World Development Movement blog

Guest post by Tim Jones, Jubilee Debt Campaign

Debt payments by the most impoverished countries are set to rise over coming years as part of the fallout from the global financial crisis. The new report from Jubilee Debt Campaign, The state of debt, shows how this threatens to extend the 30-year pattern of debt crises across the globe, from the Mexican debt crisis of 1982 to the Eurozone crisis today.

At the recent Barclays AGM, World Development Movement campaigners dressed up as evil Barclays eagles to highlight the bank's role in speculating on food prices. This inspired our favourite cartoonist, Ben Jennings, to take the eagle to new heights. 

Guest post by Lucy Hurn, south west London group

Last week Lucy from our south west London group kicked off her fundraising challenge with a difference: doing the alphabet the hard way. Here she explains.

I blame the WDM London groups Christmas social! For some reason, no doubt spurred on by beer, a few of us started talking about doing the Berlin marathon. Having found that was already booked up, our plan changed to Amsterdam. Which begins with an ‘A’. And that’s where it all started…

Last week we reported how developed countries, with the UK as one of the worst offenders, were attempting to remove the remit of UNCTAD to work on economic development issues – including food speculation.

But action by campaigners and developing countries has prevented this, as the statement below, published by global justice groups at the end of last week’s conference, explains:

Final Statement of Civil Society on the Outcome of UNCTAD XIII 

April 26, 2012

It’s been the hot topic of conversation in the WDM office for last few weeks - the Barcalys AGM. In preparation for the big day tomorrow we held a photo stunt at Barclays HQ to hand in the Public Eye 'shame award' that Barclays won earlier this year for its role in food speculation. 

Yesterday I went to the launch of ‘Greenwash Gold’: the campaign against Olympics corporate sponsors: Rio Tinto, Dow Chemical and BP. Although there are other controversial sponsors of the games such as Coca Cola and McDonalds, the coalition of groups running the campaign have chosen to focus on these three companies.

Last week was a big week for our campaign to regulate food speculation, with developments on the relevant legislation in both the European parliament and Council of Ministers.