Day: March 18, 2022

A trio of Russian cosmonauts arrived at the International Space Station on Friday, the first new faces in space since the start of the Russian war in Ukraine.

Russian space corporation Roscosmos cosmonauts Oleg Artemyev, Denis Matveyev and Sergey Korsakov blasted off successfully from the Russia-leased Baikonur launch facility in Kazakhstan in their Soyuz MS-21 spacecraft at 8:55 p.m. Friday (11:55 a.m. EDT). They smoothly docked at the station just over three hours later, joining two Russians, four Americans and a German on the orbiting outpost.

The blastoff marked the first space crew launch since Russia invaded Ukraine on Feb. 24.

The war has resulted in canceled spacecraft launches and broken contracts. Roscosmos chief Dmitry Rogozin has warned that the U.S. would have to use “broomsticks” to fly into space after Russia said it would stop supplying rocket engines to U.S. companies. Many worry, however, that Rogozin is putting decades of a peaceful off-planet partnership at risk, most notably at the International Space Station.

NASA Administrator Bill Nelson played down Rogozin’s comments, telling The Associated Press: “That’s just Dmitry Rogozin. He spouts off every now and then. But at the end of the day, he’s worked with us,”

“The other people that work in the Russian civilian space program, they’re professional,” Nelson told the AP on Friday. “They don’t miss a beat with us, American astronauts and American mission control. Despite all of that, up in space, we can have a cooperation with our Russian friends, our colleagues.”

NASA astronaut Mark Vande Hei — who on Tuesday broke the U.S. single spaceflight record of 340 days — is due to leave the International Space Station with two Russians aboard a Soyuz capsule for a touchdown in Kazakhstan on March 30.

In April, another three NASA and one Italian astronaut are set to blast off for the space station.

Source: Voice of America

The Biden administration is in danger of cutting short its efforts to help vaccinate the world because U.S. lawmakers had slashed global pandemic response funds from the omnibus spending bill that President Joe Biden signed into law earlier this week.

The $1.5 trillion spending bill did not include $15.6 billion requested for COVID-19 response, of which $5 billion had been marked by the White House to fight the coronavirus around the world.

White House press secretary Jen Psaki told VOA during a briefing Friday that the administration did not have an alternative plan for delivering the 700 million doses of vaccines remaining from the 1.2 billion doses it had pledged.

“We need additional funding to continue to be the arsenal of vaccines,” she said. “There is not a secret fund that we have not told you about to continue to provide the type of free programs we have in the United States or to provide the level of international assistance that we would like to continue to provide.”

A White House official confirmed that the 1.2 billion doses of vaccines had been purchased. The lack of funding, however, will devastate America’s ability to ensure recipient countries can effectively deploy them, and to provide tests, therapeutics, oxygen and humanitarian aid to countries still struggling to manage the pandemic.

The pandemic response fund was stripped following Republican lawmakers’ refusal to add new coronavirus spending unless it was offset by spending cuts elsewhere.

In early March, 36 Republican senators sent a letter to Biden saying that before they would consider additional COVID-19 requests, they wanted an accounting of how the federal government had allocated taxpayer funds to combat the pandemic. “Congress must receive a full accounting of how the government has already spent the first $6 trillion,” the letter said.

House Democrats have introduced a standalone COVID-19 relief bill, but it does not yet have the votes to pass both chambers of Congress.

Strategy pivot curtailed

Just last month, the administration said it would adjust its global pandemic response strategy, pivoting away from boosting vaccine supply and toward increasing delivery capacity. But now it can no longer finance Global Vax, its international initiative launched in December.

“Without additional funding to support getting shots into arms, USAID will have to curtail our growing efforts to turn vaccines into vaccinations — just as countries are finally gaining access to the vaccine supplies needed to protect their citizens,” said Samantha Power, administrator of the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), in a statement.

Humanitarian organizations criticized the removal of COVID-19 funding from the omnibus bill.

