A recent study by Harvard and Yale economists asks a question few in the aid community ask, after finding that food aid prolongs civil conflict and supports rebel groups by feeding them or providing them with goods that can be traded for arms or other services.
Patricia Adams
Patricia Adams is an economist and the Executive Director of Probe International, an independent think-tank and watchdog over the environmental consequences of Canadian government and corporate activities around the world. Her books include In the Name of Progress: The Underside of Foreign Aid, (Doubleday 1985), and Odious Debts: Loose Lending, Corruption and the Third World”s Environmental Legacy (Earthscan 1991), which exposes the jeopardy of years of loose lending for both the Third World’s environment and their economies, and proposes a legal remedy to place responsibility for the Third World’s debt crisis on the parties involved, instead of on First and Third World taxpayers. Pat also edited the English language translation of Yangtze! Yangtze!, the extraordinary critique by Chinese experts of the Three Gorges dam that inspired the democracy movement when it was first published in 1989, led to the postponement of the dam, and was subsequently banned by Chinese authorities. Her books have been translated into Spanish, Chinese, Japanese and Bahasa Indonesia.
Ukraine’s odious debts
Ukraine’s national news agency, Ukrinform, asked Probe International’s Patricia Adams to weigh in on Ukraine’s multibillion-dollar debt to Russia and whether Ukraine could challenge the enforceability of the US$3 billion Eurobond using an odious debts argument.
Argentina’s cronies are fair game
Argentineans would not need to suffer if assets hidden from creditors could be recovered.
More and more, poor countries are holding elections to qualify for foreign aid
(May 27, 2014) Aid agencies are coming to realize that foreign aid itself may undermine democracy.
The probe of Three Gorges officials is getting too close for Communist Party leaders
(April 21, 2014) China’s roving corruption crackdown has uncovered nepotism, shady property deals and dodgy bidding procedures at the country’s state-owned Three Gorges Dam operator, Three Gorges Corporation. The news has reignited public anger over a project funded by a special levy paid for by Chinese citizens and has sparked speculation that President Xi Jinping is using Three Gorges as a way to target two of China’s biggest “tigers”.
China Three Gorges Corp bosses replaced after graft probe
(March 26, 2014) China’s central government replaces leadership at state-owned Three Gorges Corp. following graft probe. Signals suggest “it is probable there will be further investigations into corruption inside the corporation,” says Probe International’s Patricia Adams.
Distorted economy dooms China to an “airpocalypse”
(March 4, 2014) With China’s economy operating under perverse incentives, China’s leaders, now assembled in Beijing, will be powerless to clean up its environment.
Does SNC-Lavalin deserve a clean bill of health?
(February 4, 2014) A “privileged and confidential” review by the Canadian Commercial Corporation (CCC), released to Probe International under the Access to Information Act, says graft-tainted engineering giant SNC-Lavalin has cleaned up its act. Reviews that lack rigour and independence, however, do not help the cause of rebuilding corporate reputations.
Chinese dam builders rush to Latin America
(January 7, 2014) China’s growing involvement in hydropower development in the region boosts clout but also leads to allegations of poor corporate responsibility. “There is great resistance to dam-building in Latin America and special worry about Chinese dams because of the opaque nature of China’s decision-making and poor quality in these dams,” says Pat Adams of Probe International.
Deng Xiaoping’s double debt to the Chinese people
(September 10, 2013) On the dreadful night of June 4, 1989, when the students in Tiananmen Square were mowed down by the People’s Liberation Army, the path to another tragedy, the damming of the Yangtze, was laid, says Dai Qing, China’s most famous environmentalist and longtime advocate of freedom of speech.
Ottawa falls short in attempt to rein in EDC
(August 28, 2013) Proposed changes to regulations governing Export Development Canada don’t go far enough.
Criminals see value of intangible carbon market – Interpol
(August 19, 2013) Vulnerable because of its intangible nature, carbon credit trading has become a haven for a new and emerging type of crime says Interpol, the world’s largest international police organization.
China’s electricity sector undisciplined by markets, distorted by Party
(May 24, 2013) The iron fist of government controlling China’s electricity sector is not only costing China’s power consumers dearly, it is also the cause of serious distortions in the country’s power markets, says a new study by one of China’s preeminent think tanks.
Are dams triggering China’s earthquakes?
(April 29, 2013) Understanding the forces behind China’s magnitude-7 earthquake in Sichuan Province more than a week ago should sound warning bells. Patricia Adams digs deep into the country’s recent rash of earthquakes in southwestern China and finds the region’s seismic risk is increasingly man-made.
Sichuan earthquake may be aftershock of 2008 killer quake: Chinese geologist
(April 22, 2013) China’s construction of huge dams increases the probability of earthquakes, Fan Xiao warns.
Patricia Adams
Dai Qing
Fan Xiao
Lawrence Solomon
Mu Lan
Probe International
Lisa Peryman
Probe Media
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