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The irony of subsisting in the middle of an ocean of resources

Bijoy Patro

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5 January 2022

The irony of subsisting in the middle of an ocean of resources

Islanders in a distant Maldivian atoll now benefit from a fish filleting platform installed to add value to the catch the fishermen bring.

200 kilometres north of the country’s capital island, Male, the N Maalhendhoo island is one of the 14 inhabited islands of the larger Noono Atoll that consists of 71 islands in all.

Unlike the other parts of Maldives, N. Maalhendhoo has more than just tuna fish. There are fusiliers and snappers too and island fishermen sell these fish to traders for very little money. The islanders always knew the trader’s excuses for not paying them enough were hollow, but there was very little they could do about it.

Subsistence in the middle of the vast Indian Ocean and the resource it had put to their disposal was ironical. All it needed was a little investment. This is where the bank of Maldives stepped in.

Bank of Maldives community fund

The community fund programme of the Bank of Maldives on Monday commissioned a fish filleting platform in N. Maalhendhoo implemented in the island by Maldivian NGO, Society for Leaders Initiate Development (SLID).

The space is designed to be used during the day and night with appropriate lighting to sort out and fillet the catch of fish that the fishermen bring. The workstations can accommodate eight people. It has storage unit and a supply of clean water and drainage to remove waste water. Dustbins have been placed in the area.

“The aim of the project was to find a solution for the difficulties that our fishermen faced. For the past years, we used the jetty at the harbour to carry out the filleting even in bad weather conditions,” a representative of the NGO said. “Through this project, we hope it benefits the islanders and the local fishermen to cut and sell fish in a more convenient manner.”

The commissioning of the platform was preceded by a fish cutting contest.

Resorts empty during COVID-19

Now, the approximately 700 fisher-folks living in the island of N. Maalhendhoo have a first sign of commercial activity in their community. The excitement is palpable.

All these years, young men and women from the island have had to look for work in the six resorts in the Atoll. There was very little work following the COVID-19 pandemic. The threat of the islands drowning with climate change has hindered any other infrastructure development in the atoll.

The community fund of the Bank of Maldives has so far supported 60 projects across the various atolls of the island nation.

COVID-19 And Military Coup Result in Poverty; Impact Food Consumption In Myanmar

OWSA Contributor

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5 January 2022

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COVID-19 And Military Coup Result in Poverty; Impact Food Consumption In Myanmar

An United Nations study estimates that in a worst-case scenario, almost half the population of Myanmar could slide below the poverty line by 2022. This is the twin impact of COVID-19 and the coup by the country’s military junta.

The impact of COVID-19 on the people of Myanmar has been compounded by the February 1 coup d’état of 2021, says a recently released survey report by the United Nations. The report holds ominous warnings of poverty knocking on the doors of half of the country.

Existing vulnerabilities have intensified, “impacting Myanmar’s people at the family level and even individual level,” according to the report. Nearly three fourths of households surveyed reported a drop in income. Galloping poverty has hit urban homes particularly hard.

“The last ten months showed a rising trend of households eating less food,” says the report. While the reduced consumption of food was more prevalent in urban areas, over a tenth of rural households surveyed reported that they had consumed the food they had kept aside for the lean season.

Coming on the heels of the COVID-19 pandemic, the report says, “households living in proximity to conflict have experienced the largest reduction in income.” It adds that “over three-quarters of them have reduced non-food consumption as a coping strategy.”

Distress Selling of Assets Amid Poverty

“People are also increasingly selling assets to cover living expenses, mainly gold or jewelry, livestock and motorbikes,” the study says. It adds that “There is anecdotal evidence that since the military takeover a number of informal credit businesses had arisen.”

Two-fifths (38.7 per cent) of respondents who had relied on savings since 1 February said that they have no more savings left. “People are increasingly selling assets to cover living expenses,” the report reads.

The shortage of cash has served to enhance credit businesses. This business revolved around pawning of assets or a borrower signing a bank transfer instrument. Indeed, 3.4 per cent households even reported earning interest lending money.

Other households receive informal support from family, friends and religious institutions while two in 100 receive cash or in-kind support from humanitarian organisations.

Myanmar’s Situation Not Entirely Unpredictable

This report by the United Nations agency builds on previous World Bank High Frequency Surveys and joint Household Vulnerability Survey conducted by the country’s Central Statistical Organisation together with the United Nations Development Programme. The findings are not entirely unpredictable.

