Paris Olympics food donations seek to help needy, contribute to sustainability and set an example

Food that goes uneaten at the Games — by the athletes, the spectators and the workers — is helping those in need around the French capital, part of an effort to cut down on waste and contribute to organizers’ commitment to sustainability. (AFP/File)
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Updated 07 August 2024
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Paris Olympics food donations seek to help needy, contribute to sustainability and set an example

  • Food that goes uneaten at the Games — by the athletes, the spectators and the workers — is helping those in need around the French capital
  • Paris 2024 organizers have long said the Games would be more environmentally friendly, including reusable dishes in the main restaurant at the athletes’ village

PARIS: It is quite literally the food of champions. Paris Olympics organizers are determined that it not go to waste.
Food that goes uneaten at the Games — by the athletes, the spectators and the workers — is helping those in need around the French capital, part of an effort to cut down on waste and contribute to organizers’ commitment to sustainability.
Paris 2024 organizers have long said the Games would be more environmentally friendly, including reusable dishes in the main restaurant at the athletes’ village, greener construction and seats in venues made from recycled materials. In addition to helping those in need, organizers also hope the food donations will set an example for other Olympics and major events to follow.
“This is part of the legacy that we’ve been working on since the beginning,” said Georgina Grenon, who oversees the Paris Games’ effort to reduce its carbon footprint by half compared to London in 2012 and Rio in 2016. “We’ve been working to try to change the way in which these Games are organized, both for us but also for other events. And food waste is one of those things.”
Food waste is a source of greenhouse gas emissions worldwide and even though it’s not a huge source of emissions for the Olympics, Grenon said organizers “thought it was important to be particularly exemplary on this and lead the way on showing how to do it and showing it is possible.”
They’ve tried to reduce food waste both preventively, when the menus were being drawn up, and during the Games — signing an agreement with three groups so that uneaten food is collected and redistributed.
About 40,000 meals are served each day during the Games to thousands of athletes from more than 200 countries and territories in the Olympic village. While a few have complained publicly, others have raved about the food, including about the fact that it’s all free. Organizers have said they quickly addressed complaints about the lack of some foods.
Valerie de Margerie is president of Le Chainon Manquant, which translates to The Missing Link, one of the groups that is receiving food from the Olympic sites. She said the donations help address a pressing need because there are 10 million people in France who don’t have enough to eat. At the same time, she said, the country wastes 10 million tons of food each year.
“That’s the challenge, it’s to say that we cannot continue to allow our trash cans overflow with quality products while there are people nearby who are unable to feed themselves adequately,” she said.
Her organization has collected uneaten food from the Roland Garros tennis stadium since 2014, and since expanded that to other sites — including Bercy Arena, Stade de France, and other sites now being used for the Olympics. The logistics of collecting the food can be a bit complicated, particularly because many items are perishable and need to be consumed within days — or sometimes even the same day.
With 100 volunteers taken on to help during the Games, de Margerie’s group goes to Olympic sites at 6 a.m. and then, within hours, gets the food to other charities that distribute to people in need, including families, people who live in the streets, students and others.
They collect unsold sandwiches and salads, caterers’ food for Olympic guests and also uneaten canteen food cooked for Games workers. They have gathered about 9 tons of food so far, about 20 percent of it fruit. After the closing ceremony, they’ll also collect uneaten raw foods that won’t keep until the Paralympic Games that start Aug. 28.
One of the other groups, the Banque Alimentaire de Paris et d’Ile-de-France, a food bank serving Paris and the surrounding area, sends vans to Olympic sites, including the athletes’ village, late each night to collect leftover food. They bring it back to warehouses where volunteers work until the early hours of the morning sorting the haul. On a recent night, they returned with shredded carrots and apple slices, tubs of fruit salad, microwaveable prepared dishes and hummus.
By Tuesday, the food bank had collected 30 tons of food from Olympic sites since the beginning of the Games, said Nicolas Dubois, who’s in charge of the organization’s warehouse in suburban Gennevilliers.
Some of the bounty collected by the food bank was brought to a grocery store in Epinay-sur-Seine, a northern suburb of Paris, that sells food at deeply discounted prices.
“We take advantage of this place because it helps us, it helps us enormously,” said Jeanne Musaga, 64, who gets 900 euros ($984) a month in retirement payments, 500 euros ($547) of which goes to pay her rent.
“For those of us who don’t earn much, for a family that’s suffering, we come here to get food for the month,” she said. “Instead of buying from an expensive shop, we pay less here.”


