NewzIntel.com

Category: Education

  • MIL-OSI United Kingdom: Civil Society Covenant: Government Outcomes Lab

    Source: United Kingdom – Executive Government & Departments

    Case study

    Civil Society Covenant: Government Outcomes Lab

    Data sharing and partnership working.

    The Government Outcomes Lab (GO Lab) is a research and policy centre at the Blavatnik School of Government, University of Oxford, established through a partnership with the UK Government. The mission of the GO Lab is to enable government to partner more effectively with the private and social sectors to improve people’s lives. The GO Lab offers a collaborative hub to enhance government learning from outcomes-based commissioning through world-class research, data curation and sharing, and responsive policy engagement.

    Data-led decision making

    Through initiatives such as INDIGO (International Network for Data on Impact and Government Outcomes) GO Lab’s work illustrates how data-led decision making can support effective working relationships across sectors. INDIGO is a global data collaborative that openly and transparently shares data about outcomes-focused partnerships. The INDIGO initiative includes the maintenance of a community of practitioners, a system for sharing data and open-access datasets designed to serve as public goods, such as a comprehensive dataset on social outcomes partnerships, and outcomes achieved by the Life Chances Fund projects.

    Key learnings

    Open data sharing between civil society and public bodies creates a shared evidence base and improves mutual understanding, while empowering civil society and other stakeholders to better understand and engage with government initiatives.

    Updates to this page

    Published 17 July 2025

    MIL OSI United Kingdom –

  • MIL-OSI United Kingdom: Civil Society Covenant: Calderdale Council

    Source: United Kingdom – Government Statements

    Case study

    Civil Society Covenant: Calderdale Council

    Recognising VCSE value for a flourishing future.

    Calderdale Council’s VCSE strategy 2024 to 2029 recognises the vital role of the Voluntary, Community, and Social Enterprise (VCSE) sector in Calderdale, valuing it as a key partner in achieving the local vision to be an enterprising place, full of opportunity, where everyone can live a larger life. 

    VCSE value and expertise

    At the time of its creation, VCSE groups were facing reduced public sector funding, rising costs, and growing demand for services. Staff shortages, lower pay, and fewer volunteers added to the pressure. Central to its development and implementation has been Calderdale Council’s recognition of the inherent value and expertise of the VCSE sector. 

    Co-produced with VCSE representatives, the strategy acknowledges the diverse and complex nature of the VCSE sector and its significant impact on Calderdale residents and communities. It recognises the sector’s contribution to society as well as to the local economy. Research by Durham University in 2023 reported that the total value of the VCSE in Calderdale was valued around £549.5 million. This figure includes sector expenditure, the value produced by regular volunteers, and value created for users of services.

    Outcomes

    Calderdale Council has embedded the recognition of the VCSE’s role in multiple other strategies in the borough. A key example is the Inclusive Economy Strategy, which sees a thriving VCSE sector as fundamental to achieving an inclusive economy. In Calderdale, the VCSE is a key part of the local economy, with the sector employing over 5,000 people, and supporting 13,000 as volunteers. As part of the Inclusive Economy Strategy, Calderdale will look to explore more career pathways for young people in the local VCSE sector, providing young people more opportunities to stay in Calderdale, with access to good quality work.

    Updates to this page

    Published 17 July 2025

    MIL OSI United Kingdom –

  • MIL-OSI Africa: Government scales up youth-focused initiatives 

    Source: Government of South Africa

    As government pursues faster and more inclusive economic growth, the fight against youth unemployment remains a priority, with large-scale programmes underway to create opportunities for young people to earn an income, develop skills and gain work experience.

    Delivering the Presidency Budget Vote for the 2025/2026 financial year, President Cyril Ramaphosa said the greatest challenge that faces South Africa today is youth unemployment. 

    “Approximately 3.8 million out of 10.3 million young people aged 15 to 24 years are not in employment, education or training. These are young people with energy, initiative and untapped potential,” President Ramaphosa said.

    In his address on Wednesday, the President said government has launched large-scale programmes to provide young people with income opportunities, skills development and work experience.

    “Through innovative and targeted interventions, the Presidential Employment Stimulus has continued to demonstrate that when a society invests in its people, the dividends are measured in hope restored and futures rewritten,” he said. 

    He cited the Basic Education Employment Initiative, which entered a new phase in June this year, placing over 200 000 young people as school assistants in more than 2 0000 schools. 

    To date, this initiative has created over one million posts for young people to serve as assistants in schools, supporting teachers in classrooms, school administration and school maintenance.

    “The programme has been designed to strengthen the learning environment and learning outcomes in schools. In the process, participants gain work experience and skills vital to finding employment and starting their own businesses,” the President said.

    He added that the SAYouth.mobi platform was launched in 2020 to tackle the barriers faced by young people such as experience and the lack of transport or lack of data money.

    “There are now over 4.7 million young people registered on the SAYouth network. Young people have been supported to access over 1.67 million earning opportunities.

    “A significant achievement of SA Youth is that the vast majority of earning opportunities have been accessed by the most excluded young people. Seventy percent of opportunities have been accessed by young black African women,” President Ramaphosa said.

    The President noted that around 65% of the platform’s users live in grant-receiving households, demonstrating that “we are reaching some of the people who have the greatest need.”

    Another impactful initiative mentioned was the Youth Employment Service (YES), which he said has become the largest corporate-funded youth jobs programme globally. 

    The programme has to date provided over 190 000 young people with year-long work experience opportunities.

    “Through all of these programmes coordinated by the Presidency, we are changing the way that government works and scaling innovative solutions to our unemployment challenge,” the President said. 

    Education 

    Turning to education, President Ramaphosa underscored its role in fighting poverty, with a focus on early childhood development, foundational learning, and access to well-run schools.

    “We continue our efforts to ensure that learners have a safe and conducive environment in which to learn. To date, we have completed 97 percent of the sanitation projects under the SAFE initiative aimed at getting rid of pit latrines in our schools.”

    He also confirmed the implementation of the Basic Education Laws Amendment (BELA) Act, expansion of vocational training, and broader access to higher education through the National Student Financial Aid Scheme (NSFAS).