Previously, the World Bank’s Myanmar Economic Monitor released earlier in July had estimated the economy to contract around 18 per cent in Myanmar’s Fiscal Year (October 2020 to September 2021).

An earlier report released in June 2021 had estimated that total investment in Myanmar could fall over 40 per cent during the year. “The once-positive outlook for Myanmar in 2021 and the medium term has soured,” it had said.

Impending Poverty Can Impact Half Of Myanmar’s People

The United Nations study estimates that in a worst-case scenario, almost half the population of Myanmar’s 55 million population – some 25 million people – could slide below the national poverty line by 2022. The numbers of urban poor itself could triple, it says. This will effectively erase 15 years of pre-pandemic economic growth.

“The rising levels of poverty is not just about the lack of incomes to survive but we are also seeing a significant risk to nutrition, health and education, which will negatively impact on the human capital of the next generation,” said the survey report.

The report highlights the twin impact of the military coup d’état and the COVID-19 pandemic.

The overthrow of the democratically elected government of Aung San Suu Kyi saw retaliatory mass protests and yet further action by the military junta to clamp down on the protesters. This, together with the COVID-19 pandemic, worsened the condition of people living around the sites of the protests.

Once tossed and abused, human trafficking survivor finds solace

Inter Press Service

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5 January 2022

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Once tossed and abused, human trafficking survivor finds solace

Survivors of human trafficking need help to deal with post-rescue trauma, and the experience they go through during identification interviews and legal proceedings is painful. Some face re-victimisation and are punished for crimes traffickers force them to commit. Others are stigmatised and don’t have a support system.

By Mehru Jaffer / IPS

For over two decades, Nina tossed around like a leaf in a storm. While a teenager growing up in Goa, India, she was lured into the sex trade, and pimps kept a huge chunk of the money that she earned as a sex slave. Nina was often bruised. Once, she refused sex with a man who did not want to use a condom. He beat her so severely that she had found it difficult to breathe.

One day the police raided the premises where Nina and other girls were kept as prisoners and arrested the pimps. The girls were taken to a protective home run by the local government. She like many other trafficked women abused alcohol and smoked to drown her sorrows.

Nina is now in her thirties and cured of her addictions. Her life is comfortable compared with her twenties when she was forced to live in the company of traffickers and pimps.

Lisa Pires of the Presentation Sisters Order told IPS that she had first met Nina in 2019. However, Pires declined to share Nina’s name and whereabouts. Today both government officials and social activists jealously guard the identity of all trafficking survivors who struggle to lead normal lives.

The survivors need help to deal with post-rescue trauma, and the experience they go through during identification interviews and legal proceedings is painful. Some face re-victimisation and are punished for crimes traffickers force them to commit. Others are stigmatised and don’t have a support system.

“We are happy to share stories of victims without revealing their exact identity as society needs to listen and to learn from those who have survived trafficking,” adds Amala Kulandaisamy, 40, social activist and administrative head at the Nagoa centre.

The Presentation Sisters have been working in Goa since 1967.

The Nagoa Centre opened in 2001 in the ancestral home of Pires. Her parents gifted the 110-year-old house to the Order of the Presentation Sisters.

Pires joined the order in 1958 and shares her concerns about what is happening to young women today.

Nina’s story is similar to that of countless Indian women from poverty-stricken parts of eastern Uttar Pradesh (UP) trafficked to Goa for commercial sexual exploitation, Pires says.

Surrounded by half a dozen starving siblings, a mother with mental health issues and an alcoholic father, Nina had fled her village when she was barely 15 years old. Soon after, a gang of boys picked up the vulnerable Nina. They promised her a job in Goa.

Goa is considered a significant destination in India for human trafficking and related commercial sexual work. Girls and women are trafficked to Goa from most states in India, including the countryside near Goa. They are also trafficked from Nepal, Bangladesh, Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan, Turkmenistan, Turkey, Russia, and Thailand. While fewer women are trafficked from Nepal, the number of those sold and bought from Bangladesh increased.

The sex work is primarily concentrated in the coastal belt of North Goa, with maximum rescue operations by the police taking place around the stunningly beautiful beaches of Calangute and Arjuna. Now commercial sex work is said to be spreading from the tourist areas of the coastal belt of North Goa to the mainland and away from tourist hubs.

