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Cordoba and Perez in WSJ on the desperation of the people of Cuba looking for a better life. It covers not just Havana, but also the interior Santiago de Cuba and Camarguey different regions of Cuba all desolate and in complete disarray with lack of running water, electricity and inadequate food supplies. Cuba is clearly a failed experiment and a warning to all Latin American nations that capitalist system as the US itself knows quite well has serious drawbacks that need the likes of Jefferson, Lincoln, TR and FDR, JFK and LBJ to correct but the rhetoric of Castro is not the answer, itself quite dangerous. And the answer has to come by developing new alternatives, studying what works and what doesnt, the need for inputs of capital, labor and technologies, the need for hard work, the need for scientific and technological cooperation and goodwill of the successul nations, as China has proven and India is proving today for upwards of 3 billion people in Asia.

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PM of Sweden Ulf Kristersson on the Joint Statement of the Nordic nations with India. Joint Statement: 3rd India-Nordic Summit, Oslo, 19 May 2026 Published 19 May 2026 1.  Today in Oslo, the Prime Minister of India, Shri Narendra Modi, the Acting Prime Minister of Denmark, Ms. Mette Frederiksen, the Prime Minister of Norway, Mr. Jonas Gahr Støre, the Prime Minister of Finland, Mr. Petteri Orpo, the Prime Minister of Iceland Ms. Kristrún Mjöll Frostadóttir, and the Prime Minister of Sweden, Mr. Ulf Kristersson, held the 3rd India-Nordic Summit hosted by the Norwegian Prime Minister. This Summit builds upon the previous two Summits held in Copenhagen in 2022 and Stockholm in 2018. 2. The Prime Ministers noted that they are meeting at a time of global geopolitical flux and rapid economic and technological transformation and agreed on the need to deepen the partnership between India and the Nordics for mutual benefit based upon shared interests and values and to cooperate in addressing global challenges. In this context, they decided to elevate the India-Nordic relationship to a trusted Green Technology and Innovation Strategic Partnership. 3.  As leaders of vibrant democracies and large open market economies, they underscored their shared interest in fostering a robust and resilient global order based on international law that promotes peace, stability, inclusive economic growth and sustainable development.  4. They reaffirmed their commitment to upholding international law, shared values and obligations including democracy, freedom, human rights, gender equality, rule of law, respect for sovereignty and territorial integrity and international peace and security in accordance with international law, including the United Nations Charter. 5.  The Leaders discussed international peace and security including the conflicts in Europe and the West Asia/Middle East. 6. They discussed opportunities for collaboration in trade and investment, blue economy, circular economy, digital infrastructure, digitalisation and artificial intelligence, climate action and energy security, fighting pollution, water, research and education, talent mobility, healthcare, space & geospatial sectors and defence. UN, multilateralism and international cooperation 7.   The leaders reiterated the importance of an effective multilateral system, with the United Nations at its core. They confirmed their commitment to work towards reforming the UN, including the UN Security Council, to make it more representative, inclusive, transparent, efficient, accountable, effective and reflective of the contemporary geopolitical realities. The Nordic Prime Ministers reiterated the support of the Nordic countries for permanent membership for India in a reformed and expanded UN Security Council. The Nordic leaders welcomed India’s application to the Nuclear Suppliers’ Group (NSG), and emphasized the importance of the international multilateral export control regimes in upholding non-proliferation and international peace and security. Trade, investment and economic cooperation 8.  The leaders emphasised the importance of a continued central role for the World Trade Organization in the multilateral trading system and global trade governance. They underscored the importance of a fair, open, transparent, equitable, non-discriminatory, inclusive and rules-based multilateral trading system, with WTO at its core. 9.   They acknowledged the significant economic exchanges in the form of trade and investments between India and the Nordic countries in promoting sustainable economic growth, prosperity, circular economy, bioeconomy, sustainable development and supply chain resilience. 10. To facilitate trade and investments and contribute to the objective of sustainable development, they particularly welcomed the entry into force of the India-EFTA Trade and Economic Partnership agreement and the conclusion of the India-EU Free Trade Agreement. The leaders also welcomed the active business exchanges in the margins of the Summit and highlighted the need of continued business exchanges to identify opportunities. The leaders stressed that in addition to the economic benefits by enhancing market access and removing trade barriers, the India-EU FTA and India-EFTA TEPA could support economic security and resilience through diversifying critical value chains and opening new markets. They welcomed the shared objectives under TEPA that EFTA states shall aim for investment of USD 100 billion leading to creation of one million direct jobs in India. 11.   The leaders further emphasized the need of undertaking initiatives to improve connectivity between the Nordic and the Indo-Pacific regions, including in line with the continued development of the India-Middle East-Europe Economic Corridor. ...

