View time: 1 min 25
Level : Advanced
Author: natixis-ezine
World leaders are gathering for the UN General Assembly. The outlook is gloomy
Read time : 3 mins
Level : Advanced
By EDITH M. LEDERER Associated Press
UNITED NATIONS (AP) — Facing a swirl of conflicts and crises across a fragmented world, leaders attending this week’s annual U.N. gathering are being challenged: Work together — not only on front-burner issues but on modernizing the international institutions born after World War II so they can tackle the threats and problems of the future.
U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres issued the challenge a year ago after sounding a global alarm about the survival of humanity and the planet: Come to a “Summit of the Future” and make a new commitment to multilateralism – the foundation of the United Nations and many other global bodies – and start fixing the aging global architecture to meet the rapidly changing world.
The U.N. chief told reporters last week that the summit “was born out of a cold, hard fact: international challenges are moving faster than our ability to solve them.” He pointed to “out-of-control geopolitical divisions” and “runaway” conflicts, climate change, inequalities, debt and new technologies like artificial intelligence which have no guardrails. Continue reading
China is raising its retirement age, now among the youngest in the world’s major economies
Read time : 4 mins
Level : Intermediate
By HUIZHONG WU and EMILY WANG FUJIYAMA Associated Press
BEIJING (AP) — Starting next year, China will raise its retirement age for workers, which is now among the youngest in the world’s major economies, in an effort to address its shrinking population and aging work force.
The Standing Committee of the National People’s Congress, the country’s legislature, passed the new policy Friday after a sudden announcement earlier in the week that it was reviewing the measure, state broadcaster CCTV announced.
The policy change will be carried out over 15 years, with the retirement age for men raised to 63 years, and for women to 55 or 58 years depending on their jobs. The current retirement age is 60 for men and 50 for women in blue-collar jobs and 55 for women doing white-collar work. Continue reading
Instagram makes teen accounts private as pressure mounts on the app to protect children
View time : 1 min 56
Level : Intermediate
Stonehenge Altar Stone came from Scotland
View time: 1 min 23
Level : Advanced
Sustainable investing advocate says ‘anti-woke’ backlash in US won’t stop the movement
Read time : 3 mins
Level : Advanced
By STAN CHOE AP Business Writer
NEW YORK (AP) — Maria Lettini already knew of the backlash against ESG investing when she took over as chief executive of US SIF last year.
US SIF is an advocacy group that supports sustainable investing, which encourages investors to consider a wider set of risks including the environment, social issues and corporate governance in hopes of improving their returns.
But returning to the U.S. after several years working in the U.K., Letting wasn’t prepared for how widespread the backlash against ESG was. Lettini spoke with The Associated Press about that and sustainable investing generally. The conversation has been edited for clarity and length. Continue reading
Autoworkers learn sign language hoping connection with deaf colleagues improves work and lives
Read time : 2 mins
Level : Intermediate
By DANICA KIRKA Associated Press
LONDON (AP) — One doesn’t need to know sign language to understand what Michael Connolly feels about his colleagues’ efforts to break down the barriers posed by his deafness.
When asked what he thought of his teammates’ decision to learn British Sign Language, the 45-year-old autoworker at the Nissan plant in Sunderland, England, grinned and flashed a universal symbol: Two thumbs up.
Connolly loves having the chance to banter with his workmates, to talk about everyday things — the kids, vacation plans, a TV program. And now he can, because the entire 25-member bumper-paint team at Sunderland started learning BSL at the beginning of the year. Continue reading
Spacewalking is the new domain of the rich as billionaire attempts first private spacewalk
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Level : Intermediate
Fine dining restaurants serve up VIP tables for one as solo dining trend dishes out personal culinary experiences
View time: 2 min 18
Level : Advanced
A robot begins removal of melted fuel from the Fukushima nuclear plant. It could take a century
Read time : 3 mins
Level : Advanced
By MARI YAMAGUCHI Associated Press
TOKYO (AP) — A long robot entered a damaged reactor at Japan’s Fukushima nuclear power plant on Tuesday, beginning a two-week, high-stakes mission to retrieve for the first time a tiny amount of melted fuel debris from the bottom.
The robot’s trip into the Unit 2 reactor is a crucial initial step for what comes next — a daunting, decades-long process to decommission the plant and deal with large amounts of highly radioactive melted fuel inside three reactors that were damaged by a massive earthquake and tsunami in 2011. Specialists hope the robot will help them learn more about the status of the cores and the fuel debris.
Here is an explanation of how the robot works, its mission, significance and what lies ahead as the most challenging phase of the reactor cleanup begins. Continue reading