Throughout last year, Pires worked to reduce trafficking. The theme for 2021 was Victims’ Voices Lead the Way, with social activists spending time with human trafficking survivors counselling them. The survivors are seen as key in the fight against human trafficking. The theme focused on preventing the crime, identifying, and rescuing survivors, and supporting them on the road to rehabilitation.

Local people are encouraged to check the background of those wanting to rent accommodation and ensure that tenants are not part of any human trafficking activity.

The Presentation Sisters are diligent in their work against the trafficking of women and children and sensitive to their sexual exploitation. They provide alternative employment opportunities to survivors and constantly raise awareness against this organised crime.

A vital exercise today is to document the experience of survivors without revealing their identities.

The idea is to turn the suggestions of survivors into concrete action – a more survivor-centred approach to combat human trafficking and encourage lawmakers to pass legislation that will better protect citizens vulnerable to sexual exploitation and ensure they receive justice.

They say that there is a need for stricter regulation of massage parlours and dance bars where sexual exploitation of the vulnerable is high.

Nina is fortunate. She survived the exploitation and has recently visited Potta, a well-known temple town in Kerala. Here she experienced spiritual calm and has returned to Goa to find a regular job as a caretaker in a private home.

Image: Mehru Jaffer / IPS

This piece has been sourced from Inter Press Service

Nepal’s population experts caution on COVID-19

OWSA Contributor

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4 January 2022

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Nepal’s population experts caution on COVID-19

New data shows that the COVID-19 pandemic has taken a toll on sexual and reproductive health programmes in Nepal. Experts worry that they won’t be able to do much unless there are resources.

The Nepal government’s department of health services has figured out that the use of contraceptives dropped to 39.37 per cent during the COVID-19 pandemic in between 24 March and 21 July 21 of 2020. This has come as a surprise for a country that boasted the highest use of contraceptives, especially condoms, in SouthAsia.

Data analysed by the government body also showed that 134 new mothers and pregnant women lost their lives during the infection in the four months in the same period, when a countrywide lockdown was imposed. However, experts take the official figures of maternal deaths with a pinch of salt as many remote communities remain unreached by health facilities even in the best of times.

The number of women who availed of safe abortion service during the same period was less than 15,000, according to the department. Lack of transportation and qualified health workers, excessive bleeding, abortion and labour complication as well as delivery at home were among the factors that led to their death.

Abortions during the lockdown

COVID-19 locked women in urgent need of antenatal and postnatal services indoors. Health department officials have scanned their records to put the number of women availing safe abortion service during the same period at less than 15,000. The lack of taken-for-granted services like transportation often led to excessive bleeding, abortion and labour complications. Often, even complicated cases of labour had to be attended by midwifes.

“Unwanted pregnancy and unsafe abortion have increased during the pandemic due to lack of access to and unavailability of contraceptives and the lack of safe abortion service in time,” Dr Mahesh Puri, co-director of the Centre for Research on Environment, Health and Population Activities (CREHPA) told local radio. “As a result, sexual and reproductive health service indicators have been affected,” he said.

Even in the best of times, just two out of every five abortions in the Himalayan nation.

A discourse Nepal needs to have

The number of children who died for lack of government services during the COVID-19 lockdown is still unclear. Clarity is also lacking on number of teenage pregnancies during the same time.

There is a consensus among health experts in the government as well as among advocacy groups and the government’s bilateral partners that the COVID-19 pandemic has thrown a huge challenge to the government’s maternal and child health programmes.

But senior bureaucrats think differently. Dr Roshan Pokhrel, secretary of health and population told Radio Nepal that “Sexual and reproductive health service indicators did not get impacted negatively amid the infection.”

He says that health services resumed after a gap of time, even though the health department was overwhelmed with COVID-19.

Health advocacy groups claim to be able to see through the argument. They say that it suits the government to avoid the discussion, because any discussion of the problem will need to be followed up with an allocation of resources. That is a challenge when the country’s economy has taken a beating like all other countries in SouthAsia, they say.

It is a discourse that the government and policy makers need to have with civil society groups, they say.