    Having come into effect in December last year, the Act amends sections of the South African Schools Act of 1996 (SASA) and the Employment of Educators Act, 1998 (EEA) to account for developments in the education landscape since the enactment of the original legislation.

    Through the NSFAS, government is expanding access for students from poor and working class families, and with the support of the National Skills Fund, assistance is being expanded to the ‘missing middle’.

    “This year, NSFAS is supporting over 800 000 university and TVET [technical and vocational education and training] college students. This provides opportunities to young people today that will, in time, transform our economy and society,” he said. 

    NHI

    On healthcare and the National Health Insurance (NHI), the President said government is addressing the poor state of health facilities and is hiring more professionals, while also permanently employing community health workers.

    “To address the severe challenges in the health system and in preparation for the implementation of the NHI, we are directing resources towards the hiring of more doctors, nurses and health professionals, the permanent employment of community health workers, and the purchase of new equipment and supplies.

    “We are determined to meet our HIV testing and treatment targets, despite the withdrawal of US funding,” he added, noting that Deputy President Paul Mashatile continues to lead the HIV/AIDS response through the South African National AIDS Council.

    Last week, Health Minister, Dr Aaron Motsoaledi, said the National Treasury has allocated R753 million to the Department of Health — under Section 16 of the Public Finance Management Act (PFMA) — to help bridge the shortfall caused by the United States’ decision to cut HIV and tuberculosis (TB) grants.

    READ | Treasury allocates emergency funding of R750m towards HIV and TB after US funding cuts

    The United States government’s withdrawal of funding to key health initiatives, including the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief P(EPFAR), which was established by former President George W Bush in 2003, led to a loss of R7.9 billion spent on HIV/Aids programmes annually.
     

    Governance 

    On governance, the President said building a capable and corruption-resistant state remains a priority. 

    “For us to effectively tackle any of these challenges, we need to build a capable state with institutions that are resistant to corruption or interference. 

    “The recent adoption of the Public Service Commission Bill by the National Assembly marks a crucial milestone, enhancing the independence and effectiveness of the Public Service Commission in promoting ethical governance,” the President said. 

    President Ramaphosa said the bill will allow the Commission to function as an impartial constitutional body and ensure that the executive is compelled to act on the Commission’s recommendations, thereby reinforcing accountability across the public sector. 

    Digital Transformation Roadmap

    He added that the Digital Transformation Roadmap launched in April 2025, is set to make government work more efficiently while also bringing it closer to the people.

    READ | Digital Transformation Roadmap to make it easier to access government services

    “The roadmap focuses on building digital public infrastructure including a digital identity for every South African citizen. 

    “It includes a digital payments system to enable instant, low-cost payments, and interoperable data systems to ensure that citizens only have to provide their information to government once,” said President Ramaphosa. – SAnews.gov.za

    MIL OSI Africa –

  • MIL-OSI United Nations: 17 July 2025 Departmental update Building local research capacity to advance sexual and reproductive health evidence

    Source: World Health Organisation

    Behind every policy and intervention that improves sexual and reproductive health outcomes and access to services, there is research. And behind that research, there must be skilled researchers. With evidence guiding decisions, health systems respond more effectively, services improve and rights are upheld.

    The HRP Alliance’s regional hubs have been demonstrating what it means to build sustainable research capacity in sexual and reproductive health and rights (SRHR). Anchored in the mission to promote health and rights for all, the HRP Alliance, coordinated by the UN’s Special Programme in Human Reproduction (HRP), brings together seven regional ‘hubs’ that serve as catalysts for knowledge, collaboration and innovation.

    Since its establishment in 2017, the HRP Alliance hubs have been empowering local researchers and institutions through training, mentorship, fellowships and institutional support. Moreover, they enable context-specific responses to some of the world’s most pressing SRHR challenges. Seven impact stories document how locally-led research through this initiative has driven global progress.

    In Brazil, the hub for the Americas region at the Campinas Reproductive Health Research Center (CEMICAMP) responded to the Venezuelan migration crisis by training researchers across the region to study the SRHR needs of displaced populations. Their findings on access to care, HIV treatment and sexual violence helped close a major data gap which led to a more human-centred understanding of the needs of displaced populations.

    In Burkina Faso, the Francophone Africa hub, housed at the Health Science Research Institute (IRSS), is creating a regional data and training centre, with 50 Master’s and PhD graduates now leading research and public health efforts across West and Central Africa. Their studies on postpartum contraception and maternal care are informing health strategies.

    In Ghana, the Anglophone Africa hub, housed at the University of Ghana’s School of Public Health, launched a joint master’s programme with the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine. The joint programme has built on years of investment by the HRP Alliance in developing a critical mass of skilled researchers in SRHR. Graduates have gone on to lead national SRHR units and contribute to major studies on adolescent maternal care and quality of services.

    In Kenya, the hub at the African Population and Health Research Center (APHRC) developed a training programme to help researchers and health workers reflect on their personal beliefs and how these might affect their work on sensitive issues like abortion, sexuality and HIV. The model, called values clarification and attitude transformation training, is now being adopted across Africa.

    In Pakistan, the Eastern Mediterranean hub at Aga Khan University worked directly with hospitals during COVID-19, training researchers and influencing maternal care practices, as well as including the adoption of tools to detect maternal sepsis. Their adaptive, hospital-linked approach is now seen as a model for emergency-responsive research.

    In Thailand, the hub for the South-East Asian Region at Khon Kaen University focused its efforts on Myanmar, training a core group of researchers to generate evidence in a fragile setting. Their work on respectful maternity care and cervical cancer screening is now helping to shape maternal health policies, aimed at improving care quality, reducing mistreatment during childbirth and increasing access to lifesaving screening services.

    And in Viet Nam, the hub for the Western Pacific Region at Hanoi Medical University created a dedicated SRHR track within its International Master of Public Health programme, equipping researchers with the tools to address issues relating to adolescent health and gender-based violence. Graduates reported strengthened skills in data analysis, literature review and research presentation, and several went on to work in national health institutions, including the Ministry of Health.

