The Nation Newspaper

Tag: Oxfam

  • Bane of agric sector, by Oxfam

    Despite contributing about 22% of the total gross domestic product (GDP), and employing more than 70% of the labour force, the agricultural sector is characterised by mismanagement, low productivity, poor policy and dilapidated infrastructure, the Head of Programs, Oxfam Nigeria, Constant Tchona, has said.

    He said that government policy appeared to have little focus in supporting women.

    Tchona, who spoke at a news conference to mark the World Food Day in Abuja yesterday, added that Nigeria, despite being rated as the largest economy in Africa, the growth has not translated into improved quality of life of Nigerians.

    He said: “Despite contributing about 22% of the total GDP, and employing more than 70% of the labour force, the agricultural sector is characterized by mismanagement, low productivity, poor policy and dilapidated infrastructure.

    “The smallholder farmers are constrained by poor access to markets, land and environmental degradation and climate change, and inadequate research and extension service. The Nigerian women farmers are the worst hit, yet government policy appears to have little focus on supporting women.”

    Tchona said that climate change was affecting food production in Africa.

    He, therefore, called for a new way of thinking and ideas and development economics that hold a promise of a better future for Nigerian farmers.

    “The global food system is broken. It’s not just drought or famine or bad harvest. A whole host of factors such as climate change, land grabs, food price hikes, lack of adequate inputs and credits and rudimentary farming techniques are stopping nearly 900 million – that is 1 in 8 people worldwide from having enough to eat.

    “This better future cannot be achieved with climate change effects unaddressed. Climate change is undermining the ability of African nations to feed themselves. Women smallholder producers are on the frontline, but not first-in-line for international climate finance,” he added.

     

  • ‘Corporations deprive Africa of $11b yearly in taxes’

    Multinational companies deprive African governments of $11 billion in taxes each year, and G-7 world leaders should set up a new global body to regulate corporate taxation, Oxfam International said on Monday.

    By shifting profits overseas to lower tax regimes, companies legally avoid paying taxes to the African countries where they generate revenues, depriving governments of money they desperately need for development, the anti-poverty group said in a report on Africa.

    When leaders of the G-7 major industrialised countries meet in Germany on June 7-8 to discuss how to support economic growth in Africa, a vital component of their talks should be comprehensive reform of the global tax system, Oxfam said.

    “It’s absurd that there are international organisations for trade, health and football but not for tax,” Oxfam International executive director, Winnie Byanyima, said.

    An international body similar to the World Trade Organisation could represent all countries’ interests and mediate disputes among taxation regimes, Oxfam said.

    Oxfam based its calculation of the tax revenue Africa loses on a United Nations-backed study released in April that estimated $50 billion in illicit funds flow out of the continent each year, much of it through corporate trade mispricing to avoid taxes or in transfers of money obtained corruptly.

    This is almost double the official development aid Africa receives each year, Reuters reports.

    G7 leaders already are discussing how to make the global taxation system fairer, but developing countries complain they have no seat at the table in those talks, even though they are the victims of the present system.

  • Richest 1% ‘ll dominate global wealth in 2016, says Oxfam

    Richest 1% ‘ll dominate global wealth in 2016, says Oxfam

    The richest one per cent are about to control a majority of the world’s wealth. That’s according to anti-poverty charity Oxfam, which said the slice of global wealth held by the world’s most affluent reached 48 percent last year, up from 44 percent in 2009. Their share will likely exceed 50 percent by 2016, Oxfam said in a letter addressed to attendees of the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, this week.

    “The scale of global inequality is quite simply staggering,” Winnie Byanyima, Oxfam’s executive director, said in the statement. “The gap between the richest and the rest is widening fast.”

    The world’s richest added $92 billion to their collective fortune in 2014, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index. The biggest gainer was Jack Ma, the co-founder of China’s e-commerce company Alibaba Group Holding Ltd. U.S. billionaires Warren Buffett and Mark Zuckerberg are also among the top gainers, the index show.

    As the wealth gap widens, governments from U.S. to China are proposing new taxes on their most affluent citizens. More than a billion people live on less than $1.25 a day, according to Oxfam.

    President Barack Obama plans to limit profits Americans make from investments and impose capital-gain taxes on inherited assets. Beijing’s tax officials recently started asking citizens to report their earnings overseas, according to the New York Times.

    One-fifth of global billionaires “have interests in the financial and insurance sectors” and saw their cash wealth climb 11 percent in the past year, Oxfam said. The Oxfam study uses data from Credit Suisse’s global wealth report and Forbes.

    “Oxfam is concerned that the lobbying power of these sectors is a major barrier in the way of reforming the global tax system,” according to the statement. The group proposes a crackdown on corporate and individual tax dodging, more investment infree public services, and a shift in taxes toward capital and wealth to help fix the problem.

    Obama wants to increase top tax rate on capital gains and dividends to 28 percent from 23.8 percent. The rate was 15 percent when he took office in 2009. He would also impose capital-gains taxes on asset transfers at death, ending what the White House calls “the largest capital gains loophole.”

    Chinese tax agencies have quietly started to enforce the regulation which would require citizens and companies to pay taxes on their global income, the New York Times reported earlier this month. New rules effective Feb. 1 will ban international investments deemed to be tax shelters, according to the report.

