored by Gates and Monsanto. In a summary of the key findings of IAASTD, the Pesticide Action Network North America (PANNA) emphasizes the report’s warning that “continued reliance on simplistic technological fixes—including transgenic crops—will not reduce persistent hunger and poverty and could exacerbate environmental problems and worsen social inequity.” Furthermore, PANNA explains, “The Assessment’s 21 key findings suggest that small-scale agroecological farming may offer one of the best means to feed the hungry while protecting the planet.”
The Gates Foundation has been challenged in the past for its questionable investments; in 2007, the L.A. Times exposed the Foundation for investing in its own grantees and for its “holdings in many companies that have failed tests of social responsibility because of environmental lapses, employment discrimination, disregard for worker rights, or unethical practices.” The Times chastised the Foundation for what it called “blind-eye investing,” with at least 41% of its assets invested in “companies that countered the foundation’s charitable goals or socially-concerned philosophy.”
cont.Farmers and civil society organizations around the world are outraged by the recent... more
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More than 3,500 women from 146 countries converged on the nation's capital this week for a second major conference on maternal mortality.
They celebrated benchmark achievements in reducing maternal and infant mortality and faced stubborn failures at the same time.
Melinda Gates, a major philanthropist in this field, announced $1.5 billion in new support from the Gates Foundation, based in Seattle, for programs targeting women's health. She said she hoped that donation would spur the G-8 summit in Canada on June 25, where leaders of eight of the world's most industrialized nations will meet, to step up in a similar fashion.
Gates pointed out that 350,000 women still die every year giving birth and that 3 million newborns die annually.
Read the Full Story at Women's eNews http://www.womensenews.org/story/reproductive-health/100609/global-maternal-health-gets-2nd-big-checkupMore than 3,500 women from 146 countries converged on the nation's capital this... more
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The Gates Foundation has withdrawn a $5.2 million grant to a Canadian research center for planned tobacco control work in Africa, after learning that the chairwoman of the center’s board was also a board member for a unit of one of the world’s largest tobacco companies.
Officials said antitobacco activists discovered last month that the executive, Barbara J. McDougall, who has headed the board of governors at the Canadian International Development Research Center since 2007, has also been serving since 2004 on the board of Imperial Tobacco Canada, a subsidiary of British American Tobacco.
The tobacco company affiliation, listed on Ms. McDougall’s law firm biography, had not been included on news releases about her appointment to the research center, which reports to Canada’s parliament and provides financing for tobacco control and other work. Apparently, tobacco industry opponents had not made the connection until recently.
“We are deeply disappointed by this revelation and feel this conflict is unacceptable as we work to support meaningful tobacco control programs in Africa,” Kate Teela, a program officer with the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, wrote in an e-mail message to African alliance members last weekend.
Antitobacco activists said the action came after the African Tobacco Control Alliance threatened to withdraw from a planned meeting of tobacco experts throughout Africa in Senegal next week. The Canadian research center was to be a co-host of the meeting, paying its share of the costs from the Gates Foundation grant. Without that money, the meeting’s status was unclear Monday.
READ MORE AT LINKThe Gates Foundation has withdrawn a $5.2 million grant to a Canadian research center... more
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When we talk about zero climate emissions, we sound crazy. When Bill Gates does it, bankers pick up the phone.
February 16, 2010 |
On Friday, the world's most successful businessperson and most powerful philanthropist did something outstandingly bold, that went almost unremarked: Bill Gates announced that his top priority is getting the world to zero climate emissions.
Now, I'm not a member of the Cult of Bill myself (I'm typing this on a MacBook), but you don't have to believe that Gates has superhuman powers of prediction to know that his predictions have enormous power. People who will never listen to Al Gore, much to less someone like me, hang on Gates' every utterance.
And Friday, Gates predicted extraordinary climate action: zero. Not small steps, not incremental progress, not doing less bad: zero. In fact, he stood in front of a slide with nothing but the planet Earth and the number zero. That moment was the most important thing that has happened at TED.
What, exactly, did he say, and why is it so important?
Gates spoke about his commitment to using his massive philanthropic resources (the Gates Foundation is the world's largest) to make life better for people through public health and poverty alleviation ("vaccines and seeds" as he put it). Then he said something he's never said before: that is it because he's committed to improving life for the world's vulnerable people that he now believes that climate change is the most important challenge on the planet.
Even more importantly, he acknowledged the only sensible goal, when it comes to climate emissions, is to eliminate them: we should be aiming for a civilization that produces no net emissions, and we should be aiming to live in that civilization here in the developed world by 2050.
Obviously, that's a big goal. Because he is the world's biggest geek, to explain how he plans to achieve that goal, Gates put up a slide with a formula (which we can call the Gates Climate Equation):
CO2 = P x S x E x C
Meaning this: the climate emissions of human civilization are the result of four driving forces:
* Population: the total number of people on the planet (which is still increasing because we are not yet at peak population).