    The stories capture how each hub has been working in its own way. Some prioritize formal academic pathways; others focus on skills development through short courses, mentorship or practical implementation research. All share a common goal: building lasting, regionally-led research ecosystems that respond to regional needs.

    Because when researchers are trained locally, mentored locally and supported to ask the right questions, health systems respond better. SRHR services improve. And people’s rights, choices and dignity are upheld.

    MIL OSI United Nations News –

  • MIL-OSI China: Geeking out, China’s high-tech factory floors adored as ‘industrial Disneyland’

    Source: People’s Republic of China – State Council News

    Robots work at Xiaomi’s automobile factory in Beijing, capital of China, June 16, 2025. [Photo/Xinhua]

    Getting a pass into Xiaomi’s car plant in suburban Beijing feels like snagging front-row tickets to the world’s hottest concert.

    “Application accepted!” Wang Shuang crowed, posting a screenshot to social media. “The last time I felt this giddy was when I landed a Taylor Swift ticket.”

    Welcome to China’s newest travel craze: high-tech factories have joined ancient palaces and world-class museums as the nation’s must-see destinations.

    China has dominated as the world’s manufacturing powerhouse for fifteen straight years. Yet, in just the past two years, the robust rise of smart manufacturing has revolutionized the country’s once dreary, clang-and-hiss assembly lines into a cultural phenomenon or “industrial Disneyland.”

    Chinese manufacturers aren’t pioneering this factory fascination. France’s Citroen ignited the trend in the 1950s. Boeing and Toyota plants remain the top U.S. and Japan draws.

    As the country’s industrial prowess ascends from the lower rungs of the global supply chain to a technology-driven frontier, a profound shift has taken hold. An increasing number of Chinese people now celebrate mechanical ingenuity with reverence, as their pride in homegrown sectors flourishes.

    The registration page of Xiaomi, a headline-grabbing newcomer to the electric vehicle (EV) sector last year, was still live ticking: beside the tiny line “20 spots only,” the counter read “4,060 already applied” as a scramble ensued to witness robotic arms assembling electric cars.

    Wang snagged that coveted ticket only after camping on the official website for days, finger tap-dancing like a twitchy trigger, until the confirmation flashed alive.

    Tech odyssey 

    Under the scorching sun, the lucky visitor Wang stepped into the factory complex as scheduled. The two-hour journey felt like a tech-filled odyssey. She rode a shuttle vehicle that zipped through the six major workshops: stamping, large die casting, body welding, painting, battery assembly and final assembly.

    In her experience, factories were enclosed, dusty, and filled with workers in safety helmets. This time, she saw robotic arms working with micron-level precision on the factory floor and AI-driven robots moving freely along planned routes to deliver battery cell components to their destinations.

    “It takes just 76 seconds to churn out a new car,” Wang exclaimed in amazement. “Quicker than whipping up a latte.”

    NIO, another domestic EV manufacturer, has opened its “Second Advanced Manufacturing Base” to the public since October 2023. Visitors can also tour the facility, which is filled with robotic arms, from an elevated corridor. In 2024, over 130,000 people visited the site, including about 900 from overseas.

    The moves to open production lines to the public came as China’s new energy vehicles have topped the global production and sales charts for nine consecutive years. Along with lithium batteries and photovoltaic products, they form China’s “new export trio,” showcasing the technological upgrades of “Made in China.”

    Freya Zhang, a research analyst at the investment consulting firm Tech Buzz China, told the journal Wired that China’s EV factory tour “offers a chance to not only see the production line up close, but also experience the human side of the brand.”

    Beyond EVs, emerging tech hubs are becoming pilgrimage sites. In Hangzhou, an innovative magnet in east China, robotics pioneers like Unitree Robotics draw curated tour groups.

    At the AG600 final-assembly plant in the southern Chinese city of Zhuhai — host city of China’s premier airshow — a steady stream of visitors was filing through the country’s only extensive special-mission aircraft production line that is open to the public.

    The AG600 line attracts roughly 40,000 visitors a year, with open-day slots almost booked out to a crowd dominated by the young. The domestically developed amphibious aircraft, which has already entered mass production, can swiftly shuttle between water sources and fire sites, making it a powerful tool for forest firefighting.

    The destination of industry tourism is also emerging from unexpected origins: waste treatment plants. Not far from Zhuhai, Shenzhen, an economic hub of China, now welcomes visitors to four such “eco-parks.”

    One social platform user from Xiaohongshu posted about their visit: The true spectacle lies in the industrial-scale choreography of the facility’s central sorting hall, where a colossal hydraulic claw, operating with uncanny precision, plunges into mountains of refuse and sorts recyclables. “It provides a sense of satisfaction akin to that of playing a claw crane game.”

    New growth 

    China hosts over 40 percent of the world’s “lighthouse factories,” and more assembly lines have been digitally transformed, creating an ideal foundation for transforming humans on factory floors into a cultural canvas.

    More Chinese cities have made industrial tourism their new engines for growth. In February, Beijing vowed to create five national industrial-tourism demonstration bases by 2027 and become a leading destination by 2029.

    The city’s tourism blueprint includes opening high-level autonomous driving scenarios, rocket institutes, low-altitude economy, and green energy routes, while inviting research institutes to grant public access to select labs and assembly halls.

    Local governments are also looking to outfit industrial tourism itself with next-gen stagecraft: Shanghai is set to weave large language models, the metaverse and blockchain into richer cultural narratives, while Hunan province in central China will deploy AR, VR, AI, 5G, 3D cinema, and holography to build fully immersive worlds.

    “Industrial tourism is a nexus where secondary and tertiary industries converge,” said Chen Wei, an expert from Tsinghua University. “It can fuel consumption, expand domestic demand, and promote industrial science education.”

    Among the facilities listed as national industrial tourism demonstration bases are Jiangnan Shipyard in Shanghai, the aerospace supercomputing center in the island province of Hainan, and the Zhuzhou electric locomotive production line in Hunan, which is a cradle of China’s high-speed trains, according to China’s Ministry of Culture and Tourism.

