Monthly Archives: June 2014

keita

Ebola deaths pass 300 in West Africa-WHO

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The number of people killed by the deadly Ebola virus in West Africa has risen, WHO has said. Ebola-related deaths were reported in three countories by the WHO. The three countries have been battling to contain the outbreak . The outbreak began in the one countory, but then spread to its neighbours.

There is no cure or vaccine for Ebola. It is spread by close contact and kills between 25% and 90% of those infected, according to the WHO. Symptoms include internal and external bleeding, diarrhoea and vomiting.

The WHO said it was working with the three countories to strengthen cross- border collaboration aimed at tackling the outbreak. It dose not recommend any travel or trade restrictions on the three countories, the WHO added.

I think that Ebola virus is so terrible and I hope to decrease the victims by Ebola tirus.

At first, we should prevent infection from spreading. Simultaneously, we should discover the way to cure. Although the sanitation in Africa  is poor, they should keep themselves clean as much as possible.

Like this, as taking care of sanitary management, we wish the new medicine will be developed. I hope that the number of people infected Ebola virus will drcrease and I wish African safety.

kenji

My reaction “Made in Africa: Is manufacturing taking off on the continent?”

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The low cost of manufacturing in African countries is attracting companies from around the world.

Several African countries have enjoyed economic growth in recent years, but there are fears that a failure to develop manufacturing could prove to be costly.

“Economies that have sustained high growth over the long term have typically gone through a process of economic diversification, the spread of new technologies, rising productivity in agriculture, the expansion of the manufacturing sector, and the development of a skilled workforce,” write the authors of a recently published Africa Progress Panal report.

“These have not been characteristics of growth in Africa, even in sectors that are attracting foreign investment. Put differently, there has been a lot of growth but little structural transformation,” they conclude.

I think that the low cost of manufacturing in Africa is very attractive for some developped countries. European countries maybe able to benefit from African countries. African workers are paid low salary compared with European workers. Moreover, companies can rent African lands with low costs. America or Japan are far from African countries, so they can’t reap the much benefit, but European countries maybe able to reap it.

However, the environment in African countries is bad compared from European countries. I think European countries should help African countries to build infrastracture, give financial support. Helping each other is very important about this problem between developping countries to developped countries.

yuka

Social Business in Uganda

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This article carries a story of social business in Uganda.
In Uganda, infant mortality is currently at issue.
BundleTree Baby, a baby blanket and accessories brand, sell products all handmade by Ugandan mothers in order to empower mothers and save babies. The profit directly contributes to a healthcare and education fund.
People can recognize the exact support toward such social issues through small purchases.

＜Comment＞
My comment is about sustainability of social business.
Even if the products cannot be sold well, the company cannot dismiss its workers and has to continue paying rural mothers certain amount of money.
The company cannot make large amount of products because they are all handmade. Products of social business absolutely need to survive market competition as well as other product by profit seeking companies.
Thus, I doubted whether social businesses such as BundleTree Baby continue to support mothers and babies.
Social businesses in a rural area, however, have a sense of strong community ties among women toward a shared goal. Since women recognize they need to cooperate each other in order to make a living in a small rural area, mutual understandings, trusts and respects are formed among women there.
These characteristics can be strong point of social businesses.
Therefore, I think companies running social businesses can probably be sustainable through making full use of these advantages.

etona

EU court backs “right to be forgotten” in Google case

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summery

A top EU court has ruled Google must amend some search results which is irrelevant and outdated date at the request of ordinary people in a test of the “right to be forgotten”.
They concluded that sometimes Google’s search would infringe someone’s privacy.
But Google said they were disappointed at this conclusion and it was inadequate because it’s hard for them to do censorship a lot of data.
Finally the court said people had the right to request information be removed if it appeared to be “inadequate,irrelevant or no longer relevant.”

my reaction
I thought the right to be forgotten is very important for this social and we have to think about treating the information.
I heard about this news on BBC before the class , I could deepen the opinion about this through the discussion.
Today, we face and treat a lot of information, so we consider about the merit and demerit of information…
For example, privacy ,classified information , the right to know and etc….
Reading this article, I could find out the good point and bad point of information society

keisuke, Uncategorized

My reaction about poaching elephants

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In the last lesson, our group picked up the topic about apartheid. It was very meaningful for me to study the history on discrimination in Africa. But in the last half of lesson, our teacher Damon gave us some challenging problems, the part of which is about the trade in illicit ivory. So, I would like to talk about ivory.

First of all, what is it ivory?  Since the past, people have been processing ivory and making several products such as musical instruments, craftworks and especially personal seals in Japan. But in Japan, most ivory is imported and China is also big buyer in the world. On the other hand, main exporters are African countries. Cote d’ivoire ,which beated Japan in the World Cup, is one of the largest exporters. That country has another name, Ivory Coast, which means it has been exporting ivory by the ships.

Since 1989, the Washington Treaty has been reducing the trade on ivory. It was held because a lot of elephants was killed by hunters and many people feared that elephants would became extinct. This talks decided to take measures to number each elephants. In that time, the main measure is grasp the numbers of the elephants but that was not succeeded.

I think that poaching elephants is deeper problem. The hunters in Africa want to earn money because of the lack of legal profitable labor. And they also give some profit local people. That’s because killing elephants links to saving their crops and houses from them. Local people are afraid of being damaged by elephants and have been fighting against them. In this topic, several stances are involved. It is bad to takikng a stopgap measure can resolve the complex problem.

nkeita

My Opinion about Bribe

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I heard the news which is about bribe. Former Guatemalan President was sentenced to five years and ten months in jail for taking bribe from Taiwan.

