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If one were to believe the news cycle, the current crisis in Somalia would seem to have arisen without warning. But it is part of a pattern we have had plenty of opportunity to observe and recognise. In fact Eastern Africa is historically well acquainted with famine.
On Tuesday the Government 'suspended' transport of Australian live cattle to Indonesia. This is not a ban, but a hiatus. Public outrage over the export of live cattle is hypocritical given the lack of outrage regarding the inhumane treatment of asylum-seeking children.
Prime Minister Gillard's speech to the Sydney Institute last week, and Tony Abbot’s policy announcements two weeks ago, drew unanimous response from the community sector — that getting people into work is a sound objective, but it's harder than it looks.
As airstrikes are launched against Libya, controversy grows around Australia's detention centres, and NSW prepares for its election, Japan will inevitably slip off our news radar. The rebuilding work of grassroots agencies will continue for years to come.
At last, an Australian government has presented for public consideration an intelligently conceived framework for a national carbon emissions plan. Has Gillard broken her pre-election 'no carbon tax' promise? Does it matter?
If the Gillard Government manages to serve a full term, there is a good chance that Parliament will pass a well-designed, effective national carbon pricing policy into law in 2012. This would be a major policy success that Gillard could legitimately boast of going into a 2013 full-term election.
Australians can rejoice in the good year our farmers are having. But farming in southern Australia continues to be a high-risk business. Climate change is inevitably going to make it harder to sustain all kinds of agriculture in inland southern Australia.
Irrigated agriculture systems, like electric grids and city roads, trigger a government's duty of care to the human communities that they sustain. Particularly when they were built with the blood, sweat and tears that went into building our Murray-Darling Basin irrigation communities.
Associate Professor of Public Policy at Australian Catholic University, Gary Johns, has challenged the Government's growing support of African nations. In so doing, Johns blatantly dismisses the fundamental principles of solidarity, human dignity, common good and option for the poor.
I am struck by lurid online comment on whether Aussie troops should go or stay in Afghanistan, a miasma of old-left vs new-right trench exchanges, armchair military strategists and conspiracy theorists. As in the national game of Buzkashi, Afghanistan is a goat carcass fought over by a gaggle of teams.
Throughout his 2007 election campaign Rudd pledged to address 'inflated grocery prices'. But Australians are spending less at the supermarket than ever before. Cheap food has come at a cost to the livelihoods of Australian farmers and the environment.