Israel has been under pressure to make changes to the blockade since the May 31st skirmish that left 9 people dead aboard a ship carrying aid items.

From NPR, this Associated Press story gives us more details on the changes to the blockade.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office released few details about the changes in its three-year-old blockade, and it was not clear whether any firm decisions had been made.

The only item singled out in its statement was a plan to allow in desperately needed construction materials for civilian projects, but only under international supervision.

Israel has barely allowed in materials like cement and steel, arguing that Hamas militants could use them to build weapons and fortifications. That policy has prevented Gaza from rebuilding after Israel’s fierce war in the territory last year.

There was no mention in the statement of any change in other damaging aspects of the blockade, like bans on exports or allowing in raw materials used in industrial production.
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But the blockade failed to achieve its aims of stanching the flow of weapons to Gaza or weakening Hamas. A network of smuggling tunnels under the Egypt-Gaza border became a conduit for both weapons and commercial goods sold at black market prices. Gazans sank deeper into poverty, turning their anger against Israel and not their Hamas rulers.
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Amid the heavy international criticism that followed the Israeli naval raid, Egypt opened its land border crossing with Gaza – the main gateway for some residents to enter and exit the crowded territory.

But most Gazans remained confined to the territory because Egyptian officials say they have let in only about 10,000 people with special travel permits, such as students and people with foreign passports.

Israel will now allow construction materials into Gaza is a post from: Updated News

From The Daily Journal is this snippet of Harris’ commentary. Harris is the founder of the Microcredit Summit and Results.

He was so shaken by the sight of people dying of starvation that when he set foot into Jobra, the village next to his campus, all he wanted to do was to see if he could be of use to one person for one day — not 40 million — just one.

It was in that village that he met a stool maker who horrified him when she explained she earned only 2 cents a day for her beautiful craftsmanship. With no money to buy the bamboo she needed, Sufia Khatun was forced to borrow from a moneylender who demanded that she sell her finished stools back to him at a price he set — a price so low that she made only 2 cents a day profit.

When he asked whether she could earn more if she was freed from the moneylender, she told him, “Yes I can.” Yunus had a student look for other villagers who were in the same dilemma. The student found 42 people who needed a grand total of $27 to pay off the moneylender, buy their raw materials and sell their wares to the highest bidder. That’s right; all they needed was an average of 68 cents each. With her loan of less than $1 the stool-maker’s profits soared from 2 cents a day to $1.25 a day.
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Now, Yunus has set his sights on titans of business and industry with his social business concept, and the chairmen of Dannone, Intel and BASF are beating a “yes we can” path to his door to create new nonprofit/non-loss businesses that have as their sole goal improving people’s lives. The corporations can recover their initial investments in the social businesses, but after that, all profits are plowed back into these new companies. They include a joint venture with Dannone producing nutritionally fortified yogurt for malnourished villagers, another with BASF producing chemically treated bed-nets to protect people from mosquitoes carrying malaria, and still another with Intel bringing information technology solutions to rural villages.

When the U.S. president shook the hand of the Bangladeshi micro-banker at the White House ceremony last week, Obama touched his own past and the microfinance work his mother did in Indonesia. And when Yunus opens the Microcredit Summit next April in Nairobi, Kenya, the micro-banker from Bangladesh will launch the next phase of microfinance in the birthplace of Obama’s father and throughout the continent.

Comment: the roots of microcredit is a post from: Updated News

Global Witness says companies sourcing minerals used in electronic gadgets are buying them from traders who finance rebel and government troops.

It calls for the UK-based Amalgamated Metal Corporation (AMC) and others to have assets frozen over the issue.

AMC, whose subsidiary Thaisarco sources tin from DR Congo, denies the claims.

The Global Witness report focuses on the troubled region of eastern DR Congo, where various rebel groups and government troops control large parts of the trade in minerals including coltan, cassiterite and gold.

Read more ….

My Comment: These activists are blaming Western firms, but the biggest purchaser of these raw materials are Chinese firms hungry for the raw material that is essential in the production of their electronics.

Mineral Firms ‘Fuel Congo Unrest’ is a post from: Updated News

The cost of goods leaving UK factories in February rose at the slowest rate for 16 months, figures have shown.

Factory gate inflation fell to 3.1% last month, compared with 3.5% in January, according to the Office for National Statistics (ONS).

That is the lowest annual rate since September 2007. The fall was largely due to a drop in prices for oil and petroleum products, the ONS said.