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Kuwait oil production cut as storage fills up March 2026. Fewer tankers are making it through the Straits of Hormuz. Huge inventory on tankers in ocean waters and the added supplies from Venezuela help relieve the pressure on oil supplies as Iranian oil production stops. The US allows India to get Russian oil for 100 days in this special situation of war in the Middle East region. 

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Rugged hilly coast and shallow narrow straits - problems for Straits of Hormuz shipping is shown in the NYT following similar reports in WSJ. It will cost $200 billion for the munitions supplies and interceptors, and US naval operations, French naval operations to keep the Straits of Hormuz open, which is supported by US business as is seen in opinion in Editorial Board of WSJ on March 24, 2026. The Straits are a lifeline for Asia until renewable energy and alternative supplies of oil make the Straits history and a redundant proposition, which will be sooner than later after this episode, one too many more from the Middle East. More likely by 2030-2035. China and Japan depend on it for 90% of imports, and India 50% with alternative supplies provided for India from the US and Russia. Germany is only dependent on the Straits for 6% of its imports showing how far Germany has come and how important renewables and alternative sources of oil such as Venezuela will become in the time ahead, in a two pronged strategy that does not forget the challenges posed by climate from fires and floods. Were not stuck with the Straits- Japan and China can and will find alternative sources and increase production of renewable energy in the way Germany has done to get to 6% of imports from that region. ...

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Iraq as two states in one now dragged into Iran War by Iran sponsored Popular Mobilization Forces that are part of the two state government. It points to a never ending conflict in this region, even after Afghanistan, Syria and Iraq. Finding alternative sources of oil and accelerating renewable energy are ways to stay away from the Middle East, easier to accomplish through innovation and rapid progress than sourcing oil from the region.  Irreconciliable differences between religious sects complicated further by the artificial countries created of Syria and Iraq created by the British and French Empires from the ruins of the Ottoman Empire by 1921 are enough reason to stay out of the Middle East conflicts for the US, Russia, India, China, the European Union.  The British and French colonial powers that drew up the map of Iraq and Syria created states with different populations that made no difference to them in 1921, but which create unmanageable and impossible to run states today. This is learning from the bitter experience of 50 years of conflict and wars that led through war distraction to deindustrialization of the US and European Union, and consequently to the tariff wars with China, a process that is still unwinding today. The US is better off developing new oil supplies as it considers another push in renewable energy, the EU, China and India have the resources to make a new push for renewable energy and efficient use of energy similar to Germany and Japan, using additional supplies from the US as a transition point. Imagine combining the energy technological innovation that is a bigger motivation combining the scientific minds and resources of China, Japan, India, the US and Europe, than the dislocation and internal strife inside these countries that is generated from the Middle East -that is itself the legacy of irrational decisions made by colonial powers of the 1920's,  1930's and 1940's that remain a hundred years later- impossible to resolve except by working with new solutions for energy outside of the region. ...

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Prof. Patrice Geoffron of Universite Paris-Dauphine writes in Le Monde what is on everyone's minds- on how oil geopolitics and fossil fuel price volatility and price uncertainty what he calls fossil fuel chaos, is creating a new demand for renewable energy in Europe in 2027 to 2031. Business and industry in Europe see the value of renewable energy not in comparison with low fossil fuel prices anymore but with a fossil fuel price that can jump at any time to the $100 a barrel for some geopolitical event. Compared to this fossil chaos European business and industry can depend on a known price and known conditions for solar energy. The same thinking will be going on in business in Asia- in China and established leader in solar, in India an aspiring solar power, and in Japan. Modular nuclear reactors are also a new way to go. This means even under DJT with his skepticism for renewables the technology and production of renewables will continue and pick up pace. People will also ask whether its worth all the trouble to get fossil fuel supplies at levels that make no sense through waters of Hormuz straits- China and Jpan getting a makes no sense 90% of their imports from Hormuz, and India nearly 50%. Their are moral considerations also whether a morally conscious China, Japan and India, South Korea with much of the industrial base in the world can justify missile attacks on the scale of tens of thousands in the region and bombing just to clear Hormuz. ...