Image: Wikimedia Commons — Mass-community health teaching in Achham, Nepal

Imran Khan Plans A Glitzy City On Mangrove Islands Off Karachi, Pakistan

OWSA Contributor

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4 January 2022

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Imran Khan Plans A Glitzy City On Mangrove Islands Off Karachi, Pakistan

Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan is determined to implement a $50-billion real-estate urbanisation project on the Bundal and Buddo mangrove islands in the Arabian Sea. Environmentalists are sounding the alarm bell. But the government argues that this will ease pressure on Karachi.

Pakistan’s environmentalists are unhappy about the government’s plan to build $50-billion modern cities on the Arabian Sea mangrove islands of Bundal and Buddo. Prime minister Imran Khan wants to be remembered as the builder of the two cities that will vie with the razzmatazz of Dubai – a dream destination for many a Pakistani.

But environmentalists warn that this has grave ecological consequences. The islands have dozens of species of sea snakes, migratory birds and plants, mainly mangroves. The islands’ shores are also nesting sites for rare green turtles.

Bundal and Buddo islands have been created from silt that the Indus river deposited in the sea over the decades. The two are among some 300 islands along Pakistan’s coastline. Bundal is spread over an area of 120 square km (about a fifth the size of Mumbai). Buddo is half its size.

The islands account for over 90 per cent of Pakistan’s mangrove cover, according to geographer Syed Jamil Hassan Kazmi. He argues that building a city over these will damage the islands’ natural environment and ecological systems.

Karachi-based film-maker Mahera Omar says that the once pristine mangrove forests are now in terrible shape with mud crabs clinging to tree stumps.

Ramsar Convention

Activists have petitioned against the development of cities on the islands. They say that the mangrove forests should be protected under the Ramsar Convention that stresses on “conservation and wise use of all wetlands through local and national actions”.

As Mahera Omar says, “new cities should not be an ecological nightmare for locals.”

Mangroves are an exclusive flora of a saline coastal ecology. These help minimise the risk of natural disasters such as urban flooding. Additionally, they also work as natural barriers against cyclones and tsunamis.

Threatening the livelihoods of fishing communities

Activists also point to the economic and cultural rights of the people who, for centuries, have earned their living on these two islands. They argue that the project is likely to exacerbate, rather than solve, the country’s ecological problems.

“It is an attack on the livelihood of fisher-folk,” Mohammad Ali Shah, chairman of the Pakistan Fisherfolk Forum, told the Dawn newspaper.

“These forests are fish and shrimp nurseries while these creeks from Karachi to Thatta serve as fishing grounds for the fishermen.”. He adds that the creeks leading to the sea around these islands have served as routes for fishing boats.

The Pakistan government, on the other hand, says that building modern cities on the islands will create around 150,000 jobs. Prime minister Imran Khan is determined to implement the enormous real-estate project estimated to be worth $50-billion, ostensibly to ease pressure on Karachi, an expanding megacity of 20 million people.

Edited by Pulkita Sharma

Human rights defenders worked in precarious conditions as COVID-19 swept through 2020, says Forum Asia report

OWSA Staff

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4 January 2022

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Human rights defenders worked in precarious conditions as COVID-19 swept through 2020, says Forum Asia report

A recently released study conducted by Forum Asia says that rights defenders in 11 Asian countries (including Bangladesh, India, Myanmar, Nepal, Pakistan and Sri Lanka) were unable to perform their mandates effectively as their independence was compromised due to repressive laws.

Civic spaces continued to shrink and human rights defenders persisted to work in precarious conditions with minimal protection, says a report released by the Asian NGO Network on National Human Rights Institutions (ANNI). The report led by local civil society organisations covers 11 Asian countries, including the SouthAsian countries of Bangladesh, India, Myanmar, Nepal, Pakistan and Sri Lanka.

The Forum Asia study, ‘Report 2020 on the Performance of National Human Rights Institutions’, gauges the conditions under which Asia’s human rights defenders worked in 2020. It critically assesses the performance of these institutions against the Paris Principles in 2020.

The report says that the human rights situation in 11 Asian countries continued to deteriorate as “draconian laws and enactment of repressive legislations increased across several Asian countries, under the pretext of COVID-19.”

National Human Rights Institutions (NHRIs) in Asia faced immense challenges as their independence has been weakened under increasingly authoritarian governments, financial and human resources have been restricted, and work has been impeded by political instability, resulting in failure to comply with the Paris Principles, the report says.

