SciDev.Net

The WHO has provided its own estimates of how non-communicable diseases are set to rise in developing countries. These authors pool data from national registries and international databases to compare data on the differing burden from individual diseases. They outline the risk factors associated with the diseases.

The main three killers are cardiovascular disease, diabetes, and cancer. The paper ranks different types of cancer by how many people in developing countries they kill (lung and breast cancer are the deadliest) and also ranks diabetes prevalence by country (India, followed by China, has the highest prevalence).

To tackle these diseases, say the authors, people need to look closely at the risk factors in their life – eating healthily and exercising can do much to reduce the chances of getting one of these diseases.

Cardiovascular diseases are set to rise dramatically in developing countries, partly because of an increase in risk factors for the diseases, which include diet, physical activity, smoking. The authors looked at cardiovascular disease risks such as being overweight or obese, systolic blood pressure, and total cholesterol, and related them to national income, food purchase constraints, and urbanisation. Body mass index (BMI) and cholesterol increased as national income increased, then flattened, and eventually declined. BMI also rose with increasing urbanisation.

The authors suggest that cardiovascular disease risks will increasingly be concentrated in low-income and middle-income countries. Thus, preventing obesity should be considered a priority in these countries, along with measures to control blood pressure, cholesterol, and tobacco use.

Chronic diseases — heart and lung disease, cancer and diabetes — are having a negative economic impact on both the developed and developing world, says this report, which is why they should be properly addressed by domestic and international policy makers. Compared to the epidemiological evidence on the rise of non-communicable diseases in developing nations, there is little information on how this increase will affect their economies.

This report investigates the demographics of the problem and finds that contrary to popular belief, the disproportionate burden of disease on the elderly does have economic implications. The reason is that though the elderly may not be part of the workforce, they are still consumers and therefore a part of the economic equation.

Whether approaches to tackling chronic diseases are cost-effective or not is a vital issue for countries whose health budgets are already overstretched — the report outlines some of the interventions that offer most bang for buck. The authors point out that strategies that work well in developed countries are not so effective in developing countries, and call for more research to assess what will be appropriate.

This extensive report was one of the first to document the scale of the problem of chronic diseases in developing countries, and crucially, to offer guidance on feasible and practical methods of tackling them.

The document starts by laying out in detail the profiles of chronic diseases in different countries, projections for the future, and how chronic diseases are linked with poverty. It also examines in depth the economic costs of such diseases and the macroeconomic consequences of not tackling them quickly enough. The authors outline interventions — whether community, workplace, or school — that have robust evidence supporting them.

The report ends with a call for a unifying framework of global health experts and stakeholders, in which the government has a key role. It also specifies what policymakers need to do to ensure that measures to tackle chronic diseases are put into action.

This document presents the proceedings of a conference at the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences in December 2001. The conference papers deal with themes relating to the role of scientific research in the development of Northern countries and the need for North–South research cooperation. They document the experiences of research cooperation involving, among others, India, South Africa and a number of East African countries. Several papers deal with innovation and scientific cooperation, with case studies.

This paper presents a review of the challenges of international scholarly scientific collaboration. It looks at institutional constraints and points out that the challenges and problems multiply when collaborators come from different countries with differing conditions, resource endowments and institutional structures. It is easier to call for more and better forms of international collaboration than it is to design them. The report asserts that good design is helped by a better understanding of what collaboration is and how it has been carried out. It draws on social research insights to help reduce the transactional, financial, ethical and emotional costs of international linkages and exchange and provides a conceptual framework for thinking about international collaboration issues.

This draft policy brief says African, Caribbean and Pacific (ACP) countries can use local natural resources — such as sugarcane and jatropha — to meet energy requirements through biofuels, curtailing dependence on fossil fuels.

But the authors warn of challenges for developing countries, including economic and trade issues, and suggest practical steps for meeting these. They also present various bioenergy options for households, such as BioGel — a solid wood-substitute made from low-grade ethanol mixed with a gelling agent.

The brief makes a number of policy recommendations, including national strategies for promoting and sustaining local demand, and more funding for local and regional ACP research.