* Services: the things that provide prosperity (and because billions of people are still rising out of poverty and because no global system will work unless it's fair, we can expect a massively increased demand for the services that provide prosperity).
* Energy: the amount of energy it takes to produce and provide the goods and services that our peaking population uses as it grows more prosperous (what some might call the energy intensity of goods and services). Gates believes it's likely cutting two-thirds of our energy waste is about as good as we can do.
* Carbon: the amount of climate emissions generated in order to produce the energy it takes to fuel prosperity.
Those four, he says, essentially define our emissions (more on that later). In order to reach zero emissions, then, at least one of these values has to fall to zero. But which one? He reckons that because population is going to continue to grow for at least four decades, because billions of poor people want more equitable prosperity, and because (as he sees it) improvements in energy efficiency are limited, we have to focus on the last element of the equation, the carbon intensity of energy. Simply, we need climate-neutral energy. We need to use nothing but climate-neutral energy.
To do that, we need an "energy miracle." We need energy solutions that don't yet exist, released through a global push for clean energy innovation. That, in turn, demands that a generation of entrepreneurs push forward new ideas for renewable energy, unleashing "1,000 promising ideas." He described one of his own investments, but went on to note that we need hundreds of other ambitious companies as well, and he plans to put his own efforts into this arena.
Why is this important? The news stories focused largely on the clean energy aspect of the speech, and certainly the world's most successful businessman announcing that clean energy is the next frontier is a big headline. However, I think though that the real breakthrough was not Gates' answer to the problem, but his definition of success: zero.
http://www.alternet.org/environment/145694/did_bill_gates_just_give_the_most_important_climate_speech_of_the_yearWhen we talk about zero climate emissions, we sound crazy. When Bill Gates does it,... more
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No longer will Bill Gates get caught up in nerd squabbles with Steve Jobs...
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/01/30/health/30gates.html
Endorsing vaccines as the world’s most cost-effective public health measure, Bill and Melinda Gates said Friday that their foundation would more than double its spending on them over the next decade, to at least $10 billion.
Bill and Melinda Gates announced on Friday during the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, that their foundation would raise its spending on vaccines over the next decade to at least $10 billion.
The change could save the lives of as many as eight million children by 2020, Mr. Gates calculated. He said he hoped his gift would inspire other charities and donor nations to do the same.
“Vaccines are a real success story,” Mr. Gates said in an interview before the announcement, which he made at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland. “The cost is tiny, and yet it saves more lives than any other component of a health care system.”
Julian Lob-Levyt, the executive secretary of the GAVI Alliance, a partnership among drug companies, health agencies and charities bringing vaccines to poor countries, said he “hugely welcomed” the announcement.
“If other donors follow the lead of the Gates Foundation and step up their funding for vaccines,” Dr. Lob-Levyt said, “GAVI has the ability to immunize millions of children against the world’s two biggest childhood killers, pneumonia and diarrhea.”
Vaccines already get more financing from the Gates Foundation than any other cause, and Mr. Gates said no money would be shifted away from other projects, like improved crops, assistance to small businesses and, on the domestic front, schools and libraries. Instead, he and Warren Buffett will increase their annual gifts to the foundation, and about 30 percent of all spending, up from 20 percent, will be for vaccines.
In calculating that eight million lives could be saved, Mr. Gates cited a computer model developed for the foundation by public health specialists at Johns Hopkins University.
Whether such an optimistic prediction comes true depends on several factors that are still uncertain.
For starters, Mr. Gates wants to make sure that 90 percent of the world’s children get shots for routine childhood diseases like measles, diphtheria, whooping cough and polio. Right now, almost 80 percent do. But with 134 million children born each year, it is a constant struggle to keep up, and efforts can be interrupted by factors like war, natural disasters, bad roads and corrupt officials.
Then he assumes that two new vaccines against rotavirus and pneumococcal disease, which are major killers of malnourished children, are adopted as routine immunizations in most poor countries and reach 80 percent of all children by 2020. Even in wealthy countries, the introduction of any new vaccine can be tricky because of bureaucratic and logistical delays and because unexpected rumors can spring up, like the persistent one that polio vaccine is a plot to sterilize Muslim girls.
Mr. Gates’s model also assumes that a malaria vaccine now in development by GlaxoSmithKline will be approved and will by 2014 reach at least some of the one million children, mostly in Africa, who die annually of the disease.
Yet the vaccine, known as RTS,S, is still in the testing phase. And as Mr. Gates acknowledged, “you can always be surprised” during clinical trials.