Our discussion group talked about whether bribes are wright and, when it is wrong, how to prevent from taking bribes.

For example, you may say that hospitality – we Japanese sometimes call them Omotenashi – can be a kind of bribe because hospitality and bribe are both used for negotiation. But I think what is essential to both of them is the size of society they contribute to. Even the word bribe sounds bad, I think they are good when they contribute to large societies and many people. On the other hand, I cannot say hospitality is good when it enriches the very small number of people.

And then, how we prevent from bad bribes? This will be a very, very difficult problem. I think we cannot prevent perfectly at all. But if we give up them all, bribes and corruptions will increase much, which can violate our human rights. I think indeed we have to give up some bribes being taken, but keep an eye on the people disposed of our money and rights. We have to make effort to reduce bribes and punish the people who take bribes.

rintaro

My reaction about ivory trade

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The very future of the African elephant, the largest land animal on Earth, could be at risk. The number of elephants in Africa is declining because of illegal hunts.  Alarmingly, elephant population is being hit hardest, with thousands of elephants killed each year. According to the article existence of a legal trade is contributing to provide cover for a much more extensive black market. These markets are patronised by ex-pat communities and Chinese business, and almost ninety per cent of all the people arrested at the airports ferrying ivory are Chinese. It’s conclude that China’s booming economy means there will be an ever-growing market.
Food chain. Animals kill other animals to survive, so I don’t think killing animals for food is wrong. But in the event of poaching in Africa,  MONEY is at the heart of the killing of elephants. Killing animal to earn money(or to calm down excessive desire) and killing animals for meat are definitely different. It must be difficult to fight against poaching but we should react rapidly to help elephant from the risk of extinction. I want to stress that, reinforcing the monitoring system to detect poachers or toughening the law to punish poachers more strictly could be a strong deterrent to crime, but those measures are not effective enough to abolish illegal ivory trades. Securing the future of Africa’s elephant will mean not just beating the poachers but also tackling black-market sales in China(we don’t have to forget punishing buyers of tusks). In addition, I think that international cooperation is required to control poaching in Africa. We should realize how it is difficult to arrest poachers and have to extend a helping hand.
Normally ivories are helpful to protect elephants’s life. Ironically having too beautiful ivories is today their primary cause of death…
mao

My reaction about World Cup

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Recently, people become enthusiastic over the world. The FIFA World Cup took place in Brazil,on June 13,2014.

Why do people get excited the soccer game? Probably,nobody knows what will happened until the end of the game. Almost sports except soccer are possible to expect a victory or defeat by the ranking of the world easily. However,soccer wasn’t influenced the ranking of the world because only goal decided the game. For example, Spain which was ranked top in the world was eliminated in the first league in this World Cup. People were surprised to hear this fact all over the world. There will not seldom happen in other sports. Therefore, nobody knows country which win the trophy. That’s why many people are so excited the soccer games.

According to this article, although Cameroon was very strong team, this team faced a crisis that Cameroon skipper Samuel Eto’o will fail to appear the game against Croatia due to his right knee injury. The situation took an unexpected turn.

Many people expect the host country, Brazil to win this tournament. But, Someone will perform miracles during this tournament. So, I am looking forward to seeing the final match.

Uncategorized, yhiroki

My reaction about a Ugandan journalist

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Summary

In Uganda, a journalist makes effort to support lost and abandoned children. Her name is Gladys Kalibala. She is writing newspaper column for New Vision, one of Uganda’s leading newspapers to get more people know that children and to offer assistance for them.
Kalibala is loved by many of motherless children because she primarily considers them. But she is not a rich woman. But thanks to funds provided by her supportive readers, she supports she pays tuition fees, for example.
Where does her compassion come from? The key is her childhood. Because she was abandoned by her mother, she was raised by her grandfather. He was a reverend, so he often willingly helped needy people. Because she grew with looking at such behavior of him, she took over his mind.
She hopes to start a foundation for supporting these children by providing them with shelter and education.

Opinion

After reading this article, I was surprised at her conscientiousness. How many people who can do the same are there? Of course, some people do the same. But in many cases, they are rich people. Not rich people, like us, can’t easily such things. Well then, what shall they do?
I think there are 2 means for this.
First, they can start fund campaigns or join them. If even they have little money, many a little makes a mickle. This is an ordinary means but most effective means I think.
Second, they can inform existence of that children to other people, like Kalibala. Today, the power of the mass media is very strong. Supportive people may appear for this. Thanks to the spread of the Internet, we can inform various things to people in the world. And recently, by the appearance of SNS, we became to connect other people more easily.

naoki

my reaction about poaching africa elephant

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Summary

My group talked about poaching Africa elephants. The survival of Africa’s elephants are under threat because many people poached elephants for their ivory, and trade it them secretly. The report documented an increase in number of large seizures of ivory in 2013. Africa elephant is endangered species. Now elephants are threatened with extinction. Elephant conservationists do believe that increased ivory confiscation is a sign that law enforcement is improving. We have to know about the poaching more, who, where and how. And find out a solution to stop it.

Opinion

I have two opinions. First, I think that the law about poaching and transnational organized crime should be more strictly. It is important to regulate the trade about endangered animals more strictly. The second solution is to preserve Africa elephants. The government preserves and watches them as national property. And making a huge area where human can’t enter is very important. But many developing countries don’t have much money. So it is difficult to preserving many animals. In the present situation, I think making the law is better solution. We have to find a solution protecting animals from extinction.