The U.S. will not be able to “keep up the fight against COVID at home and around the world — a serious concern given the rising surges in Asia and Europe,” said Tom Hart, president of the ONE Campaign, in a statement to VOA.

Hart said that if large parts of the world remain vulnerable to the virus and its variants, Americans’ own health and economic recovery are at risk. “What should be a no-brainer after two years of a pandemic has proven impossible for world leaders and lawmakers to grasp: We will not end the pandemic anywhere until we end it everywhere. Congress can and must fix this,” Hart said.

Only 14.1% of people in low-income countries have received at least one dose, according to Our World in Data.

While the U.S. remains the biggest vaccine donor by far, public health officials called the lack of global pandemic response funding “self-defeating.”

“American leadership for a robust and effective global response is the best pathway to end the pandemic, build resilient health systems, and be better prepared for future health security threats,” said Dr. Krishna Udayakumar, founding director of the Duke Global Health Innovation Center.

“We can’t fully protect the health and economic prosperity of Americans without doing more around the world,” Udayakumar told VOA.

The cut to pandemic response funding came as lawmakers agreed to $13.6 billion in assistance for Ukraine, including $6.5 billion to supply Kyiv with weapons as it battles Russia’s invasion and $6.7 billion for economic and humanitarian aid for the country.

Source: Voice of America

Luanda – The lack of scientific and technical knowledge by the national farmers, with highlight to family agriculture, constitutes one of the main factors that hinder the progress of agricultural activity in the country.

This statement comes from the minister of Agriculture and Fisheries, António Franciasco de Assis, while talking this Friday in Luand, during the second edition of the CaféCIPRA space.

“Despite the lack of instruments and agricultural inputs, we have an accentuated deficit related to technical knowledge, mainly within the operators that engage in family agriculture (…), explained the official.

The minister stresses that the absence of industrial units for the manufacture of fertilizers, pesticides and agricultural equipment – such as hoes, machetes, axes and watering cans – are other factors that hamstring the practice of agriculture by families in Angola.

Facing this scenario, António Francisco de Assis points the need to reinforce the bet in economic diplomacy aiming to attract new investment for the sector of industry.

In this regard, the minister recalled that Angola already has two projects of private initiative for the assembling of fertilizers factory in the provinces of Zaire and Cabinda respectively, actions that should be replicated in other regions of the country.

According to the minister the country also needs to improve the distribution chain and the flow of agricultural products to encourage farmers.

The official admitted, however, that there is still a big deficit in the supply of agricultural foodstuffs to the national market, taking into account the crescent seeking of essential products in the country.

On the occasion the agricultural and industrial operators advocated the need to have more inclusion and concert among the government and the producers to boost the productive activity in the country.

On his turn, the Trade Chamber and Industry of Angola (CCIA) chairman, Vicente Vaz, states that it is necessary to improve the dialogue and concert among the government and the operators aiming for the realization of national production increase.

The manager of the Pérola do Kikuxi farm, Elizabeth dos Santos, defends the implementation of policies that allow to effectively fight unfair competition as well as to protect the national producer in the country, fundamentally in the production of eggs.

On the other hand, the owner of the company Nova Agrolíder, Laurinda Macedo, advocates the creation of an Exporter Bureau to reduce excess bureaucracy that is still recorded in the process of national products exportation.

Promoted by the Press Centre of the Presidency of the Republic of Angola (CIPRA), the participants in the second edition of the CaféCIPRA Space, which is a dialogue without mediation, have assessed the Promotion of national production and sustainability of the Strategic Food Reserve (REA).

The respective assessment, which was attended by businesspersons, journalists, among other guests, was co-chaired by the ministers of Industry and Trade, Victor Fernandes, Agriculture and Fisheries, António Francisco Assis, as well as the coordinator of REA, Eduardo Machado.

The first edition of the dialogue without mediation called CaféCIPRA took place last February, with the theme “Economic Diplomacy: balance and perspectives”.