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Chennai, a city of 10 million in India faces a water crisis. It is approaching a situation of Day Zero when the water utility in the city can not any longer provide regular supplies of water through tap water. Tankers with water are used instead. This situation is a result of the 4 reservoirs used for Chennai water suffering from drought in the area- two are dry and the other two are almost dry. Water tankers supply water at the cost of an average salary of 9000 rupees  a month as shown in this story in the WSJ.

Cities such as Shimla, Managalore, Hyderabad, Delhi, also face water supplies crisis. All over India 600 million people live in water stressed areas, according to NITI Aayog, a government policy think tank. By 2030 the demand for water is expected to double. With weak monsoon rains the government is calling for water conservation.

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Extreme heat and dehydration affecting farming villages and fishing communities, and lack of clean drinking water, contamination of water supplies by chemicals, has led to kidney disease in 40 year olds in Sri Lanka. This also shows how important the clean drinking water Har Ghar Jal - clean water for all homes- of prime minister Narendra Modi is for 1.4 billion people in India. Sri Lanka (Ceyon) faced with decades of civil war, and mismanaged finances with corruption, is ill equipped to tackle the huge problems that it faces.

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See the BBC show geography of the Straits Hormuz of Iran and Saudi/Oman. Would Iran block the Straits of Hormuz, the narrow waters in the Persian Gulf where Oman, Saudi Arabia on one side and Iran on the other meet. At some points the corridor in the sea which is 20 miles wide at narrowest point, is 108 miles long, is only 6 miles wide for oceangoing tankers carrying a fifth of world oil supplies. The reason Iran woul be hesitant to do this are- Iran supplies China with discounted oil through these Straits. Iran central bank says $67 billion of its total oil exports go through the Straits Hormuz, 90% of it to China. China gets a third of its oil supplies from the Saudis/Iran through these Straits. India gets 40% of its oil supplies, Japan 75% and South Korea 60% of crude oil supplies through tankers plying this waterway. It would put China and  all industrialized countries in opposition to Iran. It would also cut Iranian oil exports and leave it's oil based economy unfunded.   ...

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Agatha Sangma, at 28, is the youngest member of Parliament in India. Se was reelected from the Tura constituency in Meghalaya,, in India's northeast. She is minister of state for rural development in the newly elected Congress coalition government. Her father PA Sangma was a speaker in the Lok Sabha, India's Parliament. In India's system the cabinet minister has the biggest chunk of work and under him comes the minister of state. But considering how big the rural economy is in India, at over 40% of GDP and growing fast from a low base, its aposition of great responsibility for ayoung woman. Here she talks to Jyoti Malhotra of the WSJ. She is responsible for drinking water and sanitation. Access to drinking water, contamination of water, and water supplies for agriculture are a huge challenge for India. Agatha has studied environmental management in the UK, so she can bring knowledge of modern methods for managing water to her job. She likes to be responsible for implementing work in the rural areas, and has the youth and energy to travel and see things first hand for implementation. She says accountability is important for implementation and out in the field she can observe and ask questions. One of the problems she shees in implementation is properly using the funds allocated. This fund alone is 62,000 crores. And seeing that these funds are properly allocated and spent to generate the best use of the resources is critical for improving lives and meeting the needs for rural development. She sees room for experimenting, for innovation and bringing fresh ideas to this job. She seems to handle the interview questions quite well....

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Without hydropower and the clean energy from dams estimates are for 10% more use of burning fossil fuels. China and Brazil have added 12.5 gigawatts of power from hydropower, 50% of this in the world for 2017. Africa added 1.9 gigawatts in this period and 6 countries depend on hydro for 90% of electricity production.  The entry of private capital and the financing from the government in the case of China and India is replacing the role of the World Bank. 

