Monsoon rains upon us

Pakistan remain woefully unprepared for floods this year which UN officials said could affect up to five million people in worst-case scenario. All along the Indus River, dykes and embankments are incomplete while international donations for preparedness have fallen short. Sindh, one of the last year's most hard-hit provinces, is especially vulnerable to new flooding. Last year's floods began in late July after heavier-than-usual monsoon rains swelled the headwaters of the Indus River basin, sending flash floods through the northwest and inundating great swaths of the country...>

Bittersweet Elections

Official results for the Haitian presidential election has been released. This long process should have occurred in February 2010 but has been postponed due to the earthquake first and then accusations of fraud. Michel "Sweet Micky" Martelly is officially the president. With no political experience, the singer is preparing to play a very delicate role: to give Haiti a government capable of interacting with international organizations, NGOs and, above all, Haitians.Many people wonder which line Martelly will take. The first issue that has begun to deal, in recent days, is about the presence of two bulky ex-presidents recently returned to the country, the former dictator Jean-Claude Duvalier and the ex-priest Jean-Bertrand Aristide...>

San Antonio de los alimentos

San Antonio, Chile . From here, a few years ago, fish was exported and consumed in Europe, Asia and North America. The most nutritious and the best that could be found in the Pacific Ocean used to be caught in Chilean waters. But, along with the fish, international consumers were tasting great and heroic tales of seafarers, a millennial culture inherited from the indigenous peoples, a unique system of distribution of profits in the all world, which is disappearing and thus generating pain and suffering among the artisanal fishermen, in the framework of an ocean that, despite its name, is Pacificless...>

The Mapuche: companies kill Mother Earth

Foreign interests for the Chilean hydroelectric power does not stop in Patagonia. About 800 miles north of Coyhaique, is Panguipulli, the tourist center of the Region de Los Rios in the Sur Chico. Here at least seven hydropower projects signed by Enel / Endesa, and the Norwegian by Colbún Sn Power, threatening not only aecosystem still intact, but also the survival of the Mapuche community for overfive hundred years live in these territories. La Region de los Rios is in fact a crucial point of 'bulky program Chilean energy, and is in the town of Panguipulli which may concentrate about 10% hydroelectric capacity in the country...>

Food Sovereignty

642 persons coming from 93 countries and representing 450 organizations of peasant and family farmers, small scale fisher folk, pastoralists, indigenous peoples, youth, women, the urban people, agricultural workers, local and international NGOs, and other social actors, gathered in Rome from the 13-17 of November 2009, few days before the World Summit on Food Security 2009 held in Rome by FAO. Representing millions of people united in their determination to work for and demand food sovereignty in a moment in which the growing numbers of the hungry has surpassed the one billion mark. Food sovereignty entails transforming the current food system to ensure that those who produce food have equitable access to, and control over, land water, seeds, fisheries and agricultural biodiversity...>

A walk near the sea of Gaza

I clearly remember that morning. We had all woken up early to go and have a look to the fish market, where the wholesale prices were being discussed, and after febrile offers, the goods were immediately sent to the local markets and restaurants.Fishes were small, but carefully arranged in the boxes, one on top of the other. A large mural was there, depicting the market life, reminding me of an ancient fresco, from the times when fishing was enough to feed people.Now it is difficult, we are told. Patrols prevent boats from going beyond six nautical miles, despite the all night long fishing, not much is brought back. ...>

Ending Fishes

Dar Es Salam. Meeting Alex around six in the morning. He tells me that his father was a fisherman who has spent nearly fifty years in the sea around Pemba, one of the three largest islands in Tanzania. Thanks to his father, he grow up developing a very special relationship with fishing. He soon learned to recognize the different species, but especially to respect what each day accompanied his father on board of the Dhow. The Sea. As we enter the fish market of Dar Es Salaam, the largest in East Africa, Alex tells me how times changed and how traditional fishing activity is no longer economically sustainable. Dhow are going out in the open water for several kilometers, while larger vessels, controlled by large corporations, manage to return with large quantities of fish...>

Dunum, Land of Palestine

District of Jenin, north of Palestine. If the photographer had moved the camera a few degrees, the target would include settlements, by-pass roads, the wall. Luca, not as other photographers, did not came here looking for a cliché-shock-shots. He lives in Palestine, he works there. He got time. His approach is patient, respectful, modest. If you do not see the faces of women, is because they are kept apart. Here, the real queen is the Land. Omnipresent in wrinkles furrowed by the peace of work in the fields, slowly, in their faces burnt by the sun, the pride of the eyes of those who know where is the proper place, for generations, under the immense sky...>

Traces of Palestine

This project begins in a small soap factory of Nablus, in the north of the West Bank, where the Palestinians still produce soap manually from olive oil with a traditional process, strongly challenged by modern industrialization. In the past the soap factory was the pulsing heart of the local social and economic life. Althought Nablus soap industry goes back to hundreds of years, we start having evidences about it only in the tenth century. This industry proliferated mainly in the Old City-Qasabeh area, which is made of six neighborhoods: Yasminah, Qaryoun, Qasabeh, Qisariyeh, Hableh and Faqous...>