It is necessary to ensure that the measures being taken to contain climate warming are clear and effective, not make believe. Obviously, many of them will generate new economic, financial and social burdens. Whoever suggests otherwise is either living permanently on cloud 9, or trying to deceive, probably including him/herself.
The question that arises is how to distribute emerging burdens in a just manner. There seems to be general agreement that this is what should be done, not least because doing otherwise would certainly provoke a wide political backlash.
In all measures, a social balance has to be kept that would allow populations which are being adversely affected to get compensation for the adverse consequences they will have to face. The case of coal miners (who will all be losing their jobs) is perhaps the most obvious instance of this.
Adverse consequences resulting from other measures are less salient but they too need some mechanism to balance their effect. Like for instance with the new taxes that will be introduced on air transport.
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LIBYA THE FORGOTTEN?
Perhaps it’s something that should be taken for granted. But since Putin launched his war, it looks like Libya has been forgotten. At times like this, first things first becomes the call -- which makes it natural for the conflict in Ukraine to get first priority.
Yet, when a major conflagration is happening somewhere and not that far from it smaller fires are taking root, the danger is that by ignoring them, one lets them get stronger. They might then join with the “big” one to develop into a massive bonfire.
As of now, all attempts to bring the governance of Libya back to a “normal” mode have been stymied. One imagines that time after time the best efforts were made to satisfy national leaders of all kinds... and to serve the interests of foreign powers who wish to keep a finger in the Libyan pie. What was really in the interests of the Libyan people overall might quite likely have been less than related to what was being proposed.
The failure occurred on two fronts: vested interests remained dissatisfied while the aspirations of the Libyan people for peace and progress were not met.
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SMALL AND MEDIUM SIZED
These past weeks, walking down streets which I had not visited for a while, I was impressed by the number of small and medium sized enterprises (smes), shops mostly, which had closed down. Indeed, in Europe it is said that this is one characteristic of smes -- that they are established, then die out, then revive or some other enterprise replaces them. In this turnover, the dynamism of the sector as a whole is displayed.
Even so, it’s not pleasant at all to note how small enterprises which one had been familiar with (having bought some of their wares) for twenty, thirty years are now unexpectedly shuttered. Despite govenment aids, many European smes have not managed to survive the disruptions that came in the wake first of the Covid pandemic, then of the war in the Ukraine.