The effect of lack of electricity in India and Africa is underestimated in how it affects people's lives in these regions with lack of water supplies, and lack of electricity severely hurting people in large numbers who are marginalized or forgotten because they never had access to lighting at night before.

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Prime minister Modi's address in Hindi to the nation on May 12 on "Atman Nirbhar Bharat" (self reliant India) as India looks ahead to a situation beyond the coronavirus. What would the economy look like as India moves forward? He says the emphasis will be on planning for the need for land, labor, liquidity, and laws to develop the Indian economy. A bold package of economic action for an investment of 20 lakh crore rupees or $280 billion was announced with details to be provided later. The basic philosophy of the next move forward was what the prime minister concentrated his speech on. Modi says there are 5 pillars for the Atman Nirbhar Bharat, or Self Reliant India. The first action not to go for incremental change- go instead for a quantum leap, be bold. This applies to both technology and investment and creating an environment where results can be achieved. Second action to make the kind of infrastructure that would set a new standard in the world. Third a "sabhi ke sapno ke aadhar," taking everyone along, be technology driven. Third action celebrate and build on India's vibrant demography, once seen as a weakness this will be turned into a strength. Fifth action be Demand driven - "demand or supply chain puri samtha ke saman karne ki jaruat che." The demand and supply chain  should be taken good care of. That also means be local and local manufacturing. Be vocal for local is the new message said Modi, because this is what worked and is saving us in the pandemic. As external supply chains failed countries in Europe and North America, it is the local supply chain for medicine, health care equipment, and food supplies, local technology for citizen id and bank accounts for direct deposit, agricultural supplies, strong and large national postal and rail networks and millions of employees spanning the country in all directions, that have proved of amazing value in this crisis. "Is local ne bhi bachaya, ham sabki jinnadari hai," - the local saved us and is everyone's responsibility.   ...

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Farmers protests asking for minimum support price to be extended to other products beyond rice and wheat. About 260 million people are employed in agriculture in India with many farmers on small plots, and large farms depleting water supplies. Efforts to introduce market pricing that would increase farm incomes and to shift more agricultural labor to the industrial sectors that build modern infrastructure and to factories are designed to improve standards of living. The pandemic and the years of slow growth before 2014 and lack of infrastructure building in earlier decades means the kind of shift of agricultural workers to factories that happened in China will be the task of the next ten years. The next budget for 2024-2025 shown in adjoining powerpoint shows the increase of capital expenditures of 11.1% in the coming year for infrastructure that is meant to catch up to the advanced industrial economies of the world with sustained investment at scale over the next decade. ...

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Somini Sengupta reports on the Green Revolution and its aftemath from Jalandhar (Jullundur in Hindi) in the Indian Punjab wheat belt. Problems facing farmers here are the shrinking water supplies as more of the table water is exhausted through pumping from tube wells, lack of government investment in agriculture, the low grain prices paid to farmers by the government, and poor storage and transportation to market. Also affecting the suuply of grain and lentils and agricultural produce is the progress of industrialization as more farmers either grow crops that are in demand in the cities like baby corn instead of wheat, and the farmers who sell of land for industry or commercial use. Only 40% of the land is irrigated so too much depends on the monsoon and other rainfall, which is why India's large agricultural component in the economy affects the growth rates depending on the monsoon rains. What happens here affects food supplies worldwide and prices. When India is self sufficient or able to export there is less pressure on prices. Two years ago the situation deteriorated and India imported about 7 million tons for its grain stockpile. Since then the government raised prices for grains the situation has improved, farmers planted more wheat and sold more supplies to the government for building up buffer stocks of grain. Now the emphasis shifting to USA-India cooperation in the field of agriculture for a second Green Revolution. Agreements for the agricultural improvements were signed as part of the agreements signed for cooperation during President Bush's vist to India. The government of Manmohan Singh was elected for another 4 year term and is committed to helpiong Indian farmers. A more organized funded effort is needed especially with the economic crisis. The rural areas are the fastest growing part of the Indian economy. See link. ...

