Catch share: Responsible ways to harvest fish

Most of the news about the world’s oceans is a litany of gloom: rising water temperatures, acidification, bleached coral reefs, tons of Japanese tsunami trash drifting toward North America’s west coast. So it is worth noting when something good is happening with the seas. Last month, the U.S. government reported that six types of fish, including Maine haddock, summer flounder in the mid-Atlantic and Chinook salmon in northern California, had fully recovered in the past year from decades of overf

June 29, 2012

Parties must ensure bills pass upper house

The House of Representatives passed bills on integrated reform of the social security and tax systems at a plenary meeting Tuesday. This marked a significant step toward the nation’s fiscal reconstruction and social security reform.The set of bills ― with an increase in the consumption tax rate as the centerpiece ― was approved by the ruling Democratic Party of Japan and its junior partner, People’s New Party, and also by the two main opposition parties, the Liberal Democratic Party and New Kome

June 29, 2012

Exit, entry management

Besides a heavy dose of routine legislative scrutiny, the Chinese National People’s Congress will review five draft laws in five days, the topics ranging from seniors’ rights to government budgets.But the small yet growing expat community across the country will be most interested in the third reading of the draft law on exit and entry control. Especially in the wake of the recent media frenzy over the city of Beijing’s ongoing efforts to deal with illegal immigration.Over-analysis and misinterp

June 29, 2012

Go boldly into space, but go jointly too

Not without reason, China was in an exuberant mood last week over its first manned docking in space and its record 6,965m submersible dive in the Mariana Trench. Netizens poignantly recalled how Mao Zedong waxed poetically: “We can clasp the moon in the ninth heaven and seize turtles deep down in the five seas.” The simultaneous achievements deserve to be toasted even if others “have been there, done that.”China lags the United States and Russia by decades in manned space flights. And a Swiss-Am

June 29, 2012

In praise of the heavenly hammock

If I wrote a history of the hammock, I’d detail the texture of hamack-tree bark, record the number of hammocks Columbus packed for his return trip to Spain, and dig up reactions among Old World royalty to the slings that let natives sleep above creepy-crawlies. There would be chapters about hammocks on ships of sea and space, chapters on the complexities of weave. I’d think about princes in palaces swaying in the breeze. I’d think about hammocks in the trenches of jungle wars.But as soon as I go

June 28, 2012

Don’t count out Facebook’s business model just yet

Facebook Inc.’s disastrous initial public offering has led to an increasing consensus that the social networking site was overpriced and that its business model is flawed. Some attribute the debacle to issues raised in the company’s prospectus, such as the difficulty of monetizing mobile technology. Others have pointed to the slow growth in advertising revenue or questioned Facebook’s strategy of collecting vast quantities of data from its networked users to enable customized ads. Yet the pillar

June 28, 2012

Is your couch cushion trying to kill you?

Imagine if government officials knew that certain chemicals were hazardous enough to cause health problems as serious as cancer and neurological defects, yet were largely powerless to restrict them.That, in a nutshell, is the state of chemical regulation in the U.S. On paper, the Environmental Protection Agency has the authority to regulate or ban toxic substances. In practice, the agency faces so many hurdles that it hasn’t tried to do so since it made an ill-fated run at asbestos in 1991.More

June 27, 2012

Court order serves democracy in Pakistan

ISLAMABAD ― On June 19, in what it called a “short order,” Pakistan’s Supreme Court removed Syed Yousaf Raza Gilani as the country’s prime minister, a post that he had held for more than four years ― longer than any of his 16 predecessors. For those who favor democracy in Pakistan, the court’s decision is cause, not for concern, but for celebration.Gilani had been convicted weeks earlier of contempt of court, after he refused to comply with a court order directing him to write to Swiss authoriti

June 27, 2012

Somali piracy: A threat and an opportunity for major rival powers

The coasts of Somalia and the Gulf of Aden have been home for some of the worst acts of piracy for years, costing lives and billions of dollars in damage every year and threatening Indian Ocean trade and shipment in one of the most vital trade routes in the world. But this part of the world is also emerging as an area of cooperation between (sometimes rival) countries and an opportunity to project power for others. Whether it is the U.S. Navy rescuing Iranian fishermen, or Iranian naval forces r

June 27, 2012

George Zimmerman case and the pre-trial system

Proceedings in Florida’s case against George Zimmerman for the tragic shooting death of Trayvon Martin have recently provided an object lesson in how the institution of bail is supposed to work ― but almost never does.Recently Zimmerman’s wife was charged with perjury for allegedly lying at her husband’s bail hearing in April; she testified that the couple was broke, which prompted the court to set a low bond. But since then, prosecutors have alleged that, at the time of the hearing, the Zimmerm

June 26, 2012

Redefining sustainable development for megacities

One of the most striking changes at Rio+20, compared to the original 1992 Earth Summit, is the extensive discussion of population issues. In part, this is driven by the fact that many developing countries, including the BRICs, are seeking to redefine what sustainability means with their generally rapid annual growth rates, and high population growth which is estimated to see world population rise from around 7 billion today, to between 8 billion and 11 billion by 2050.This reminds us of the mass

June 26, 2012

State, market and money

Joseph Yam’s paper on “The Future of the Monetary System in Hong Kong” caused quite a stir this month. Irrespective of what happens to the Hong Kong dollar peg, the fundamental thrust of Joseph’s argument is irrefutable ― that no fixed exchange rate system is consistent with sustainable budgetary deficits. This is the major lesson learned from the current European crisis and was bitterly learned in the last Asian financial crisis. Hence, I interprete Joseph’s remarkable essay as a reminder that

June 26, 2012