Pakistan’s Punjab province shuts public spaces in smog-hit cities

Updated 8 sec ago
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Pakistan’s Punjab province shuts public spaces in smog-hit cities

  • Access to parks, zoos, playgrounds, historic monuments, museums and recreational areas banned until November 17 due to poor air quality
  • Punjab residents have been trapped in thick smog for over a week ever since the air quality index spiked above 1,000
LAHORE, Pakistan: Pakistan’s most populated province of Punjab ordered public spaces closed in smog-hit main cities, authorities said Friday, as the country battles record air pollution.
Access to parks, zoos, playgrounds, historic monuments, museums and recreational areas will be banned until November 17 due to poor air quality, according to a local government directive seen by AFP.
The concentration of fine particulate matter (PM2.5) in Lahore’s air was more than 20 times higher than the level deemed acceptable by the World Health Organization (WHO). In Multan, it was up to 48 times higher on Friday.
Punjab residents have been trapped in thick smog for over a week ever since the air quality index (AQI), which measures a range of pollutants, spiked above 1,000 — well above the level of 300 considered ‘dangerous’ — according to data from IQAir.
Schools in some of Punjab’s major cities were ordered shut on Tuesday until November 17.
The province extended that order on Wednesday to several more cities enveloped by smog, a mix of fog and pollutants caused by low-grade diesel fumes, smoke from seasonal agricultural burning and winter cooling.
The decision follows restrictions imposed last month on four “hot spots” in Lahore that banned tuk-tuks with polluting two-stroke engines, along with restaurants that operate barbecues without filters.
Seasonal crop burn-off by farmers on the outskirts of Lahore also contributes to toxic air, which the WHO says can cause strokes, heart disease, lung cancer and respiratory diseases.
Excess pollution shortens the life expectancy of Lahore residents by an average of 7.5 years, according to the University of Chicago’s Energy Policy Institute.
According to UNICEF, nearly 600 million children in South Asia are exposed to high levels of air pollution, which is also linked to half of childhood pneumonia deaths.

Putin says China is Russia’s ally, backs its stance on Taiwan

Updated 57 min 41 sec ago
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Putin says China is Russia’s ally, backs its stance on Taiwan

  • The two countries have not declared a formal military alliance, but have signed a ‘no limits’ partnership deal in 2022
  • Putin suggested that Taiwan was trying to stir up a Ukraine-style crisis in Asia in order to attract outside support

SOCHI, Russia: Russian President Vladimir Putin described China on Thursday as Russia’s ally and threw his weight behind Beijing’s claims over Taiwan, while stating that no countries had anything to fear from deepening Sino-Russian co-operation.
The two countries have not declared a formal military alliance, but Putin and Chinese President Xi Jinping signed a “no limits” partnership deal in 2022, less than three weeks before Putin sent his troops into Ukraine.
In May this year they agreed to deepen what they called their “comprehensive partnership and strategic cooperation” for a new era.
“We do not believe that China is pursuing an aggressive policy in the region,” Putin said at the Valdai discussion club in the Russian Black Sea resort of Sochi.
He suggested that Taiwan was trying to stir up a Ukraine-style crisis in Asia in order to attract outside support.
China views democratically governed Taiwan as its own territory, despite strong objections by the government in Taipei, and regularly holds wargames near the island.
“A lot is going on around Taiwan,” Putin said. “Everyone formally acknowledges, yes, Taiwan is part of China. But in reality? In reality, it is acting in a completely different direction. Provoking the situation toward escalation.
“We do support China. And because of this, we believe that (China) is conducting a completely reasonable policy. And also because it is our ally. We have a very large trade turnover, we co-operate in the security sector.”
Taiwan’s foreign ministry said China and Russia were the real problem.
“The regime of Russia’s Putin launched a war of aggression against Ukraine, leading to misery for Ukraine’s people and sanctions and condemnation from the international community,” it said in a statement.
“China and Russia together continue to undermine the rule-based international order and have become a serious threat to world peace and stability.”
Putin compared military drills between Russia and China to those the United States holds with Japan.
“These exercises do not threaten anyone,” Putin said. “They are aimed at ensuring our security.”


Swiss ‘burqa ban,’ condemned by Muslims, to take effect from Jan. 1, 2025

Updated 08 November 2024
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Swiss ‘burqa ban,’ condemned by Muslims, to take effect from Jan. 1, 2025

  • Anyone who unlawfully flouts the ban faces a fine of up to $1,144
  • Facial coverings remain permitted for reasons relating to health, safety

ZURICH: A contentious Swiss prohibition on facial coverings in public spaces widely known as the “burqa ban” will take effect on Jan. 1, the government said on Wednesday.
Narrowly passed in a 2021 referendum in neutral Switzerland, and condemned by Muslim associations, the measure was launched by the same group that organized a 2009 ban on new minarets.
The governing Federal Council said in a statement it had fixed the start of the ban, and that anyone who unlawfully flouts it faces a fine of up to 1,000 Swiss francs ($1,144).
The ban does not apply to planes or in diplomatic and consular premises, and faces may also be covered in places of worship and other sacred sites, the government said.
Facial coverings will remain permitted for reasons relating to health and safety, for native customs, or due to weather conditions, it said. They would also be allowed on artistic and entertainment grounds and for advertising, it added.
If such coverings are needed for personal protection in exercising freedom of expression and assembly, they should be permitted provided the responsible authority has already approved them and public order is not compromised, it said.
 