Source: Angola Press News Agency

Luanda – A delegation of the Ministry of Culture, Tourism and Environment, worked early this month in Spain, where they interacted and acquired experiences on the implementation of strategies and exploitation of the energy potential of solid urban waste and the model of the country’s intermunicipal waste management system.

According to a press release, made available this Friday to ANGOP, the meeting had the purpose of evaluating the way of functioning of some solid urban waste processing units in San Sebastian, Bilbao.

The note stresses that in a final communiqué on the visit, direct recommendations were passed on for the Ministry of Culture, Tourism and Environment to find ways to enable the acquisition of two units of waste processing, based on the technologies used in Spain, to initially produce electricity and separate the remaining waste for later marketing.

The delegation led by the CEO of the National Waste Agency, Nelma Caetano, to the Kingdom of Spain, visited the plastics processing unit, focused on the use of plastic bottles, called EKO RECI W, the Urban Solid Waste Processing Unit (RSU) managed by the waste consortium of Gipuzkoa (GHK) that serves 90 municipalities comprising about 740.000 inhabitants.

Source: Angola Press News Agency

Luanda – The Capital Market Commission (CMC) expects to launch a programme dubbed “Capital Market Incubator for Small and Medium Companies”, in May this year, with the aim to increase the levels of financial literacy and contribute to the economic development of Angola, its CEO Maria Uini Baptista said Friday.

Maria Uini Baptista explained that the launching of the programme is waiting for the fulfillment of some agreements and commitment letters with the partners.

“The programme would already be in operation, but we had a situation with the partners, since they will be the accelerators, the incubators and the auditors, as well as with some entities that finance projects. I’m talking about the International Finance Corporation (IFC), the African Development Bank (ADB), among others”, she disclosed.

Maria Baptista, who was speaking on the 17th anniversary of the CMC marked on March 18, said the incubator’s objective is to create a kind of “nurseries”, where the companies will be endowed with financial reporting techniques, corporate governance and reporting in general.

Maria Baptista indicated that with this programme the intention is to organize companies, so that in 4 or 5 years they get the necessary skills for their development.

The CMC is a legal entity under Public Law, subject to the supervision of the President of the Republic and the Ministry of Finance.

CMC’s mission is the regulation, supervision, inspection and promotion of the securities market and of the activities involving all the agents that intervene in it, directly or indirectly, under the terms of the Presidential Decree no. 54/13, of June 6th (Organic Statute of CMC).

Source: Angola Press News Agency

Luanda – Angola and Cuba in Luanda analysed the strengthening and deepening of friendship and cooperation relations, in a meeting held at the Angolan Foreign Relations Ministry.

The meeting brought together the Secretary of State for International Cooperation and Angolan Communities, Domingos Vieira Lopes, and the Cuban ambassador to Angola, Esther Gloria Armenteros Cárdenas.

According to the Angolan Foreign Relations Ministry, the meeting served to make an aftermath of the recent visit of the Minister of State and Head of the Civil House of the President of the Republic of Angola, Adão de Almeida, to Cuba.

Minister of State Adão de Almeida made a working visit to Cuba from 27 February to 3 March of this year.

In 1976, Angola and Cuba signed the General Bilateral Cooperation Agreement that covers several sectors, having evolved over the years within the framework of the historical-international context and the interests of both parties.

Source: Angola Press News Agency

Uige – The first provincial secretary of MPLA in Uige, José Carvalho da Rocha, appealed on Friday, in Negage municipality, for a greater commitment in mobilising militants in order to win the general elections set for next August.

He was speaking on the occasion of the entry of 2,838 militants into MPLA, and stressed the importance of continuing to mobilise for the entry of new militants into the ruling party.

The conquest of more militants will strengthen the party in the materialisation of the electoral challenges.

The politician took the opportunity to reinforce the appeal for citizens to join the Single Public Service Desk (BUAP) to get them registered.

Source: Angola Press News Agency