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WSJ's reporters Meichtry, L, Pokharel, and Soon look at the extraordinary rise of Gautam Adani through his efforts to develop reclaimed land at Mundra port in the state of Gujarat. Adani who started with a small family owned plastics maker in Ahmedabad developed Mundra port around 2001 with the help of the Modi administration. Modi saw the electricity shortages in Gujarat as an opportunity to tackle India's chronic electricity shortages. Adani's early development of a deep water port at Mundra offered both Modi and Adani the opportunity to tackle the electricity shortages by bringing coal in large ships to Mundra in the way that China was already doing by 2005 in its own efforts at industrialization. So deeply immersed was India under the Congress Raj of licenses and closed economy that India's established business failed to see what China was doing to break into the ranks of industrialized nations. India's first prime minister Nehru had build a command economy where not much happened without government licenses and approval often riddled unwittingly with corruption. Modi needed someone outside the established companies operating under the Congress Raj command economy and with a vision of an India with abundant electricity to take the risks Chinese companies were taking to build an entirely new economy. By 2005 Guangzhou was importing coal with large ships from Indonesia and Australia. State owned companies moved slowly and would take years to develop the port capacity. Using China's example Modi pushed ahead with Adani on a rapid time delivery making Mundra a Special economic Zone and helping to connect Indian Railways to the port of Mundra for coal deliveries. Adani Enterprises built the thermal power plants near Mundra and build electricity transmission lines on a rapid mission mode giving Gujarat abundant electricity supplies and giving Gujarat state in northwestern India a great leap forward in the way China was already doing right in front of everyone's eyes by 2005 with world class ports built at Guangzhou, Shanghai, Shenzen, Hong Kong and logistics connections set with the help of Maersk.  Maersk is now doing the same for modern logistics in India in collaboration with the Modi administration.  Modi and the younger generation of aspirational youth in India see a New India that can break into the ranks of the largest industrialized nations with world class infrastructure in the way China has done, and use new technologies with innovation that will speed up the process in a way that the world has never seen. A quick look at Mundra Port in Wikipedia shows the timeline, It starts in 1998 when Adani Port Ltd was setup and Mundra port work began, 2002 the port integrated with Indian Railways, 2003 when it was made a Special Economic Zone by the Modi government in Gujarat, 2007 when IPO of 40 million shares at price band of around Rs 400 was done.  The Biden administration and the Trump administration support India's efforts to build a new modern economy with a rapid shift to renewable energy. As India is building the ports and logistics with the help of Maersk and other companies in the European Union, president Biden is working with prime minister Modi to build a new supply chain that removes the overconcentration of manufacturing and supply chain logistics in China. This means new ports with the latest technologies in India to handle shipment to the US and the EU. Jake Sullivan set out the goals for president Biden to accomplish this task in meetings with his Indian counterpart Ajit Doval this week on iCERT. President Biden and Republicans, Germany and the EU, see India as a critical part of the Initiative on Critical and Emerging Technologies, and the new supply chain. For the Adani Group the IPO pause offers an opportunity to do what Nirmala Sitharman has done in the Indian Budget this week- build a stable growth path ahead for the long term in line with India's Amrit Kal the next 25 years to centenary of freedom in 2047. Nirmala Sitharaman set a goal of rapid capital spending and investment increasing capital spending in 2023 by 33% in 2023 over 2022, yet maintaining a stable fiscal path by keeping the deficit below 6%. ...

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India needs more dams to collect, store and channel water to where it is needed. The rainy season is becoming shorter, with alot of the rain as much as 50% falling in about 15 days. This means some areas are flood prone and the water if not collected in dams would be lost. THe other problem is that a lot of water is wasted without proper maintenance of the existing dams and storage areas. Much of the state governments investment in this is ineffective so water is lost for lack of maintenance. The state irrigation departments are underfunded, overmanned and corrupt and are not upto the task of maintaining the existing irrigation systems. This presents ahuge problem because India is estimated to lose the equivalent of two thirds of the new storage it builds to siltation. Between 1992-2004 India built 200 medium size irrigation projects but the area irrigated by these projects actually shrank by 3.2 million hectares. New dams are not coming on fast enough and India has 200 cubic metres of water per person, compared with 1000 cubic metres in China. Groundwater -with the governments providing free electricity to farmers for pumps- is used widely but this is becoming unsustainable. The WOrld Bank estimates that 15% of India's food production comes from "mining" which is the use of unrenewable groundwater supplies. Many of these wells are drying out. Also free electricity is causing electricity boards to have insufficient funds for expanding supply causing chronic shortages. One quarter of India's electricity is given free or cut rate to farmers. And politicians trying to reform this system are often booted out of office. All this as 400 million Indians have no electricity. The answer is not merely to raise prices in places like Haryana state- where according to aWorld Bank study farmers with electricity spend 25% of their incomes for it and to repair engine pumps- but also for the utilities to improve supply. Farmers also need to learn to use water more efficiently. ...