On the pessimistic side, his model assumes that no vaccine against AIDS or tuberculosis will be licensed during the decade — something that virtually all public health specialists ruefully agree with because progress on those has been very slow.No longer will Bill Gates get caught up in nerd squabbles with Steve Jobs...... more
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Superb must-read article on the Gates Foundation - Africa's ultimate "strong-man" with the power to make the world bend to its misguided agenda. Good to see this in The Nation and its special focus on food.
http://www.thenation.com/doc/20090921
EXTRACTS: ...the destinies of millions of the world's poorest farmers are again being shaped by the richest Americans, and philanthropic choices are very different from democratic ones.
In a number of [Gates] grants, for instance, one corporation appears repeatedly--Monsanto. To some extent, this simply reflects Monsanto's domination of industrial agricultural research. There are, however, notable synergies between Gates and Monsanto... and there's some overlap between them. Robert Horsch, a former senior vice president at Monsanto, is, for instance, now interim director of Gates's agricultural development program and head of the science and technology team.
Travis English and Paige Miller, researchers with the Seattle-based Community Alliance for Global Justice, have uncovered some striking trends in Gates Foundation funding. By following the money, English told us that "AGRA used funds from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation to write twenty-three grants for projects in Kenya. Twelve of those recipients are involved in research in genetically modified agriculture, development or advocacy. About 79 percent of funding in Kenya involves biotech in one way or another." And, English says, "so far, we have found over $100 million in grants to organizations connected to Monsanto."
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Much more at the link. The article attached is well worth the read. I am truly amazed at the arrogance of these companies and their benefactors telling other countries what they need, especially when it is only for their financial benefit. As the attached article at the link relates, people need access to food and to food sovereignty, not to be held to the whims of the rich.Superb must-read article on the Gates Foundation - Africa's ultimate... more
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envisionGood.tv met up with Aaron Sklar, Designer for Humanity at IDEO, this week at his office in Palo Alto, California: learn from Aaron what "humanity-centered design" is all about, and hear what you can expect at his panel at the upcoming Social Capital Markets (SOCAP09) conference in San Francisco, Ca, this September.
Thanks for watching: please subscribe, comment, and rate this vid - thanks!envisionGood.tv met up with Aaron Sklar, Designer for Humanity at IDEO, this week at... more
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Sally Madsen, Designer of Social Impact (IDEO) at IDEO joined us for a short interview at IDEO's office in Palo Alto, California this week. Learn from Sally what "human-centered" design is all about, and hear what Sally has to say about her current project: "Ripple Effect" - an initiative to bring safe drinking water to communities of need in Kenya and India. Sally will be talking more about "Ripple Effect" in an upcoming panel at SOCAP09: Social Capital Markets conference in San Francisco, California on September 1st - 3rd, 2009.
Thanks for watching: please subscribe to envisionGood.tv, comment, and rate this vid! Thanks!Sally Madsen, Designer of Social Impact (IDEO) at IDEO joined us for a short interview... more
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Wed Apr 22, 6:47 pm ET >>Clipsfcwire>> National accredited only
To: NATIONAL EDITORS
Contact: Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, +1-206-709-3400, media@gatesfoundation.org
SEATTLE, April 22 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation welcomes today's news that the UK Government will deliver on its promises to the poorest people in the world, despite the current economic downturn, and achieve the EU target to increase development assistance to 0.56 percent of National Income by 2010.
"The UK government's pledge to increase the amount of money it gives to poor countries at this time will contribute to real progress in the fight against poverty and disease," said Bill Gates, co-chair of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. "We know that progress is possible on the major challenges facing poor people across the world, even in difficult times. It takes sustained and smart investments to maintain progress and reach shared global goals.
"Along with recent positive news from the United States and Germany, this shows that G8 countries are able to meet their ODA targets. We hope that all G8 countries will honor their previous commitments in the fight against poverty and disease by the time of the G8 Summit in July."
"We are committed to working with governments and other partners in Europe and around the world. Like them, we are working to ensure that gains made so far to combat poverty and improve health are not reversed because of the global economic crisis," said Melinda Gates, co-chair of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.
Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation
Guided by the belief that every life has equal value, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation works to help all people lead healthy, productive lives. In developing countries, it focuses on improving people's health and giving them the chance to lift themselves out of hunger and extreme poverty. In the United States, it seeks to ensure that all people -- especially those with the fewest resources -- have access to the opportunities they need to succeed in school and life. Based in Seattle, Washington, the foundation is led by CEO Jeff Raikes and Co-chair William H. Gates Sr., under the direction of Bill and Melinda Gates and Warren Buffett. Learn more at www.gatesfoundation.org.
SOURCE Bill & Melinda Gates FoundationWed Apr 22, 6:47 pm ET >>Clipsfcwire>> National accredited only
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