The airline business has faced constant challenges when it comes to decarbonization and ESG. The trouble is that air travel is emissions-heavy, and there aren’t many ways to get around the impact that air travel has on climate. These technical limitations haven’t stopped companies from trying to get an environmental edge over their competition, however. The use of offsetting and “sustainable aviation fuels” led some airlines to make claims many view as greenwashing. Recently the UK’s Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) issued an opinion against Virgin Atlantic that struck another blow against “sustainable aviation fuels.” In November 2023, Virgin released a…
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GREENVILLE, TN – The U.S. Department of Labor has obtained a consent judgment in a Tennessee federal court that requires a Kingsport staffing agency to stop employing children illegally and forbids them from future violations of federal child labor laws.The action comes after federal investigators uncovered oppressive child labor at a Morristown manufacturing facility that produces outdoor power equipment for major companies including John Deere, Toro and Yamaha. Entered on Aug. 12, 2024, in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Tennessee, the court’s action comes after the department’s Wage and Hour Division discovered several children employed in dangerous jobs at a…
Speaking from Sudan, UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF) spokesperson James Elder described meeting a senior medical worker at a hospital outside Khartoum who had “direct contact with hundreds, hundreds of women and girls, some as young as eight years old, who have been raped. Many have been held captive for weeks on end.” The medic from Al Nao hospital in Omdurman also spoke “of the distressing number of babies born – born after rape – who are being abandoned now”, the UNICEF spokesperson continued, during an update to journalists in Geneva via videolink from the wartorn country. Countless horrors He maintained…
So certain is the Australian government that childcare workers are being poorly paid that it is handing them an extra 15% – 10% this December, followed by a further 5% in December 2025 – and speaking as if there’s more to come. It is calling the increases “interim” because it expects the Fair Work Commission to offer at least that much. The commission has begun an investigation into what “early childhood education and care workers” are actually worth compared to workers in other occupations. They’re not paid as much as most. On a list of the average hourly rates for…
The blazes that began Sunday near the village of Varnava, some 35 kilometers north of Athens, raged out of control on Monday and spread panic as flames reached densely populated neighborhoods which haven’t experienced wildfire in decades. The charred body of a 64-year-old woman was found inside a factory in the neighborhood of Vrilissia, around 14 kilometers from central Athens. Wildfires are frequent in Greece as summers become warmer and drier, though their encroachment on a major urban area is unusual. In 2018, 104 people died in a huge blaze in the seaside town of Mati close to Athens, while…
Social media algorithms should be disabled by default to protect people from “hateful, false and violent content”, the Irish and UK governments have been told. An open letter signed by over 240 organisations has called on Taoiseach Simon Harris, UK prime minister Keir Starmer and Northern Ireland leaders Michelle O’Neill and Emma-Little Pengelly to take action following a spate of anti-immigration riots. It states: “We know that people’s real lives are affected by what plays out online. Right now social media and video platforms recommend hateful, false and violent content for people to see. “The business model prioritises emotionally manipulative…
The URBAN TECH final event, “Innovate for Europe – Greentech, Health Tech & Smart City Showdown”, took place on 6 June, as part of the Impact Days 2024, during ViennaUP, a city-wide celebration of innovation and entrepreneurship. The event provided a unique platform, for the over 20 companies of the URBAN TECH program, to meet with investors and pitch their groundbreaking solutions developed across the sectors of Greentech, HealthTech, and Smart City. The core activities of the event included two series of investor meetup sessions, where URBAN TECH companies had the opportunity to matchmake with an EU-wide network of investors, and the final…
Briefing the Security Council in New York, UN Deputy Emergency Relief Coordinator Joyce Msuya urged the international community to work to end the full-scale Russian invasion of Ukraine, now in its third year. Ms. Msuya said the civilian toll has continued to mount since her last briefing to the Council three weeks ago. Kharkiv under fire While few areas have been spared from the hostilities, the Kharkiv region has suffered the heaviest impact after Russia stepped up attacks there on 10 May. UN human rights monitors in Ukraine reported on Friday that at least 174 people were killed and 690…
Port Sudan – The humanitarian situation in Sudan is at “a catastrophic breaking point” according to the International Organization for Migration (IOM). The stark warning comes as famine and floods add to the catalogue of challenges facing millions of people struggling to cope in the world’s largest displacement crisis following 16 months of brutal conflict. Within the past week, the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC) Famine Review Committee (FRC) reported famine conditions in Zamzam camp near Al Fasher town in North Darfur – home to half a million displaced people. The camp is witnessing extreme food scarcity,…
NBG Logistics Alliance moved workers to local fast-food restaurant to obstruct investigation SAN DIEGO – The U.S. Department of Labor has obtained a preliminary injunction and court order forbidding a Calexico logistics company from threatening or retaliating against its workers and further interfering with an ongoing federal investigation. When the investigators with the department’s Wage and Hour Division showed up at NBG Logistics Alliance Inc. worksites, the company removed workers and hid them for hours at a local fast-food restaurant until the investigators left. The company then instructed employees to work across the border in Mexicali before firing them and deleting proof…