Letter from Brazil - Stories by Mario Osava / IPS Inter Press Service

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Sunday, March 21, 2010 01:14 GMT

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The Threat Posed by Livestock
By Mario Osava
RIO DE JANEIRO - The livestock industry has less economic clout than the oil industry, but ranchers say it has better arguments to defend itself from accusations regarding its share of responsibility for global warming.
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Ambitious Development Plan to Cut Inequality
By Mario Osava
RIO DE JANEIRO - Brazil will be "radically less unequal" and less vulnerable to shocks from the outside when it celebrates 200 years of independence from Portugal, if the Strategic Affairs Secretariat's (SAE) plans for the next 12 years are put into practice, according to a high-ranking official.
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Clinton Attempts Damage Control
By Mario Osava *
RIO DE JANEIRO - The dialogue of the deaf on Iran's nuclear programme that took place in the capital of Brazil highlights the hurdles faced by U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton in her attempt at forging warmer ties during her tour of six Latin American countries.
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Women More Educated, Not More Equal
By Mario Osava *
RIO DE JANEIRO - When it comes to female education rates, progress has been made around the world, and in many countries girls and young women have outnumbered and outperformed boys and men at all levels of schooling for decades. Nevertheless, these advances have yet to translate into greater equity in employment, politics and social relations.
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When the City Makes You Sick
By Mario Osava*
RIO DE JANEIRO - Limiting your cholesterol through diet may not be enough to maintain cardiovascular health in polluted cities like São Paulo in Brazil: the particulates suspended in the air alter the molecular composition of LDL, popularly known as "bad cholesterol," making it even more dangerous.
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Commodities Rule in Exports to China
By Mario Osava
RIO DE JANEIRO - China took over from the United States as Brazil's top market in 2009, indicating a qualitative change for exports from the South American giant, which is increasingly dependent on sales of commodities and food.
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Carnival, a Complex Annual Revolution for Women, Gays
By Mario Osava
RIO DE JANEIRO - Fátima Oliveira, one of Brazil's few black women doctors, always goes to "the best carnival," in Sabará, a city of 130,000 people in the state of Minas Gerais, where "men dress up as women" at a celebration that is "very informal, very local, with few tourists."
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Reconciling Social and Environmental Needs
By Mario Osava* IPS/TerraViva
SALVADOR, Brazil - One of the greatest challenges facing the world today is to attend to the urgent social needs of the planet’s population, and particularly the one billion people living "on the brink of survival", while dealing with the equally urgent demands of the environment.
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"Machista" but Valued by Feminists Nonetheless
By Mario Osava *
PORTO ALEGRE, Brazil - The World Social Forum (WSF) "changed our lives," although it continues to be "machista," with men significantly outnumbering women in its organisation and almost all discussion panels, commented Nalu Farias, coordinator in Brazil of the World March of Women.
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Another Kind of Economics Is Possible
By Mario Osava
PORTO ALEGRE, Brazil - Democratising economics as well as politics is essential for ending irrationality and discrimination as part of the struggle for social and environmental justice, said participants at one of the panels of the seminar assessing the World Social Forum's (WSF) first 10 years.
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Crisis Could Usher In Another World
By Mario Osava
PORTO ALEGRE, Brazil - In the societies of the future, young people may not start to work until the age of 25, there will be lifelong education for everyone, with university graduation as the starting point rather than the end goal, while working hours could be reduced to 12 hours a week for all.
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Talk vs Action - the Tug-of-War Continues
By Mario Osava
PORTO ALEGRE, Brazil - A call issued by social movements to evolve towards a more active role in generating concrete action marked the opening session of a seminar assessing the 10 years of the World Social Forum (WSF) Monday in this southern Brazilian city, the birthplace of the annual global civil society gathering.
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Back Seat Driver of Social Change
By Mario Osava
RIO DE JANEIRO - The World Social Forum (WSF) is only "a tool" and must not be confused with the global movement for another world, says Chico Whitaker, one of the founders of this meeting which is celebrating its tenth year with a seminar to assess its track record Jan. 25-29, in its southern Brazilian place of origin, Porto Alegre.
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Mario Osava, IPS's Brazil correspondent, covers political, economic and social issues, including human rights, labour, environment, poverty, indigenous issues, and sustainable development. He has travelled the corners of Latin America's largest country to bring you these stories.