     

  • Oxfam condemns child labour on cocoa farms

    Oxfam condemns child labour on cocoa farms

    Oxfam  has  reiterated  its  commitment  to  seeing  more  certified farmers in Nigeria  earn higher yields and revenue from their cocoa crops,  stressing it will not encourage use of child labour on the farms.

    Addressing children at an event organised under  the  Kokodola project  in collaboration  with Osun State in  Oshogbo, its  Programme Officer, Women Empowerment, Mainstreaming and Networking Cocoa Project,  Mr John Ajipo, said  the organisation was   charged with dealing with social issues, including child labour and promotion of gender justice.

    According to him, most of the industry’s effort was focused on child labour, following an International Cocoa Initiative and an industry group to respond to the challenge.

    Oxfam, he  explained,  was committed to ensuring that child labour is reduced and the rights of children protected across cocoa plantations.

    To this end, he maintained that there was sustained awareness  campaign for the prevention and elimination of child labour adding that the organisation uses the Children’s Day to raise awareness on the issue with the state government.

    According to him, the   cocoa sector is of great importance for rural livelihoods and provides employment for many households, stressing that the organisation does not support  employing children on cocoa plantation.

    He said the sector has been criticised for using children on the farms globally.

    Consequently, most of the industry’s effort was focused on child labour.

    He said Oxfam was determined  to foster a durable relationship with farmers by supporting programmes to help them to manage their resources sustainably.

    Oxfam’s mission, he maintained, is to work with individuals and organisations  to create a just world without poverty.

    The organisation works   with other members of the Kokodola project consortium to implement the Sustainable Cocoa projects in Osun and Ondo states. The goal of the project is to create a growing sustainable and efficient value chain of farmers for certified cocoa production, thereby improving social, economic and environmental conditions of the cocoa farmers across the two states.

    The Programme Coordinator, Farmers Development Union (FADU), Mr. Bayo Olaniyan, highlighted the danger of child labour.

    He  said the organisation is working as hard as possible to playan even more proactive role towards the elimination of the worst formsof child labour.

  • Oxfam to fight poverty with five million euro

    The Country Director, Oxfam Nigeria, Dr. Chichi Okoye, has said Oxfam has budgeted over five million euro in addressing poverty in Nigeria, especially in assisting small scale farmers in the next three years.

    Okoye stated this during a press conference on ‘Go live’ in Abuja, saying it is time to challenge the government on how to meet the need of small scale farmers in Nigeria.

    She said: “In Nigeria the Single Management System (SMS) process has led to Oxfam GB and Oxfam Novib developing a joint country strategy which outlines our areas of focus and ways of working for the next three years.

    “With a combined annual budget of over five million euro, the new Oxfam in Nigeria will be more robust and aggressive in addressing issues of poverty in Nigeria.

    “Oxfam aims at achieving this by saving lives and responding swiftly to provide aid support and protection during emergencies. Develop programmes and solutions that empower people to work their way out of poverty.

    “The organisation has recorded some success by raising the voice of the small scale farmers, especially women farmers through the GROW campaign which is primarily focused in simple terms on food access, availability and production.

    “It also aims to ensure that small scale farmers are empowered to meet food demands through increased investment in agriculture and building their resilence towards food price volatility.

    “We have helped organised small scale farmers by providing support for the establishment of the association of small scale agro producers in Nigeria ASSAPIN the first ever association of small scale farms in Nigeria.

    “Oxfam has successfully linked Cocoa farmers in Ibadan to a chocolate factory in the Netherland where the Cocoa farmers will supply the factory with Cocoa for their chocolate at a fair price and under favourable working conditions. We are hoping to replicate this with other produce,” she stressed.

    On December 13, 2012, the two Oxfam that operats in Nigeria, Oxfam Great Britain and Oxfam Novib Netherlands, are coming together as one Oxfam. It will be marked by the signing of Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) in a ceremony tagged Go live in Abuja.

  • Oxfam urges World Bank to freeze land investments

    Oxfam urges World Bank to freeze land investments

    Global development group Oxfam on Wednesday called on the World Bank to suspend financing for large-scale land acquisitions to ensure that its practices do not encourage foreign land grabs in developing countries.

    Oxfam urged Jim Yong Kim, the lender’s new president, to announce a six-month moratorium on land investments by the bank at meetings of the International Monetary Fund and World Bank in Tokyo next week.

    But senior bank officials said it would be a mistake to suspend the World Bank’s involvement at a time when global food prices are rising and there is growing interest by foreign investors in buying farmland in Asia, Latin America and Africa.

    Reuters says the 2008-2009 global food price crisis prompted a scramble for land in parts of Asia, Africa and Latin America, and widespread fears of land grabbing.

    Madagascar’s president was toppled in 2009 after he negotiated a deal with South Korea’s Daewoo Logistics to lease half the island’s arable land to grow food and ship it to Asia.

    The World Bank has long argued that Africa needs more investments in agriculture that would not only help modernize farming practices but also create jobs and new markets for local farmers.

    The lender has boosted its investment in agriculture to $9.5 billion a year from $2.5 billion annually in 2008.

    Oxfam said the World Bank was in a unique position as both a financier, through its private-sector lending arm the International Finance Corp, and adviser to developing countries to ensure land deals are transparent and not forcing local communities off land they have farmed for generations.

    According to Oxfam more than 60 percent of investments in agricultural land by foreign investors between 2000 and 2010 were in developing countries with serious hunger problems.