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The UNICEF Represetative in India describes the effort made by children to change attitudes and take action on issues related to sanitation and the Clean India campaign of the Modi government. It shows that a generational change in attitudes is underway as children take the lead for the first time.

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A 1000 mile windswept coastline and 300 days of sunshine make the southern African nation of Namibia an attractive location for green hydrogen projects. Green hydrogen is produced using wind and solar energy. There is a 50 fold increase in green hydrogen projects in just the last 12 months globally. The costly technology needs many projects to get to lower costs through technological advances. Germany is doing a pilot project in Luderitz, Namibia. Luderitz will need a deep water project to ship the fuel out.   Renewable wind and solar energy is used to distil the hydrogen atoms in water, as opposed to the currently used method to maky hydrogen from fossil fuels, known as gray hydrogen, or blue hydrogen if the emissions from fossil fuels are captured. Namibia is chosen as its natural advantages could bring the costs down faster. Other locations being adopted are Morocco, Australia, and Chile. The two sites in Namibia had bids from Africa's Sasol, Australia's Fortescu, Germany's Enertrag and Hyphen Hydrogen.  Hyphen Hydrogen won the bid for the two sites. It says the $9.4 billion project is targeting 300,000 metric tons of green hydrogen production a year from 5 gigawatts of renewable energy generation capacity by 2030. "Now all of a sudden the desert has become valuable," says Namibia's finance minister Mr. Shiimi. Additional asset for Namibia is that it ranks highest after Cape Verde in Africa for transparency, creating ease of doing business. It is ranked 57 in Transparency International rank of transparency for countries in 2020. China is 78, India 86 in rank. Namibia is putting up $45 million for the feasibility study on the project with the sesert scrub land an hour from Luderitz, once a diamond mining town on a rocky Atlantic coastline in 1900. Two sites are located in the area each 675 square miles. South Africa is severely short of energy supplies and a pipeline is being considered to take the Namibian hydrogen to South Africa. The African region is expanding in renewable energy. Lake Turkana Wind Power Project in Kenya provides 17% of installed electricity capacity in Kenya with 365 wind turbines.     ...

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The full text of the letter is given here. In this letter the U.S. sets out some important facts about events that happened during the coronavirus crisis during the crucial 4 month period from December 2019 to March 2020. Every week lost in this time due to reasons of a lack of transparency, openness meant hundreds of thousands of people more infected and tens of thousands of deaths worldwide. There are questions of transparency, of openness and this raises questions about the manner in which the World Health Assembly operates with hundreds of small countries in Africa and Asia having votes equal to that of the U.S., India, Brazil, Mexico with votes taken of over 200 countries. The entire election process can now be seen as questionable, when over a billion people in one country alone such as India or hundreds of millions in Brazil and Mexico would have to bear the consequences of poor decisions made by small countries that can be swayed in one direction or another based on political bias and other considerations that have nothing to do with global health.  At the conclusion of the letter by the U.S. to the current WHO shaped by a controversial election in 2017 the following is stated about the standards set by Gro Harlem Brundtland and which helped the world prevent the SARS crisis which originated in China in 2003 from spreading to the large countries of the world India, Brazil, Mexico, and other such countries in Asia and Africa, Latin America, and the U.S. European Union. "In 2003, in response to the outbreak of the Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS) in China, Director-General Harlem Brundtland boldly declared the World Health Organization’s first emergency travel advisory in 55 years, recommending against travel to and from the disease epicenter in southern China. She also did not hesitate to criticize China for endangering global health by attempting to cover up the outbreak through its usual playbook of arresting whistleblowers and censoring media. Many lives could have been saved had you followed Dr. Brundtland’s example." Even this does not come to grips with the flawed way in which the election of WHO head is done. It can no longer be relied on when there is the danger that lack of transparency can emerge in the WHO leadership itself because of a flawed process. It risks endangering the lives and livelihoods of hundreds of millions in countries such as India, Brazil, Mexico, as well as in the relatively small countries of Africa and Latin America where even basic water supplies are at risk but which could tilt elections at the World Health Assembly. Consider that a cyclone just hit the Indian state of West Bengal and Bangladesh on May 20 just as the coronavirus pandemic is spreading. That this region of 1.5 billion people had just 2 votes out of over 200 cast at the World Health Assembly in 2017 shocking. And even these votes cast based on old geopolitical considerations not how good the candidate is, and how good the country he is coming from is in terms of its record  on public health. The irony here is that private foundations in the advanced countries in the U.S. and Europe some of whom are major donors to WHO did not think that more experienced candidates in their own countries with a better record of public health such as in France or Germany are better qualified, in a flawed NGO support mentality left from the Clinton years. Basically the people in these large countries such as India, Brazil, Mexico were disenfranchised, when the austerity policies were consuming the European Union, and the U.S. had just elected a new administration itself groping for ways to reverse years of neglect of public services and infrastructure priorities. They would trust good leaders no matter where they come from, who have a record of transparency, leadership, and all the values we cherish together no matter where we come from. ...