    “Fast-tracking industrial tourism is a strategic move in building a modern industrial system, which serves to unlock growth potential for regional economic vitality,” said Chen. 

    MIL OSI China News –

  • Three-person IVF technique spared children from inherited diseases, scientists say

    Source: Government of India

    Source: Government of India (4)

    Eight children in the UK have been spared from devastating genetic diseases thanks to a new three–person in vitro fertilization technique, scientists from Newcastle University reported on Wednesday.

    The technique, which is banned in the United States, transfers pieces from inside the mother’s fertilized egg – its nucleus, plus the nucleus of the father’s sperm – into a healthy egg provided by an anonymous donor.

    The procedure prevents the transfer of mutated genes from inside the mother’s mitochondria – the cells’ energy factories – that could cause incurable and potentially fatal disorders.

    Mutations in mitochondrial DNA can affect multiple organs, particularly those that require high energy, such as the brain, liver, heart, muscles and kidneys.

    One of the eight children is now 2 years old, two are between ages 1 and 2, and five are infants. All were healthy at birth, with blood tests showing no or low levels of mitochondrial gene mutations, the scientists reported in the New England Journal of Medicine. All have made normal developmental progress, they said.

    The results “are the culmination of decades of work,” not just on the scientific/technical challenges but also in ethical inquiry, public and patient engagement, law-making, drafting and execution of regulations, and establishing a system for monitoring and caring for the mothers and infants, reproductive medicine specialist Dr. Andy Greenfield of the University of Oxford, who was not involved in the research, said in a statement.

    The researchers’ “treasure trove of data” is likely to be the starting point of new avenues of investigation, Greenfield said.

    Often during IVF screening procedures, doctors can identify some low-risk eggs with very few mitochondrial gene mutations that are suitable for implantation.

    But sometimes all of the eggs’ mitochondrial DNA carries mutations. In those cases, using the new technique, the UK doctors first fertilize the mother’s egg with the father’s sperm. Then they remove the fertilized egg’s “pronuclei” – that is, the nuclei of the egg and the sperm, which carry the DNA instructions from both parents for the baby’s development, survival and reproduction.

    Next, they transfer the egg and sperm nuclei into a donated fertilized egg that has had its pronuclei removed.

    The donor egg will now begin to divide and develop with its healthy mitochondria and the nuclear DNA from the mother’s egg and the father’s sperm.

    This process, detailed in a second paper in the journal, “essentially replaces the faulty mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) with healthy mtDNA from the donor,” senior researcher Mary Herbert, professor of reproductive biology at Newcastle, said at a press briefing.

    Blood levels of mtDNA mutations were 95% to 100% lower in six newborns, and 77% to 88% lower in two others, compared to levels of the same variants in their mothers, the researchers reported in a second paper.

    “These data indicate that pronuclear transfer was effective in reducing transmission of mtDNA disease,” they said.

    The procedure was tested in 22 women whose babies were likely to inherit such genes. In addition to the eight women who delivered the children described in this report, another one of the 22 is currently pregnant.

    Seven of the eight pregnancies were uneventful; in one case, a pregnant woman had blood tests showing high lipid levels.

    There have been no miscarriages.

    The authors of the current reports have also tried transplanting the nucleus of a mother’s unfertilized egg into a donor egg and then fertilizing the donor egg afterward, but they believe their new approach may more reliably prevent transmission of the genetic disorders.

    In 2015, the UK became the first country in the world to legalize research into mitochondrial donation treatment in humans.

    That same year in the United States, pronuclear transfer was effectively banned for human use by a congressional appropriations bill that prohibited the Food and Drug Administration from using funds to consider the use of “heritable genetic modification”.

    (Reuters)

  • MIL-OSI Asia-Pac: LCSD to launch cross-cultural music lecture series “When Chinese landscape painting meets Western classical music” (with photos)

    Source: Hong Kong Government special administrative region

         The Leisure and Cultural Services Department will present a cross-cultural music lecture series entitled “When Chinese landscape painting meets Western classical music” from September to October. The eight-lecture series, hosted by music critic William Ting, will explore the connections between Chinese landscape painting and Western classical music through appreciating works of Chinese and Western artists from various perspectives. The programme will also feature live demonstrations by pianist Chung Chi-woo and qin musician Chung Siu-sun in different lectures, offering audiences a fresh perspective on viewing paintings and appreciating music.
     
         Details of each lecture are as follows:

    Lecture 1: “Connect: The Meeting Point of Chinese Painting and Western Music” 
    ————————————————————————————————–
    Date: September 5 (Friday)
    Piano demonstration: Chung Chi-woo

    To provide an overview of the stylistic features and characteristics of Chinese landscape painting and Western classical music across different periods, examining the intersections between them and the similarities in their historical development.

    Lecture 2: “Sublime: Fan Kuan and J.S. Bach” 
    ————————————————————————————————–
    Date: September 12 (Friday)
    Piano demonstration: Chung Chi-woo
     
         To explore the connections between the works of Northern Song dynasty painter Fan Kuan and Baroque music master Bach, and discuss the intersection of “Travelers Among Mountains and Streams” and “The Art of Fugue”, two masterpieces in the history of Chinese painting and Western music.

    Lecture 3: “Transcendent Elegance: Ni Zan and Mozart”
    ————————————————————————————————–
    Date: September 19 (Friday)
    Piano demonstration: William Ting
     
         Through appreciating the works of Yuan dynasty painter Ni Zan and Western classical music composer Mozart, in an attempt to reveal the inner worlds of the two artists while exploring the aesthetic significance and similarities behind their creations.

    Lecture 4: “Visual Melodies: Sound and Music in the Paintings”
    ————————————————————————————————–
    Date: September 26 (Friday)
    Guqin demonstration and explanation: Chung Siu-sun
     
         Featuring a selection of Chinese landscape paintings and Western paintings to explore how to “listen” to the artworks’ audible elements, or how to integrate melodies and musical forms into the paintings with lines and colours, thereby discovering these “visible” sounds.
     
