The South African Civil Society Information Service
A nonprofit news agency promoting social justice. Seeking answers to the question:
How do we make democracy work for the poor?
A nonprofit news agency promoting social justice. Seeking answers to the question:
How do we make democracy work for the poor?
Glenn is a multidisciplinarian with a background in geography. Besides being a published author, he also edited "A Patented World? The Privatisation of Life and Knowledge," published by Jacana in South Africa. He currently is on the editorial board of the SA Journal of Natural Medicine.
Additionally, Glenn has written many commentaries and analyses of wide ranging issues including waste management, water use, food security, genetic engineering, nanotechnology, health, agricultural fuels, marine resources, climate and many other environmental and socially relevant issues.
He has also presented many papers and talks to a wide range of audiences. He specialises in communicating complex scientific issues in an accessible manner. He is a freelance writer and researcher.
Glenn Ashton -
Humans certainly are an enterprising species. Problem is, our discoveries tend to result in unintended consequences.
People have now figured out that we may be able to repair or reduce our unintended impacts on the global climate by intentionally re-engineering it through a set of processes which have been collectively called “geo-engineering.” Besides the obvious moral considerations, there are serious practical concerns that geo-engineering has a high probability of making an...
Glenn Ashton -
The state has become a major driver of inflation. Our state owned port, railway, road, power and airport authorities have each increased prices at rates that far exceed our targeted or actual inflation rate. Consequently these so-called State Owned Enterprises (SOEs) collectively fuel further downstream inflation.
How does it benefit South Africa if government fiscal policy, supposedly focused on inflation targeting as a key fiscal instrument, is ignored, not only in the breach but in...
Glenn Ashton -
The United Nations Environmental Programme (UNEP) has recently released a practical strategic analysis that provides a “greenprint” to shift us from our collective environmental crises toward a sustainable future.
Entitled “Towards a Green Economy: Pathways to Sustainable Development and Poverty Eradication - A Synthesis for Policy Makers,” it highlights the economic opportunities, which emerge if we shift away from our exploitative patterns of business as usual....
Glenn Ashton -
South Africa's agricultural landscape remains essentially unchanged. Landed white farmers pursue an industrial farming model that relies on high external inputs. Farm ownership patterns have changed little, despite continual promises. Food security remains unresolved. Significant sectors of our people, particularly women and children, remain under or malnourished. To top it off, the ecological impacts of our farming – soil erosion, high water use and abstraction, overuse of chemicals,...
Glenn Ashton -
The media will always be a contested space. Some insist there should be no controls over the amorphous beast that is the media; others insist we cannot have a free-for-all. In South Africa we presently walk an uneasy middle road between a free press, a powerful public broadcaster as well as corporate and political oligopolies, which wish to place self-serving limits on our freedom of expression.
The sleazy British phone hacking scandal within the extensive Murdoch media empire poses a...
Glenn Ashton -
During the peak of the anti-apartheid disinvestment campaign the Anglo-American Corporation took full advantage of the situation and snapped up disinvesting companies. By the 1990's Anglo American controlled 85% of the companies and over 60% of the wealth of the Johannesburg Stock Exchange, making it the biggest economic beneficiary of apartheid.
Through its diversified holdings it controlled vast sectors of the economy. Besides mining it was involved in forestry, paper, retail, car...