In this manifesto, John Mathews, professor of strategic management at Australia's Macquarie University, challenges development organisations to reconsider their position on biofuels. He says countries should follow Brazil, China and India in forging a "new pathway of industrial development", based around biofuels.

Mathews argues that although China and India are seen as big polluters, they, together with Brazil, are actually paving the way for developing nations to invest in renewable energy.

He outlines practical steps for creating renewable energy industries, citing Brazil — the world's leading producer of biofuels — as an example. Mathews sets out 10 arguments for biofuels in the developing world.

Biofuels offer an attractive solution to escalating oil prices and concern over how fossil fuels affect global climate. They also provide new prospects for rural communities.

But their full implications, for developing countries and the environment, remain unclear. Balancing economic efficiency and environmental sustainability is not easy, and many key questions remain unanswered.

This essay addresses some of these questions, investigating the pros and cons of biofuels for the developing world. It examines economic and social factors, and the role of science and technology in biofuels production. It explores experiences from Brazil and other developing nations, as well as trade-offs between producing biofuels and food.

This report evaluates the impacts of genetically modified (GM) crops in Argentina between 1996 and 2005, alongside wider trends in the country's agriculture and national economy.

The authors calculate the financial benefits of three GM crops — soybeans, maize and cotton — to be over US$20 billion, although they also estimate that about US$2.3 billion is needed to restore soil fertility after soybean cultivation.

They say that introducing GM crops to Argentina resulted in approximately one million new jobs over ten years, and led to lower global soybean prices.

The authors conclude that the benefits of introducing GM crops such as soybeans outweigh the costs.

But they call for public debate and policy intervention to address the environmental problems caused by long-term soybean monocultures, and the risks of depending too heavily on soybean exports.

This study uses empirical data to analyse the extent to which technological spillovers occur as a result of foreign direct investment (FDI) in Argentina. It discusses why FDI is often assumed to be fundamental to human capital formation and technological development in developing countries.

The authors argue that FDI may not be the most effective instrument to foster technological development. They observe that FDI spillovers are not extensive and that they depend on multinational corporations' assets and investment decisions as well as domestic firms' absorptive capacity, as indicated by their investment in training and equipment.

One of the study's key conclusions is that only those firms that have invested heavily in improving their absorptive capacity will receive positive spillovers from FDI.

The authors suggest that governments must make broader efforts to promote local firms and science and technology organisations, and improve the links between these.

This paper provides an interesting historic perspective on the reasons for Brazil's position in international climate negotiations that is rarely found in this format. Written for the Danish Institute for International Studies, the author provides an in depth assessment of Brazil's foreign policy as it relates to climate change, starting as early as 1988. This document is useful reading for anyone interested in the early years of climate change negotiations and the positions of developing countries.

This paper examines the main approaches to developing an equitable international climate change regime. The first section introduces the main Brazilian stakeholders and the activities related to the Climate Convention, and reviews the national debate on climate change, environment and development. Section II discusses the connections between Brazil's climate change mitigation and sustainable development strategies, illustrating some programmes leading to greenhouse gas emissions mitigation. Section III identifies important barriers to integrating climate change into national sustainable development strategies. The core part considers approaches to harnessing synergies between climate change and sustainable development policies, and illustrates the key issues in building an equitable burden-sharing climate regime. As part of this, it considers the Brazilian Proposal made at COP-3.

The paper's key conclusions include that Brazil's main source of emissions is deforestation to create more farmland, that renewable energy production and improved energy efficiency have significantly contributed to avoiding emissions, and that the Brazilian Proposal may be a useful starting point for developing international mitigation policy.

Through much of the past climate change negotiations, there has been little interaction between the Brazilian government and non-governmental organisations. In 2002 however, Brazilian NGOs formed a network because they were not satisfied with how the government dealt with important climate concerns, especially the link between deforestation and global warming.

The network, called the Climate Observatory, aims to become a vehicle for influencing government views and policies on climate change. A first priority was to direct more attention to deforestation, an important yet controversial issue, both in Brazil and the international arena. In 2002, the network had 26 members from all over Brazil, and the effects of the network have included a broader participation of NGOs in the climate change debate in Brazil.