    Lecture 5: “Ancient Worshipping: Dong Qichang and Brahms”
    ————————————————————————————————–
    Date: October 10 (Friday)
    Piano demonstration: Chung Chi-woo
     
         Through examining the works of Ming dynasty painter Dong Qichang and Western classical music composer Brahms, to explore how they both “imitated” their ancient masters while forging new paths for future generations, illustrating the close relationship between arts development and the social environment of their time.
     
    Lecture 6: “The Beauty of Ugliness: Shitao and Beethoven”
    ————————————————————————————————–
    Date: October 17 (Friday)
    Piano demonstration: Chung Chi-woo
     
         To explore how the works of Qing dynasty painter Shitao and Western classical music composer Beethoven take ugliness as a kind of beauty, subverting the aesthetic traditions of their time, thereby offering new perspectives for interpreting these “ugly” creations.
     
    Lecture 7: “Deliberate Blank: Silence and Emptiness in Music and Painting”
    ————————————————————————————————–
    Date: October 24 (Friday)
    Piano demonstration: Chung Chi-woo

         To analyse how the technique of “deliberate blank” in Chinese ink painting infuses works with “spiritual energy” and stimulates the viewers’ imagination, and how different uses of “silence” in Western music express emotions and imbue music with deeper meaning.
     
    Lecture 8: “Inner Beauty: Fou Ts’ong and Huang Binhong”
    ————————————————————————————————–
    Date: October 31 (Friday)
    Piano demonstration: William Ting
     
         To explore how the essence of Chinese culture is reflected in the musical approach of pianist Fou Ts’ong from the perspective of musical interpretation, and how these relate to painter Huang Binhong’s works.
     
         William Ting graduated from Hong Kong Baptist University and received his Master Degree in Historical Musicology from Royal Holloway, University of London. He is currently a life member of the International Association of Theatre Critics (Hong Kong). As a local music critic, Ting’s writings are widely published in art magazines, newspapers and online. As a musicologist, Ting has conducted numerous public lectures in recent years including Baroque Music Lecture Series: Bach & Beyond in 2022.
     
         Chung Chi-woo earned his Master Degree in Piano Performance from the Manhattan School of Music in the United States. He has performed solo recitals and chamber performances across Europe and the United States and participated in many music festivals and master classes. Chung Siu-sun is a pupil of seasoned virtuoso of guqin Sou Si-tai, studying both guqin and xiao. He contributed his guqin expertise to the album “Gem of Ci Poetry Music” in recent years. He is currently the general officer of the Deyin Qin Society. 
     
         All lectures will be conducted in Cantonese and start at 7.30pm in the Lecture Hall of the Hong Kong Space Museum. Each lecture will run for about one hour and 30 minutes. Tickets priced at $80 (for each lecture, with free seating) are now available at URBTIX (www.urbtix.hk). For telephone bookings, please call 3166 1288. For programme enquiries, please call 2268 7321 or visit www.lcsd.gov.hk/CE/CulturalService/Programme/en/music/programs_1886.html.

    MIL OSI Asia Pacific News –

  • MIL-Evening Report: Why a surprise jump in unemployment isn’t as bad as it sounds

    Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Jeff Borland, Professor of Economics, The University of Melbourne

    New figures show Australia’s seasonally adjusted unemployment rate unexpectedly rose to 4.3% – its highest level since late 2021 – in June this year, up from 4.1% in May.

    While this is bad news, it’s not as bad as it might seem. Higher unemployment came from more people looking for work. In the long run, that’s good for the economy.

    And these figures also make it more likely we’ll see an interest rate cut next month – which is now looking overdue.

    What’s the bad news?

    This is the second month in a row we’ve seen no growth in total employment, while total hours worked (the number of hours worked by employed individuals, regardless of whether they are full-time, part-time or overtime) in the past month has gone backwards.

    All this adds to the picture of a slowing labour market since the start of the year, after surprisingly strong growth in the second half of 2024.

    The latest Australian Bureau of Statistics release also includes data on where extra hours worked during 2025 have come from.

    Employment growth has come entirely from the “non-market sector” – which is healthcare and social assistance, education and training, and public administration and safety. And the big driver of those extra jobs has been in social assistance and health care, which is largely government-funded.

    That means employment has gone backwards in the rest of the economy, adding to a picture of a jobs market being propped up by government investment in the caring economy.

    Why it as bad as you might think

    The reason unemployment rose is that more people were looking for work – so it’s not because employment fell.

    Of course, we’d prefer those people to have found jobs. But it does mean people weren’t losing jobs for the unemployment rate to rise.

    The growth in labour force participation in June continues the trend of strong growth since late 2021. In the long run, that’s a good thing – it means the country can produce more output, and more people gain an income from work.

    An interest rate cut now looks more certain

    A fortnight ago, the Reserve Bank surprised most people by keeping the cash rate on hold at 3.85%.

    Today’s unemployment data is extra evidence that the labour market isn’t contributing to inflation pressure – in fact, it’s the opposite.

    It shows an interest rate cut is now overdue. The Reserve Bank board meets again in mid-August, with a decision on rates announced on August 12.

    When will we know if this is a blip or a trend?

    One possibility is that some of the extra people who became unemployed in June have a job to go to in the next month. Ups and downs in that group have at times been influential in driving unemployment numbers in recent times. In that case, this month’s figures may partly turn out to be a blip. We’ll be able to tell that when we see next month’s figures.

    But the blip is unlikely to explain all of the rise in June. This is also about a labour market that is slowing.

    Jeff Borland receives funding from the Australian Research Council.

    – ref. Why a surprise jump in unemployment isn’t as bad as it sounds – https://theconversation.com/why-a-surprise-jump-in-unemployment-isnt-as-bad-as-it-sounds-261375

    MIL OSI Analysis – EveningReport.nz –

  • MIL-OSI USA: Grassley-Led HALT Fentanyl Act Becomes Law

    US Senate News:

    Source: United States Senator for Iowa Chuck Grassley

    WASHINGTON – President Donald Trump today signed the Halt All Lethal Trafficking of (HALT) Fentanyl Act into law, permanently classifying illicit, fentanyl-related substances as Schedule I. The bipartisan and bicameral legislation was led by Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa), Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Chairman Bill Cassidy, M.D. (R-La.) and Sen. Martin Heinrich (D-N.M.).

