World

• For some, a weekly shopping trip may be the only chance to interact with others.
• A supermarket chain in the Netherlands is helping to combat loneliness with so-called “slow” checkouts where chatting is encouraged.
• Read more:
  Why loneliness is both an individual thing and a shared result of the cities we create

We’re getting lonelier

• Another Australian survey found men aged 35 to 49 had the highest levels of loneliness.
• Social isolation is a matter of how often we have contact with friends, family and others, which can be measured.
• Instead of meaningful face-to-face interactions, many of us now rely on social media, phone apps and video calls to socialise.
• Read more:
  Loneliness is making us physically sick, but social prescribing can treat it – podcast

Could slow, ‘chatty’ checkouts be part of the solution?

• Sadly, increased use of technology, including self-serve checkouts, and cashiers tasked with speedily processing customers can make it challenging to have a conversation.
• Recognising loneliness was an issue for many, the idea was to increase social interaction between customers and staff by slowing things down and encouraging conversation.
• Jumbo’s chief commercial officer, Colette Cloosterman-van Eerd, explained:
  Many people, especially the elderly, sometimes feel lonely.
• Our shops are an important meeting place for many people, and we want to play a role in identifying and reducing loneliness.
• The first Kletskassa, in Vlijmen in Brabant, was so successful the family-owned company started rolling out slow checkouts in 200 of its stores.

Supermarkets as ‘third places’ to combat loneliness

• Third places are familiar public spaces where people can connect over a shared interest or activity.
• Libraries, coffee shops, book stores, community gardens, churches, gyms and clubs are examples of third places.
• They all provide the opportunity for close proximity, interaction and often serendipitous conversations with other people we might not usually meet.

• By the time the shooting stops the UN predicts that Ukraine will be one of the most mine-contaminated countries in the world.
• According to Ukraine’s prime minister, Denys Shmyhal, in March alone, “724 people have been blown up on Russian mines, 226 of them killed”.
• Landmines also make it very difficult for humanitarian organisations to move relief supplies in areas that may or may not have been cleared.

Case study: Angola

• This is a humanitarian tragedy that adds to the complexity of post-war development and presents huge environmental problems.
• For example, during a research trip to Angola in 2019, in Cuito Cuanavale, a town and municipality in Cuando Cubango province, my group of researchers encountered roads that are still inaccessible nearly 40 years after the conflict due to the presence of mines.
• During our visit, our safest option was flying, an option that is out of reach for most Angolans.

A land contaminated

• Many of the roughly 14 million people who are displaced and about 8 million who have fled to neighbouring countries will want to return.
• This will be impossible without surveying the land, getting rid of mines and declaring it safe.
• Once that is done, the public will need to be educated about the risks of unexploded ordnance.
• A report on de-mining from international thinktank Globsec has predicted a 45% reduction of arable grain land after two years of war.

Costly legacy

• As of July 8, the World Bank estimated that mine clearance and mitigation once the war was over would cost more than US$37 billion (£28.5 billion).
• This is huge – especially when you consider the cost of the continuing humanitarian crises and conflicts in other regions.
• Recovery will not be complete until these people’s streets and farms are cleared, their livelihoods restored and their children can go to school or play outside without fear of explosions.

• But our new research shows that the number of women who continued to exclusively breastfeed for six months increased.
• And in fact, women were 40% more likely to exclusively breastfeed for six months during COVID than they were before the pandemic or now, post-pandemic.
• The World Health Organization (WHO) recommends exclusively breastfeeding for the first six months of a baby’s life.
• However, when women say in pregnancy that they intend to breastfeed, then approximately 90% of these women do start doing so.
• They are also 27 times more likely to breastfeed for six months compared to women who did not intend to breastfeed.

The time factor

• But what is it that helps women who do want to breastfeed, do so for longer?
• We know that even without the support systems and training by midwives, more women who wanted to breastfeed were able to for longer during the pandemic.

Breastfeeding benefits

• Breastfeeding has many benefits, including fewer infections, increased intelligence and the prevention obesity and diabetes.
• Breastfeeding also has advantages for mothers as it lessens the risk of cancers, postpartum bleeding and helps with weight loss after birth.
• The short term gains of getting parents back to work should not outweigh the long term benefits to our society from having healthier families.

• The enlargement will grow the association’s membership to 11, and increase its envisaged role as a geopolitical alternative to global institutions dominated by the west.
• The Brics five represent about 42% of the world’s population and more than 23% of world GDP.
• The disparate nature of the six new members is bound to spark debate about the real nature of Brics.
• In his welcoming remarks at the summit (22-24 August), the host, South African president Cyril Ramaphosa, stated:
  Brics stands for solidarity and for progress.

Understanding the nature of Brics

• Brics is not an organisation (it has no headquarters, secretariat or treaty).
• But it does have a formal institution that is jointly owned – the New Development Bank.
• Read more:
  South Africa's role as host of the BRICS summit is fraught with dangers.
• As a political scientist interested in global politics, I have written about Brics and its potential for changing the status quo.
• With hindsight, I can assert that certain principles have informed it since its establishment and first summit in 2009.


The association self-reportedly seeks secure sustainable development for itself and the global south, to safeguard and advance multilateralism, to institute reform for the goal of representative institutions, and to achieve solidarity among members.

Economic development

• Economics comes first in the group; at its root, it is a collective of emerging economies eager to sustain and improve their economic trajectory.
• Read more:
  China’s Africa strategy is shifting from extraction to investment – driven from the industry-rich Hunan region

  The group’s first, and so far only, notable establishment is the New Development Bank, primarily to finance infrastructure development.

Multilateralism

• The second value refers to the group’s concern about the use of entities outside the UN to pursue global objectives.
• The use of force can only be considered legitimate if the decision is sanctioned by the UN.

Global governance reform

• Thirdly, the Brics countries have long pushed for leaders of global institutions to be elected in a transparent and democratic way.
• For example, the president of the World Bank has always been an American, and the managing director of the IMF a European.

Solidarity

• Finally, the members have articulated solidarity with one another in a number of declarations, beginning in 2010.
• Read more:
  When two elephants fight: how the global south uses non-alignment to avoid great power rivalries

  In light of criticism and sanctions plans against China, for its alleged suppression of the Uyghur-Muslim population, and Russia, for invading Ukraine, solidarity has come to mean silence or nonalignment.

A blank slate

• This has proved beneficial for member countries hosting Brics summits.
• They get to set the agenda and use it for their ends – without upsetting the consensus.
• Brazil and Russia have inserted issues that are important to their region, and often invited leaders of neighbouring countries to retreats.