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Council on Foreign Relations (September 7)

2017/ 09/ 08 by jd in Global News

“Congress, again, should take the lead” in Asia. “Not only has the White House paid relatively little attention to growing crises in mainland Southeast Asia but those crises are quickly spiraling out of control.” There is an opportunity “for Congress, rather than the White House, to develop a tough approach to the growing climate of repression in Cambodia” and solve other issues like the crisis affecting the persecuted Rohingya fleeing Myanmar for Bangladesh.

 

USA Today (August 30)

2017/ 09/ 01 by jd in Global News

“Climate change didn’t cause Harvey, but it almost surely made the storm worse.” And extreme weather “isn’t just happening in North America. Even as Harvey riveted the nation’s attention this week, the death toll topped 1,000 from unusually severe monsoonal rains half a world away in Bangladesh, India and Nepal.” With such destruction creating “a torrent of human misery, the question isn’t whether the nation can afford to get serious about global warming. We can’t afford not to.”

 

The Los Angeles Times (January 21, 2014)

2014/ 01/ 21 by jd in Global News

Half a century ago, the Surgeon General declared cigarette smoking causes lung cancer. Since the earth-shattering report, “the percentage of Americans who smoke has dropped by more than half,” with only 18% still lighting up. “Other developed countries have achieved similarly dramatic smoking reductions.” Staggering estimates are put on items such as lives saved and medical costs eliminated. “But this is not the end of the story, sadly.” Cigarette smoking has grown dramatically in developing countries, nearly tripling between 1970 and 2000 alone. “There are now 1 billion smokers globally, almost one-third of the world’s adult population, and smoking rates are increasing in some countries, such as Bangladesh and Indonesia.”

 

New York Times (June 27)

2013/ 06/ 28 by jd in Global News

The outsourcing model is broken. “Most American and European brands and retailers use a rotating cast of hundreds of third-world suppliers, instead of establishing long-term relationships with fewer of them.” The result is a race to the bottom and horrid catastrophes like the building collapse in Bangladesh which killed more than 1,100 people. Things must change. Retailers should “contract with fewer factories and establish long-term relationships with them. If they did so, they would have to monitor fewer factories and would have greater influence over suppliers to demand upgrades and changes.”

 

Los Angeles Times (May 17, 2013)

2013/ 05/ 18 by jd in Global News

“If the horrific garment factory collapse last month in Bangladesh has any silver lining, it is the response from more than 30 of the world’s leading apparel companies — including Benetton, PVH, Abercrombie & Fitch, H&M, Inditex (Zara), Marks & Spencer and Tesco — to sign an agreement to protect the safety and lives of that nation’s workers, who make the companies’ products.”

 

LA Times (May 7, 2013)

2013/ 05/ 08 by jd in Global News

“The deaths of more than 600 garment workers in Bangladesh’s Rana Plaza factory collapse April 24 is a tragedy that highlights widespread problems in the global apparel industry. But will it be the spark that finally leads to much-needed global reforms?” Not until we quit looking for smoking guns and, instead, look in the mirror. Only then, will we see “the real culprits: the global apparel industry and ourselves for being complicit in supporting or ignoring a system of trade and offshoring largely designed to bypass regulatory policy of every stripe, while putting maximum profit before people.”

 

Time (April 25)

2011/ 04/ 29 by jd in Global News

Time calls it “the China Effect.” As China prospers and internal demand generates an ever larger share of economic growth, low-skill manufacturing is being shifted to other Asian countries, including Vietnam, Bangladesh, Malaysia and Thailand. “After ferociously sucking jobs and investment out of Southeast Asia over the past two decades, the China Effect is now lifting once declining industrial hubs like Penang out of their long economic slump.” The era with China as the world’s factory is beginning to come to an end.

Time calls it “the China Effect.” As China prospers and internal demand generates an ever larger share of economic growth, low-skill manufacturing is being shifted to other Asian countries, including Vietnam, Bangladesh, Malaysia and Thailand. “After ferociously sucking jobs and investment out of Southeast Asia over the past two decades, the China Effect is now lifting once declining industrial hubs like Penang out of their long economic slump.” The era with China as the world’s factory is beginning to come to an end.

 

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