When Sam’s hard-up relatives needed money to buy a plot of land and start their own business several years ago, they turned to Sathapana Bank in Siem Reap to borrow about US$20,000.Now the Siem Reap tuk-tuk driver and his wife are struggling to make monthly repayments of about US$500. “We do not have the capacity to pay, so we missed payments,” Sam, who asked to use a pseudonym, said.
Malaysia says it will cut the export of chickens from the start of June because of shortages in the country.Elsewhere in Asia, India has banned wheat exports, while Indonesia blocked overseas sales of palm oil.It comes as the world faces the worst food crisis in decades following Russia's invasion of Ukraine.One agriculture expert has highlighted concerns about the potential rise of so-called "food nationalism" by governments in the region.Malaysian shoppers have seen chicken p
The Ukraine war has major economic consequences for energy, food, inflation and poverty, according to the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD). The EBRD's chief economist, Beata Javorcik, spoke to AFP about the fallout from Russia's invasion of Ukraine, from where more than three million refugees have fled so far.Global lenders are giving billions for Ukraine, including a two-billion-euro (US$2.2 billion) "resilience package" from the London-bas
The 2019 Oscar-winning film Parasite attracted a global audience for its arresting portrayal of South Korea’s stark income inequality. The movie’s rendering of a low-income household’s acute sense of alienation resonated widely, no doubt because similar sentiments are palpable in many other countries.
One of the most telling and compelling impacts of the coronavirus pandemic is how it has magnified the gap between the “haves and the have-nots;” the disparity in the living conditions of the developed, developing, and underdeveloped countries across the globe; and how it has aggravated further the poverty situation of low-income families and individual across countries except of course in China which even amid the pandemic was able to defeat extreme poverty within its borders lifting around
In April last year, Unyakarn Booprasert, a Thai cleaner, tried to commit suicide in front of the Ministry of Finance’s building with rat poison as a “protest”, as what she was going through “happened to many people.”“I completely ran out of money. I called my friends and relatives. Everyone had no money,” Booprasert explained.
After being let go from his part-time job as a waiter last year during the pandemic, Danny Goh hit rock bottom.For eight months, he struggled to find work to support his wife and four young children.
The world is facing a global care crisis that we must address urgently.When children live in unstable family environments or lose crucial family bonds at an early age, it can have irreversible consequences on the rest of their lives.This is what we see in our work, day in and day out.We see it when we meet children like eight-month-old Aleksander and his 10-year-old sister Natalyia, who both live in Ukraine. Tragically, they recently lost their mother who was raising them as a single parent.
Within the span of a generation, a new super-rich class emerges from a society in which millions of rural migrants toiled away in factories for a pittance. Bribery becomes the most common mode of influence in politics. Opportunists speculate recklessly in land and real estate. Financial risks simmer as local governments borrow to finance railways and other large infrastructure projects.
When the first COVID-19 case was detected in the Thai border town of Mae Sot in April last year, Hnin Hnin (not her real name), was able to keep her school for migrant children open, spending her mornings as she usually did, drawing up word games on a large whiteboard as her five-year-old pupils looked on.Infections and deaths at the time remained in the single digits, and Hnin Hnin, a teacher from Myanmar, was cautiously optimistic that the pandemic would end soon.
As a nurse at one of Kabul's main hospitals, Latifa Alizada was the breadwinner for her family, providing for her three young boys and unemployed husband.Now - since the Taliban rolled into Afghanistan's capital - she too is jobless, and worried about the future.The 27-year-old left her role at Jamhuriat Hospital because the hardline Islamist group said salaries would not be paid, and imposed rules that would force her to wear a face veil and be segregated from male colleagues.&
Each phone call from Vietnam causes Thai Duong’s heart to skip a few beats.For Duong, who grew up in District 4 of Ho Chi Minh City but currently lives in California, every contact with home poses the possibility of bad news.