Input price inflation also eased to 0.5% from 1.5% in January.

The ONS said a 37.8% drop in crude oil prices over the last year was the main reason for the lower prices paid by factories for raw materials.

On Thursday, the Bank of England cut interest rates to a new record low of 0.5%.

The data from the ONS justified the Bank’s course of action, said Lloyds economist Kenneth Broux.

“The outlook is for a period of low interest rates,” he said.

Factory gate inflation slows down is a post from: Updated News

The global economic slowdown will hit the poorest nations hardest. Demand for their exports is falling. Prices of raw materials are plunging. Flows of money from migrant workers to families back home will shrink as unemployment rises elsewhere. In these circumstances it is more important than ever that rich countries deliver on aid promises. That is why the OECD has called on the world’s main donors to join an Aid Pledge to stick by their commitments.

As world leaders head to Doha for a U.N. meeting on financing for development this Saturday (November 29), however, another dimension of the issue needs urgent attention: tax systems.

Efficient tax systems underpin development. Rich countries rely on taxes to finance aid flows. In developing countries, locally generated taxes are a much bigger source of development finance than aid. Effective tax systems, based on cooperative relationships between governments, businesses and individuals, are a bedrock for democracy and growth. When businesses and citizens form part of the formal economy, good tax administration can provide for pensions, social security payments and other instruments of the modern state.

But there’s a dark side. Tax dodgers in developed and developing countries deprive governments of revenues. Many take advantage of the lack of transparency in tax havens. Developing countries are estimated to lose to tax havens almost three times what they get from developed countries in aid. If taxes on assets hidden by tax dodgers were collected in their owners’ jurisdictions, billions of dollars could become available for financing development.

Fighting tax evasion calls for cooperation between developed and developing countries. At home governments must enact fair and effective policies and make it easy for taxpayers to comply with their obligations.

Internationally, they must push for greater transparency in cross-border financial transactions.

As incoming G20 chair, Britain must take up this challenge. It has played a lead role in OECD work on countering tax haven abuse, but more is needed. Ties with Commonwealth countries and dependencies that operate as offshore financial centres make it uniquely well placed to push for improved standards of transparency. At the same time, it can give a lead in helping developing countries improve their tax administration.

We need to be realistic. Developing countries often lack the resources to build effective tax systems. Citizens may be unwilling to pay on the grounds that governments misuse the funds. It can be difficult to implement fair taxation in low-income, agrarian economies. And the poor are often subject to an equivalent of tax, in bribes and informal fees.

But something can be done. The OECD’s decade-long drive against tax havens and evasion is bearing fruit in the form of bilateral treaties aimed at improving transparency and exchange of information. The trend is spreading beyond the OECD, with China and South Africa joining this campaign. At the same time, donor countries are helping poorer nations develop fair tax services.

Significantly, developing countries are joining forces too. An African Tax Administration Forum is being developed under the leadership of Botswana, Cameroon, Ghana, Nigeria, Rwanda, South Africa and Uganda. By inviting governments to share good practices, it aims to improve service delivery and taxpayer education. Success will increase accountability, strengthen democracy and combat corruption.

In 2006, only $88m of a total $103bn in official development assistance from OECD countries was dedicated to tax-related tasks. But aid targeted at capacity building in revenue administrations is money well spent. Donor support to the Rwanda Revenue Authority brought a dramatic increase in tax revenue, from 9% of GDP in 1998 to 14.7% in 2005, with an equally significant effect on state accountability. We cannot allow the crisis to undermine such efforts.

The last time we faced a major global downturn, aid budgets fell dramatically — curtailing investment in agriculture, infrastructure, social welfare and political stability. Similar cuts now would be even more damaging, after volatility in commodity prices and a global food crisis have already hit the poor. Cuts may bring short-term savings to donor governments, but they would cost much more in the longer term in extra spending on security and humanitarian aid.

Earlier this week, OECD donors joined in an Aid Pledge to maintain aid flows consistent with promises at Gleneagles and elsewhere. If combined with a joint effort to fight tax evasion, the results for development could be significant. The OECD, as the leading international organisation with a mandate to work on tax policy, is committed to this objective. More effective tax systems in developed and developing countries would help to build a stronger, cleaner and fairer world economy. And they would help the poorest the most.

(Angel Gerri is Secretary-General of the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development.)

World – Tax evasion threat to development is a post from: Updated News