The Paris Principles are the minimum international standards for ensuring independent, effective, and credible NHRIs for the promotion and protection of human rights.

The ANNI report reveals that in 2020, most NHRIs were unable to perform their mandates effectively. Their independence has been compromised due to repressive laws, and governments have often excluded NHRIs when developing COVID-19 responses.

Trying times in SouthAsia

The gives the example of how Sri Lanka’s 20th constitutional amendment grossly undermined the credibility of the country’s NHRI, raising questions on its compliance to international standards.

In Pakistan, the report says, the NHRI has remained non-functional since May 2019 due to the lack of political willingness of the government to appoint new commissioners.

Additionally, the report finds that the Myanmar National Human Rights Commission has become complicit in towering human rights violations, especially those committed by the State.

Similarly, in India, systemic violations of freedom of expression and association through repressive laws, namely the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act (UAPA) and the National Security Act. Students were arrested and detained as ‘terrorists’ and ‘insurgents,’ while hate speech and violence targeted against the protesters were overlooked by the authorities, the authors of the report say.

Most NHRIs from the 11 Asian countries also found it challenging to adjust to an unprecedented situation caused and exacerbated by the COVID-19 pandemic.

“If fully compliant with the Paris Principles, NHRIs can drive systemic change, given their unique position as institutions and their mandate to promote and protect human rights in the country,” said Shamini Darshni Kaliemuthu, Executive Director of the Asian Forum for Human Rights and Development.

Image : A riot affected area in North-East Delhi sourced from Wikimedia Commons

Anyone there to pull Lankans out of inflation and poor fiscal management?

OWSA Contributor

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4 January 2022

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Anyone there to pull Lankans out of inflation and poor fiscal management?

Tourism and the businesses of tea and spices have, together with exports of ready-made garments, been the mainstay of Sri Lanka’s economy. But the years of hard work have now come to naught, as Omicron takes over the country’s economy.

The news editor of a prominent Colombo newspaper dismissed a press release issued by the department of statistics of the Central Bank of Sri Lanka on 31 December 2021 as one of those regular pieces out to bother him on New Years Eve. The first paragraph was, in any case, a bland one. It was the second paragraph that carried an ominous statement that the senior professional missed.

The second paragraph of the press release read: “Inflation was driven by monthly increases of prices of items in both Food and Non-food categories. Subsequently, food inflation (Y-o-Y) increased to 22.1 per cent in December 2021 from 17.5 per cent in November 2021, while non-food inflation (Y-o-Y) increased to 7.5 per cent in December 2021 from 6.4 per cent in November 2021.” (sic)

Mercifully, someone from the newspaper’s business page, looking for the ever-meaningful single-column filler, grabbed hold of that copy and the day was saved.

It should have been page 1. Readers would have related to the story, after all: Inflation has been scaling record highs; food prices are zooming; pandemic-induced disruptions are driving coffers dry; there are no tourists; and, fishermen are catching just enough for domestic consumption.

Besides, a hurried, unplanned ban on chemical fertilisers in September has come as a curse to the spice plantation, the tea estates in Nuara Elia and the rice farmers alike. Pests have halved vegetable production.

The World Bank has estimated that half-a-million people have slid below the poverty line since the beginning of the pandemic. In other words, gone are the gains from the five years of fighting poverty.

Nobody noticed when bankruptcy was knocking at the doors.

Earlier in the week, there was the depressing news of Sri Lanka temporarily closing down three overseas missions in Abuja (Nigeria), Frankfurt (Germany) and Nicosia (Cyprus) in a bid to cut spending and conserve its foreign reserves.

The New Year doesn’t seem to have begun on a promising note. Sri Lanka is on the brink of bankruptcy with a record high inflation and mounting dues. The country needs to repay an estimated $7.3 billion in domestic and foreign loans in the next 12 months and is staring down the barrel. Many Sri Lankans are returning from their job in the gulf and they are not certain when they will go back to work. The fear is that remittances will have reduced in 2022.

A humanitarian crisis stares the country in the eye and people in the emerald island realise that they are sinking into an deepening abyss of a financial mess.

A pandemic-induced economic crisis like never before has a wall of figures to stare at, even as the figures stare back ruthlessly. The gross domestic product has contracted by over three per cent last year. Any hopes the government had to pull it out of ICU were dashed with the Omicron strain of the COVID-19 virus in the air.