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US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi will spend Tuesday night August 2 in Taipei, Taiwan. China has threatened severe consequences and Taiwanese forces are on alert. Yet with over $1 trillion in China's exports to US and EU in 2021 the response will have to take this into account as also the US and EU to redesign its supply chains. This is the first trip of a senior US official to Taiwan as Speaker Pelosi comes next to the Vice President to succeed the presidency. The US response to the Russian attack on Ukraine was made in Biden's word as a deterrent to China in its role in the Indo-Pacific region. The Pelosi trip may be a reflection of this policy that seeks to maintain the US position that Indo-Pacific is international waters, that US policy will continue as before undeterred by actions such as the Russian attack on Ukraine with the support of China. And that US will engage fully with allies in the Indo-Pacific- Indonesia, Singapore, Malaysia and Taiwan. And that is doing this with the cooperation of its allies in the region- Australia, Japan and India. US and EU imports from China are $541 and $522 billion over $1 trillion for 2022. Loss of even a significant portion of these exports from major tensions in the region would have a severe impact on Chinese economic growth. The US and EU are already engage in redesigning the supply chain and would also face problems in a transition similar to the gas rationing in Germany after cutoff of Russian supplies. The trade is too big a factor at this time. ...

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As India's growth rate improves, one weak area is agriculture which is growing at about 3% a year, and contributes only 13.7% to GDP. Of huge significance is that about 600 million people depend on agriculture. Lagging development in this area leaves the nation backward as a whole. Farming practices are still backward and have not changed significantly. Agricultural markets, infrastructure, is still backward and needs improvement. Decline in the size of plots since 1970 from about 6 acres to about 3 acres today, and low productivity on farms is a problem. Farmers fear being pushed off the land and politicians look to the rural vote to preserve the status quo. Poor monsoon rains can increase problems for farmers as three fifths of farmland is still without irrigation. Agricultural markets are fragmented, so that apples from Himachal Pradesh in the north are not easily shipped to Karnataka in the south, and coconuts in the south not easily shipped to the north. State marketing boards in India called Agricultural Produce Marketing Committees (APMC's) control trade in fruit and vegetables. There are about 3000 fragmented agricultural markets in India, and markets can be fragmented within states. Laws from the 1950's to prevent hoarding are still on the books reducing incentives to invest in cold storage and warehouses, a significant problem in India leading to much waste and rotting of agricultural products. This hurts farmers because it leads to cuts in price. The distribution chain also hurts farmers with middlemen and commissioning agents taking as much as 6% in commission compared to the international level of about 0.5%. This review of the state of agriculture by the Economist says that 25 years after the first reforms opening up India's economy in 1990, agriculture as one area which touches the life of about half the population has not seen much change....

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The heavy monsoon rains this year and the lack of adequate storage facilities may result in the loss of 10-15% of the wheat and rice harvest this year, according to Indian government sources. This means food prices are rising because of this loss of grain. India badly needs more and better warehouses to store grain and control food prices.