Two separatist militants, two government-run militia members killed in Indian-administered Kashmir

Updated 08 November 2024
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Two separatist militants, two government-run militia members killed in Indian-administered Kashmir

  • Militants in the Indian-administered portion of Kashmir have been fighting New Delhi’s rule since 1989
  • Many support rebels’ goal of uniting the territory, either under Pakistani rule or as independent country

NEW DELHI: Two suspected militants were killed in a gunfight with government forces in Indian-administered Kashmir, officials said Friday, while assailants killed two members of a government-sponsored militia elsewhere in the disputed region.
The region, divided between India and Pakistan but claimed by both in its entirety, has experienced an increase in violence in recent weeks.
The Indian military said a joint team of soldiers and police raided a village near northwestern Sopore town late Thursday following a tip about the presence of a group of militants.
The militants “fired indiscriminately” at the troops, leading to a gunbattle in which two were killed, the military said in a statement.
Troops were continuing to search the area, it said. There was no independent confirmation of the incident.
Meanwhile, assailants killed two members of a government-run militia called the “Village Defense Group” in the remote southern Kishtwar area late Thursday, officials said.
Police blamed rebels fighting against Indian rule in Kashmir for the killings.
The two were abducted from a forested area where they had gone to graze cattle on Thursday. Their bodies were found late Thursday, police said.
The militia was initially formed in the 1990s as a defense against anti-India insurgents in remote Himalayan villages that government forces could not reach quickly. As the insurgency waned in their areas and as some militia members gained notoriety for brutality and rights violations, the militia was largely disbanded.
However last year, after the killing of seven Hindus in two attacks in a remote mountainous village near the highly militarized Line of Control that divides Kashmir between India and Pakistan, authorities revived the militia and began rearming and training thousands of villagers, including some teenagers.
The Kashmir Tigers, which Indian officials say is an offshoot of the Pakistan-based Jaish-e-Mohammad militant group, claimed responsibility for the killings of the two in a statement on social media. The statement could not be independently verified.
Militants in the Indian-administered portion of Kashmir have been fighting New Delhi’s rule since 1989. Many Muslim Kashmiris support the rebels’ goal of uniting the territory, either under Pakistani rule or as an independent country.
India insists the Kashmir militancy is “Pakistan-sponsored terrorism.” Pakistan denies the charge, and many Kashmiris consider it a legitimate freedom struggle. Tens of thousands of civilians, rebels and government forces have been killed in the conflict.
 


Philippine president signs new laws to assert South China Sea rights, sovereignty

Updated 08 November 2024
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Philippine president signs new laws to assert South China Sea rights, sovereignty

  • China summons Philippine ambassador to lodge solemn representations over the new laws
  • Unclear if laws could reduce incidents with China in Manila’s exclusive economic zone

MANILA: Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. signed two laws on Friday aimed at strengthening the country’s maritime claims and bolstering its territorial integrity, as tensions with China over disputed areas in the South China Sea persist.
The Maritime Zones Act and the Archipelagic Sea Lanes Act would define the Philippines’ maritime entitlements and set designated sea lanes and air routes to reinforce sovereignty and maritime rights under international law.
China has summoned the Philippine ambassador to lodge solemn representations over two new laws, its foreign ministry said on Friday.
Marcos hailed the laws as a demonstration of the Philippines’ commitment to uphold an international rules-based order, and protect its rights to exploit resources peacefully in its exclusive economic zone (EEZ).
“Our people, especially our fisher folk, should be able to pursue their livelihood free from uncertainty and harassment,” Marcos said. “We must be able to harness mineral and energy resources in our sea bed.”
While the two laws were envisioned to help US ally the Philippines to monitor and defend against potential encroachment, questions remain about how they will be enforced and if they will impact Chinese activity in the Philippine EEZ.
China asserts its claim of sovereignty over almost the entire South China Sea through an armada of coast guard ships, some of which are accused by its neighbors of aggressive conduct and of trying to disrupt energy and fisheries activity in their EEZs.
Senator Francis Tolentino, one of the authors of the maritime zones measure, said he does not expect tensions in Philippine EEZ will be instantly reduced with the implementation of the new laws.
“China will not recognize these, but the imprimatur that we’ll be getting from the international community would strengthen our position,” Tolentino told a press conference.
China’s embassy in Manila did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the new laws and senator’s remarks.
Tolentino also said the laws would reinforce a 2016 arbitration ruling on the South China Sea, which declared China’s expansive claims had no basis under international law. China has rejected the 2016 decision.