But the people, out of a long war and a series of disasters, are more resileint that the generations before them. They managed when, just four months ago, Sri Lanka declared a food emergency as the foreign-exchange crisis worsened. Three years ago, Sri Lankans offered to pay oil debts to Iran with tea to avoid US sanctions.

The country’s President, Gotabaya Rajapaksa, had then invoked emergency regulations to control prices of essential food items as private banks say they were running out of foreign exchange to finance imports.

The country’s cricketers have often pulled their team out of the jaws of defeat on a number of occasions. But, today, Sri Lankans are looking for someone who can do the same with the financial mess the country is in.

Image: Wikimedia Commons. It is tea estates like this one in Nuara Elia that have bailed the country in the past. But, will it work in 2022?

Pakistan government runs into political storm as it works to obtain IMF loan

OWSA Contributor

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3 January 2022

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Pakistan government runs into political storm as it works to obtain IMF loan

Laws proposed by the government for Pakistan’s eligibility for the sixth tranche of lending have run into resistance from various quarters across the country. A hike in the price of petrol and high speed high-speed diesel has fueled public anger.

The government on Sunday said it expected the International Monetary Fund (IMF) board to approve the next tranche of lending for Pakistan as soon as all the required actions were completed.

“As soon as the prior actions are completed by Pakistan, which the government is pushing hard, the IMF board will consider it for approval,” a statement issued by the finance ministry said adding “IMF board can move whenever our actions are completed”.

Principal to the ‘actions’ that the finance ministry statement alluded to was the introduction of the Finance (Supplementary) Bill 2021 and the State Bank of Pakistan (Amendment) Bill 2021. Both were due to be tabled in the parliament for approval end-December.

These would ensure clearance of the sixth review of IMF’s $6 billion Extended Fund Facility (EFF). This tranche is expected to be to the tune of US$ 1 billion. The IMF’s executive board is scheduled to meet for the purpose on January 12.

Radio Pakistan said that “the government is pushing hard for completion of the required actions and has introduced the supplementary finance bill 2021 and State Bank of Pakistan bill 2021 in the National Assembly.

But the proposed laws have run into resistance from various quarters across the country. There were loud protests, no sooner than Imran Khan’s Adviser on Finance hinted at ‘rationalisation of taxes’ to bridge the revenue gap in excess of Pakistani Rs. 450 billion. Nobody was prepared to an increase in revenues and electricity tariffs, reduction in circular debt, rationalisation of gas rates and complete autonomy to the State Bank of Pakistan.

Loud protests

“Obviously they ask how we are going to bridge the gap when we do not collect petroleum levy after targeting it at Rs. 600 billion in the budget,” the prime minister Imran Khan’s finance adviser, Shakat Tarin had said, following his meeting with IMF officials in December.

The government began with increasing the base electricity tariff by an average Rs 1.39 per unit across the country, opening the floodgate for protests from across the political spectrum.

The loudest protests came from the far-right political party, Tehreek-e-Labbaik Pakistan. The party organised a huge protest march after the finance adviser directed an increase in petroleum levy by Rs 4 per litre on petrol and high-speed diesel.

Prime minister Khan’s opponents say that the deal with the IMF has lacked transparency all through.

Image: Wikipedia

Revellers cross international borders to welcome 2022; throw caution to the wind

OWSA Contributor

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3 January 2022

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Revellers cross international borders to welcome 2022; throw caution to the wind

Tens of thousands of people intermingled among complete strangers to usher in the New Year on Nepal’s Kosi river barrage. The revellers arrived from neighbouring districts of India and Nepal. They were unmindful of Omicron.

The fear of COVID-19 has not been a deterrence for those wanting to usher in 2022 in style. Tens of thousands of revellers at the Kosi river barrage in Nepal for a good time, away from stress in the times of Omicron.

The Kosi river barrage lies in between the Saptari and the Sunsari districts of Nepal. It is a picnic spot of sorts. However, 1 January 2022 saw all cautions thrown to the wind. Tens of thousands of people from the districts of Saptari, Sunsari and Morang in Nepal mingled with people from across the country’s international border with India.

The revellers from India came from the districts of Saharsa, Supaul, Madhepura and Purnea districts of Bihar state in India. The huge gatherings did not seem to care for the COVID-19 or its Omicron variant.