    “The HALT Fentanyl Act is now the law of the land, marking a major victory in America’s fight against fentanyl,” Grassley said. “By permanently classifying fentanyl-related substances as Schedule I, the HALT Fentanyl Act will save American lives and prevent deadly fentanyl knockoffs from making their way into Iowa communities. I applaud President Trump’s action today, as well as his ongoing commitment to turning the corner on the Biden administration’s disastrous policies and creating a safer America.”  

    Download photos HERE. 

    Download bill text HERE and a fact sheet HERE.  

    Background:

    The HALT Fentanyl Act was introduced by Grassley, Cassidy and Heinrich in January, advanced by the Senate Judiciary Committee in February, passed by the Senate in March and passed by the House of Representatives in June. Both houses of Congress passed the bill by overwhelming margins.

    The bipartisan bill is supported by over 40 major advocacy groups, including a coalition of over 200 impacted family groups and law enforcement organizations representing over a million officers. Learn more about the bill’s widespread support HERE.

    -30-

    MIL OSI USA News –

  • Dharmendra Pradhan inaugurates University of Southampton’s India campus in Gurugram

    Source: Government of India

    Source: Government of India (4)

    Union Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan on Wednesday inaugurated the India campus of the University of Southampton in Gurugram

    This marks the first foreign university to establish a campus in India under the University Grants Commission’s new regulations,

    Describing the event as a “momentous milestone” in the internationalisation of education under the National Education Policy (NEP) 2020, Pradhan said the development also deepens the education pillar of the India–UK strategic partnership, as outlined in the India–UK Roadmap 2030.

    “Southampton University’s campus in Gurugram will create new synergies, foster a new culture of curiosity and excellence, and present an added choice to students to access world-class education at a more affordable cost and nearer to home and family,” he said.

    Pradhan also urged the university to introduce STEM programmes and contribute to India’s vision of becoming a global innovation hub.

    The launch event was attended by Haryana Chief Minister Nayab Singh Saini, Lord Patel OBE, Chancellor of the University and a member of the UK House of Lord, British High Commissioner to India Lindy Cameron, and UGC Chairman Dr. Vineet Joshi.

    Pradhan commended the university for establishing the state-of-the-art campus within a year of receiving the Letter of Intent.

    Highlighting the growing educational ties between India and the UK, Pradhan referred to Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s description of this relationship as a “living bridge” that connects the two nations.

    UGC Chairman Dr. Vineet Joshi called the Gurugram campus a proud milestone and a model for future international collaborations under NEP 2020. He said it reaffirms India’s emerging role as a global hub for education.

    The new campus will offer undergraduate and postgraduate programmes aligned with UK academic standards. Fields of study include Computer Science, Business Management, Economics, Accounting and Finance. Students will also have the flexibility to pursue parts of their education in the UK or Malaysia.

    Academic programmes at the campus are scheduled to begin in 2025, with the inaugural cohort comprising students from India, the UAE, and Nepal. Undergraduate offerings include BSc degrees in Computer Science, Economics, Accounting & Finance, and Business Management, while postgraduate options include MSc degrees in Finance and International Management.

    The university said over 75 faculty members from leading global institutions will join the Gurugram campus, ensuring international academic quality. Its global alumni network of over 290,000 graduates, including more than 1,700 from India, is also expected to play a key role in mentoring students and facilitating industry engagement.

  • MIL-OSI Russia: Delegation of businessmen from Tajikistan visited the new campus of NSU

    Translation. Region: Russian Federal

    Source: Novosibirsk State University –

    An important disclaimer is at the bottom of this article.

    A delegation of businessmen from the Republic of Tajikistan, representing the financial and insurance sectors, visited the new campus of NSU, which is being built within the framework of the national project “Youth and Children”. During the visit, a meeting was held with the management Faculty of Economics to discuss the development of cooperation with the Central Asian republic.

    The businessmen appreciated the high level of infrastructure being created on the university campus. The delegation attended lectures in large auditoriums and were impressed by the scale and high level of organization of the educational process.

    — This is not just a modern building — it is a real world-class scientific center. I was particularly impressed by the high quality of the infrastructure, comfortable classrooms and an atmosphere conducive to learning and scientific activity. Such campuses create not just an educational environment, but a space for the formation of future leaders of science and technology, — emphasized Ayubjon Nasirov, founder and current head of the insurance organization Eskhata Sugurta.

    During the meeting with the leadership of the Faculty of Economics, cooperation between universities of Tajikistan and NSU was discussed in several key areas:

    · Training and retraining of personnel in technical and economic specialties.

    · Joint scientific research, in particular in the field of information technology, digital transformation of business and medicine.

    · Internships and student exchanges, which are especially important for practical training and international experience.

    — We would like to pay special attention to the development of the Olympiad movement and work with gifted children. We are very interested in the Physics and Mathematics School (SUNC NSU), which has been successfully working with talented schoolchildren for many years. Many of our schoolchildren — winners of republican Olympiads — studied and successfully graduated from your university. It is important not only to preserve this tradition, but also to develop it, expanding the access of talented youth of Tajikistan to your educational programs, — explained Ayubjon Nasirov.

    Thus, the deputy dean of the economics department of NSU Naimdzhon Ibragimov at one time got to the university through the PhMS. In 1981, he won the republican Olympiad in mathematics in Tajikistan, after which he was offered to enroll in the summer school at the PhMS. In 1983, he graduated from the physics and mathematics school and entered the EF NSU.

    As noted by businessmen, NSU is distinguished by a high level of academic and scientific training, powerful infrastructure, as well as deep integration of science, education and innovation. Also, the trend of recent years is the strengthening of cooperation between the university and companies and enterprises from various industries.

