The excellent people at The Stop – the food bank that wants to put itself out of business – have a fine write-up in the Globe and Mail. Read more here.

Before the Soccer World Cup last year, I was asked to write a foreword to an anthology of life stories told by South African pavement dwellers, living on Symphony Way, near Cape Town. The stories blew me away. It was very easy to write the short introduction below, just as it’s easy to encourage you to take a look at it now. The book is called No Land! No House! No Vote! Voices from Symphony Way, and it’s available here.

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The staff at Focus on the Global South put together this announcement last week. Given today’s news from Syria, and President Assad’s finger-pointing at outside intervention, Focus’ position is prescient and pressing. Original here.

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Contrary to appearances, I’m still here, and still writing. Over the next few days, expect to see accumulated bits and pieces that I’ve been working on during my travels to Southern Africa and beyond. But don’t expect any of them to appear on the Huffington Post. My union, the National Writers Union, has distributed a call to support the Huffington Post Union of Bloggers, who join my blogroll today. I’ve never crossed a picket line – virtual or physical – and I’m not about to start now.

WEDNESDAY, 16 MARCH 2011 16:42

La Via Campesina expresses its deepest sympathies to all the people of Japan and all those who lost their families, friends, homes, livelihoods and all who are affected and now living in fear of a radiation leak from the damaged nuclear power plant. We are extending our support and solidarity and call on all our fellow social movements, peoples’ organizations, civil society and all concerned citizens to join in and help the people of Japan in their time of greatest need.

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The Coalition of Immokalee Workers are pushing forward with their wage demands, targeting two supermarket giants – Publix and Ahold. I’ll be taking aim at Ahold a little later next month, but if you’re on the East Coast of the US, you can join in right now – find out more at the CIW’s Do The Right Thing campaign page.

After Egypt, activists around the world have had the wind at their backs and the state at their throats. In Libya, Bahrain, Jordan , and from Wisconsin to South Africa, the streets have become – more conspicuously than usual – battlefields. Governments have struck back. In Zimbabwe, some of the finest activists have recently been rounded up and detained. Below, a call for solidarity. Here, a facebook page to keep up to date.
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I wrote this yesterday for the NY Times’ Room for Debate series, before today’s momentous news. Watch this space for more on Egypt…

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The World Sugar Committee has criticised ‘parasitic’ traders for the surging price of sugar, which is now at its highest level for thirty years. This is, of course, unfair. A mounting body of evidence suggests that parasites can be beneficial to their hosts. But, as John Cassidy recently put it, Keep Reading »