Many people came on foot and policemen were overwhelmend with managing crowds and traffic with thousands of vehicles, parked chock-a-block. Over a hundred shops had come up to fuel the celebrations with snacks and drinks. M Singh, who took pictures for OWSA says that seven out of 10 people gathered to celebrate the New Year were from Bihar.

“Not one person was wearing masks,” Singh says.

Vultures Will Be Guests At Nepal’s High Profile Restaurants

Aditi Angelina Patro

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3 January 2022

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Vulture restaurants, also called Jatayu restaurants are designed to provide safe animal carcass to the endangered birds.

Imagine a restaurant serving animal carcass to its clients. Imagine, also, if this restaurant is flocked by tourists from across the world. That is the story of Nepal’s vulture restaurants, where vultures will take a seat at the high table.

These restaurants for vultures are called Jatayu restaurants, named after the much-venerated mythological vulture demi-god mentioned in the Hindu epic, the Ramayana. Communities living in Nepal’s northern border along the Tibet also revere them because the birds are central to their traditional form of cremations, the sky burials.

Vultures play an important ecological role by acting as nature’s scavengers. By gnawing at even the remotest crevice of carcass, they halt the spread of decaying bacteria and fungus from dead animal carcasses from seeping into the environment. In other words, the absence of vultures is a certain invitation to zoonotic diseases, including rabies, anthrax, tuberculosis and brucellosis.

They are now endangered throughout South Asia. Conservationists in Nepal have discovered that the vulture restaurants are a novel way of turning around their dwindling number. Visiting tourists pay to visit these restaurants and that helps pay for the vultures’ food.

Dwindling numbers

The results are there to be seen. A vulture census count undertaken this year says that there were 2,312 individuals in the Himalayan country, 506 more than the previous year.

Nepal is home to nine of the 23 different species of the bird. Of these, three appear on the red list of critically endangered animals prepared by the International Union for Conservation of Nature.

Vultures do not proliferate fast. A female vulture lays just one egg a year and the chick has a longer immaturity duration after fledging.

But this is not the only reason behind the catastrophic decline. The dwindling numbers have also been attributed to the use of the non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drug (NSAIDs) diclofenac to which vultures highly susceptible. Veterinarians prescribe the drugs and farmers resort to buying the drug over the counter whenever they observe their animals are getting restless.

Vultures get exposed to diclofenac when they feed on the carcass of an animal that has been treated with diclofenac, 72 hours before its death. The drug is extremely toxic as it gets into the physiological system of the vultures and leads to their kidneys failure before they die of visceral gout.

The use of the drug for animals was banned in 2006. But farmers continued to buy large quantities of human doses of diclofenac and other similar NSAIDs from pharmacies.

How do the Jatayu restaurants work?

The first Jatayu restaurant was established in 2006 in Nepal’s Nawalpur district by conservationists. The community managed restaurants are a unique concept and an attraction for local and international tourists as part of promoting ecotourism. Today, Nepal has seven Jatayu restaurants.

Nepal’s farmers are donating their unproductive cows to the restaurants managements because these are often a burden. The management rears the cattle in gaushallas, or cow rescue centres. Farmers willingly give their cattle away to the cow rescue centre in the faith that their cattle are cared for in the last days of their lives. The cow rescue centre managements ensure that the cattle don’t consume NISDs while they spend their last days at the gaushalla. After the cattle dies, their carcass are fed to the vultures.

The cattle carcasses are placed at a designated dining area were vultures then come to feed. They are shielded by a hide from behind which, tourists observe them without causing them any disturbance. The restaurants attract resident as well as migrant vultures.

Bank of Maldives community fund

Resorts empty during COVID-19

Distress Selling of Assets Amid Poverty

Myanmar’s Situation Not Entirely Unpredictable

Impending Poverty Can Impact Half Of Myanmar’s People

Abortions during the lockdown

A discourse Nepal needs to have

Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan is determined to implement a $50-billion real-estate urbanisation project on the Bundal and Buddo mangrove islands in the Arabian Sea. Environmentalists are sounding the alarm bell. But the government argues that this will ease pressure on Karachi.

Ramsar Convention

Threatening the livelihoods of fishing communities

Trying times in SouthAsia

Nobody noticed when bankruptcy was knocking at the doors.

Loud protests

Dwindling numbers

How do the Jatayu restaurants work?

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