    — In Tajikistan, we are also actively developing the higher education system, but here, at NSU, we saw an example of how a university can become a center for technological and economic development in a region. We were especially impressed by the close connection between the university and business, which allows us to quickly adapt educational programs to the needs of the labor market and ensure that graduates are in demand, — added Ayubjon Nasirov.

    Please note: This information is raw content obtained directly from the source of the information. It is an accurate report of what the source claims and does not necessarily reflect the position of MIL-OSI or its clients.

    .

    MIL OSI Russia News –

  • MIL-OSI New Zealand: Industry Skills Boards

    Source: Tertiary Education Commission

    This page explains the establishment of new Industry Skills Boards (ISBs), how to apply to become a board member, and the role of Establishment Advisory Groups in preparing for the ISBs’ launch in January 2026.
    This page explains the establishment of new Industry Skills Boards (ISBs), how to apply to become a board member, and the role of Establishment Advisory Groups in preparing for the ISBs’ launch in January 2026.

    On this page:

    Overview of the ISBs’ coverage
    In April and May 2025, the Government consulted on a proposed model for the number and coverage groupings of ISBs. The consultation included a proposal to move the coverage for some sectors (creative industries and IT) to the New Zealand Qualifications Authority (NZQA).
    Thank you to the groups and individuals that made submissions on the proposals. Your views helped inform final decisions by the Government on the number and coverage of ISBs.
    We received 521 submissions on the proposals. Following this consultation, the Government has agreed (subject to the passing of legislation) to establish eight ISBs.
    The agreed ISBs will have the following broad coverage areas:

    Automotive, transport and logistics
    Construction and specialist trades
    Food and fibre (including aquaculture)
    Health and community
    Infrastructure
    Manufacturing and engineering
    Services
    Electrotechnology and information technology.

    Industry Skills Board
    Example sectors within industry coverage

    Automotive, transport and logistics

    Automotive mechanics, commercial road transport, logistics, maritime

    Construction and specialist trades

    Carpentry, flooring, plumbing, gasfitting and drainlaying, roofing, scaffolding

    Food and fibre (including aquaculture)

    Agriculture, forestry, horticulture, aquaculture

    Health and community

    Aged care, community health and support, funeral services

    Infrastructure

    Electrical supply, road construction, telecommunications, water infrastructure, composites, energy, mining, quarrying

    Manufacturing and engineering

    Food and beverage manufacturing, mechanical engineering, textiles, rail operations, wood manufacturing

    Services

    Business services, creative arts, hairdressing and barbering, hospitality, recreation, retail, tourism

    Electrotechnology and information technology

    Electrotechnology, electronics, communications technology, computing

    All industries will be covered by ISBs. NZQA will not initially take over any industry coverage. 
    In the next few months, Establishment Advisory Groups will consult with industry regarding the detailed coverage areas of each ISB. This will then be set out in the Order in Council that will formally establish each ISB.
    Overview of the Establishment Advisory Groups
    Prior to being established, each ISB will have a dedicated Establishment Advisory Group (EAG) that will be responsible for ensuring the ISB can successfully stand up, as an organisation, on day one.
    There will be various decisions that the governing body of each new ISB will need to make on the day the organisation is established. Their ability to make the required decisions promptly will be essential to the success of their organisation and their ongoing accountability and performance.  
    Until the legislation is passed, there are limits on how much work can be done in advance.
    The TEC has confirmed the appointment of members to the EAGs. These members were nominated by industry, ensuring that the system is responsive to industry needs.
    The EAG members will attend an induction in late July. Following induction, each EAG will meet monthly to make key decisions to be ratified by its Industry Skills Board once it has been appointed, including:

    appointing a chief executive-designate
    preparing day one documentation including delegations
    agreeing banking arrangements
    developing key policies
    determining an organisational structure and industry engagement model for making operational arrangements for day one, eg, shared services, lease of premises, systems etc.
    agreeing processes with relevant organisations on the transfer of assets and staff
    assisting the TEC with the consultation on key content for Orders in Council.

    TEC will provide support to every EAG, including advice and administrative support.
    Detailed coverage consultation
    One area that EAGs will focus on in the next few months is working with industry to determine the detailed coverage areas of each ISB.  The details of this consultation are not yet finalised but EAGs will communicate directly with industry on these matters.
    This information will then be set out in the Order in Council (OIC) that will formally establish each ISB. The OICs will need to be approved by Cabinet after the legislation has been passed.
    Apply to be a member of the first ISBs
    We have confirmed the members of the EAGs who will work towards setting up Industry Skills Boards on 1 January 2026.
    The TEC is now inviting industries to nominate representatives for appointment to the first ISBs. These boards will be in place from 1 January 2026.
    Candidates will need strong governance and change management skills, an industry background, and an understanding of education and training.
    On each ISB, industry-nominated members will work alongside two members appointed by the Minister.
    What do nominees need?
    Candidates are expected to have significant governance experience combined with strategic leadership experience. Collectively, the members of each ISB will need:

    experience of strategic planning, including financial planning and sustainability
    financial management experience, including capital asset management
    a well-tuned understanding of risk
    experience in maintaining high standards while managing large-scale change
    experience of effectively monitoring organisational performance in a governance or senior management role
    experience in industry leadership, and extensive knowledge of, and connections within, industry
    an understanding of education and training.

    Who can nominate a candidate?
    Industry bodies can nominate candidates. This ensures candidates have the backing of industry. Industry bodies must obtain the permission of the candidate to be nominated.
    How to nominate a candidate
    To nominate a candidate, please complete the Industry Skills Board Member Nomination Form.
    Nominations must be received before 29 August 2025.

    MIL OSI New Zealand News –

  • MIL-OSI Analysis: From coal to crops: Dayak women lead a just transition through backyard farming

    Source: The Conversation – Indonesia – By Aidy Halimanjaya, Associate lecturer, Universitas Katolik Parahyangan

    The global shift toward renewable energy is no longer a choice but a necessity: the climate crisis intensifies, with 2024 confirmed as the warmest year on record.