This is the most authoritative and comprehensive assessment to date of climate change impacts and vulnerabilities in the Latin American region. Key impacts are set in the context of ecosystems, every sector of the economy, and particularly the forestry sector.

Following a review of the regional climate, the chapter considers five key concerns: natural ecosystems, agriculture and plantation forestry, sea level rise, water resources, and human health. Climate change is an additional stress on biodiversity in the region's forested, mountainous, and mangrove ecosystems. Agriculture and plantation forestry are projected to suffer as crop models project decreased yields in several crops (e.g. maize, wheat, barley, grapes), even when the direct effect of carbon dioxide (CO2), fertilisation and moderate adaptation measures are considered. Human health concerns stem from heat and cold waves and changes in the distribution of vector borne diseases, such as malaria and dengue.

An executive summary provides a quick reference.

This report analyses Brazil's options for meeting electricity demand through to 2015. The report provides a demand forecast and detailed assessment of available power supplies. The authors suggest that Brazil's energy policy may secure its exceptional role as an environmental leader among developing countries.

Because Brazil generates over 90 per cent of its electricity from hydrodams, its per capita carbon emissions are less than half the world average. Many of its new power plants, however, will probably use natural gas. Government and industry decision-makers are greatly concerned about meeting Brazil's future demand at least-cost — including to the environment. Current reforms in the power sector, designed mainly to cut costs, have catalysed privatisation, eliminate tariff equalisation across regions, and supply contracts between power generation and distribution utilities.

Three policy cases — advanced technologies, local environmental controls, and carbon elimination — illustrate that without alternative policies, Brazil will move towards natural gas fired power plants, causing greenhouse gas emissions to rise rapidly.

Brazil's Initial National Communication to the UNFCCC was published by the Ministry of Science and Technology. The document has three parts. The first section introduces institutional arrangements that support and deal with climate change in Brazil, and outlines the national and regional development priorities that underlie decision-making.

The second section provides a national inventory of greenhouse gas emissions from Brazil's economic sectors from 1990 to 1994. It also details the uncertainties in the estimates, particularly relating to land use, land use change and forestry.

The final section explains the measures underway to implement the UNFCCC: sustainable development, research and systematic observation, education/training/public awareness, and measures addressing climatic effects. There are sections describing national and regional capacity, and how climate change will be integrated into medium- and long-term planning.

This long policy-driven document provides a thorough insight into how Brazil is approaching climate change. Note: The file is very large.

This book by Jorge Katz published by ECLAC analyses structural reforms in Latin America and the Caribbean since the 1990s which have transformed regional economies from closed and state-led to more market-oriented and open. The impact of these changes on the growth patterns, technological change and process of innovation in these countries is examined. The book concludes that the development process in the region is uneven across industries, regions and firms.

In 2003, the UK Government commissioned the UK Royal Society, and the UK Royal Academy of Engineering, to conduct an enquiry into the potential risks and benefits of nanotechnology. For this, they collected evidence from various parties, including the science and technology officer of the British Consulate in Brazil, Alexandra Ozorio de Almeida.

In her questionnaire answers, Ozorio de Almeida described the Brazilian research institutes and developments in nanotechnology. She estimated that the development of nanotechnology will receive some 77.7 million reais (US$30 million) from the government between 2004 and 2007.

Ozorio de Almeida gave details of federally funded nanotechnology research networks, funding agency efforts, the location of research teams, and regulatory frameworks. At the time of the evidence, there were no regulations on research and development in nanotechnology, but a bill was underway. In addition, public interest and knowledge about the field was not very strong or accurate, wrote Ozorio de Almeida.

One of a series of WHO case studies Perspectives and Practice in Antiretroviral Treatment, this report features the HIV Equity Initiative established in Haiti in collaboration with Harvard University's Partners for Health.

The paper highlights how existing healthcare infrastructure (a TB control programme) can be adapted to HIV/AIDS treatment, with the lessons learned now being applied in other countries, including Peru, Russia, and the United States.