    Yet in Indonesia, coal remains an economic lifeline for several regions. In East Kutai, East Kalimantan, coal mining accounts for nearly 75% of the district’s gross regional domestic product (GRDP).

    The end of the coal mining era will come at a cost to local residents, many of whom risk losing their current jobs — especially after their traditional forest-based livelihoods have already been eroded by environmental degradation tied to fossil fuel extraction.

    Aulia, 31, a Dayak women from East Kutai, admitted:

    We’re heavily dependent on mining—it’s the only thing that gives us a substantial income.

    Yet, amid this dilemma, indigenous Dayak women are unfolding a quiet revolution.

    By growing food crops in their backyards, these women not only generate income but also demonstrate that sustainable agriculture can align with local traditions. Their initiative is an inspiration, especially for communities near mining sites seeking alternative sources of income.

    Mining’s hidden toll on women and indigenous communities

    While coal fuels East Kalimantan’s economy, its benefits are unevenly distributed. In 2024, Kutai Kartanegara and East Kutai regencies were ranked first and third among the province’s poorest regions.

    Instead of prosperity, many residents face environmental degradation and the loss of traditional livelihoods (land-based livelihood). This is especially true for women, who are often marginalised in decision-making and excluded from the mining sector.

    Since the forest was converted into a mining pit, the indigenous Dayak Basap community, which once relied on the forest for its livelihood, has lost its traditional living space and been forced to adapt to survive.

    Many men have turned to mining, while women have sought other ways to support their families: some teach, others run small businesses, and many now grow chillies, spinach, and watercress in their backyards.

    From backyards to resistance: A community’s fight for survival

    With the changing economic landscape, Basap Dayak women are turning to their yards as a source of alternative income. There, they grow food crops that yield quick harvests, are in high demand, and may influence local inflation — such as chillies. Spinach and watercress are also among the popular choices.

    This shift is driven by a 2024 pilot project from Just Transition Indonesia and Parahyangan University, supported by Energi Muda, a local NGO focused on energy transition issues.

    On a 700-square-metre plot, local residents have learned to blend traditional farming with modern permaculture techniques, including composting and crop rotation. Permaculture is a holistic approach to agriculture and land management that mimics patterns found in surrounding natural ecosystems. Local youth are also engaged as community mobilisers to support the post-coal transition.

    The results are promising. With agricultural science and technological support from the startup HARA, Dayak Basap women have overcome challenges such as acidic soil and water pollution caused by mining. Through seed cultivation, their crop yields have even outperformed those of conventional farming methods previously tested.

    They’ve also learned to sell their harvests directly to consumers — such as restaurants and cracker producers — cutting out middlemen and increasing their bargaining power. This combination of traditional knowledge and modern innovation is not only enhancing community capacity but also delivering tangible economic benefits.

    When innovation meets tradition: Overcoming barriers

    However, the journey is far from easy. Formerly mined land takes a long time to recover. Acidic soil and water contaminated with heavy metals pose serious challenges, while limited access to tools and fertilisers remains a significant barrier. In some cases, communities must purchase pre-grown seedlings to speed up the planting process.

    This chilli planting program has been very good. It’s just that the condition of the land was inadequate and hard to improve. If there’s a chance, maybe we can try farming that lasts more than just one season—Indigenous Dayak women.

    Furthermore, the transition from shifting cropping to a long-term management system requires ongoing training. This kind of adaptation certainly cannot be achieved overnight and requires intensive mentoring.

    A just transition must be grassroots-led

    Initiatives like these offer valuable lessons.

    First, the energy transition must involve local communities—especially women—from the outset.

    Second, collective, community-based approaches have proven more sustainable than top-down programmes, which often fail to address real needs on the ground.

    Third, policy support must be directed toward grassroots initiatives like this. The focus should not only be on meeting transition targets, but also on ensuring social and ecological justice.

    In the global context, Indonesia has expressed its commitment through the Paris Agreement and the Just Energy Transition Partnership (JETP). However, this commitment must be grounded in the lived experiences of communities, particularly indigenous women and those directly impacted by extractive industries.

    A just energy transition requires gradual steps, targeted programme support, inclusive partnerships, and genuine commitment from all stakeholders.

    The story of the Dayak Basap women is more than one of resilience—it is a roadmap for a just energy transition. Their success proves that economic diversification is possible, even in coal-dependent regions. But that success hinges on the quality of support: whether it truly meets community needs and is led by strong local leadership.

    Aidy Halimanjaya terafiliasi sebagai pendiri dan direktur Yayasan Transisi berkeadilan Indonesia. Ia menerima dana dari Bank Indonesia melalui Universitas Parahyangan.

    – ref. From coal to crops: Dayak women lead a just transition through backyard farming – https://theconversation.com/from-coal-to-crops-dayak-women-lead-a-just-transition-through-backyard-farming-260827

    MIL OSI Analysis –

  • MIL-OSI Analysis: Do women really need more sleep than men? A sleep psychologist explains

    Source: The Conversation – Global Perspectives – By Amelia Scott, Honorary Affiliate and Clinical Psychologist at the Woolcock Institute of Medical Research, and Macquarie University Research Fellow, Macquarie University

    klebercordeiro/Getty

    If you spend any time in the wellness corners of TikTok or Instagram, you’ll see claims women need one to two hours more sleep than men.

    But what does the research actually say? And how does this relate to what’s going on in real life?

    As we’ll see, who gets to sleep, and for how long, is a complex mix of biology, psychology and societal expectations. It also depends on how you measure sleep.

    What does the evidence say?

    Researchers usually measure sleep in two ways:

    • by asking people how much they sleep (known as self-reporting). But people are surprisingly inaccurate at estimating how much sleep they get

    • using objective tools, such as research-grade, wearable sleep trackers or the gold-standard polysomnography, which records brain waves, breathing and movement while you sleep during a sleep study in a lab or clinic.

    Looking at the objective data, well-conducted studies usually show women sleep about 20 minutes more than men.

    One global study of nearly 70,000 people who wore wearable sleep trackers found a consistent, small difference between men and women across age groups. For example, the sleep difference between men and women aged 40–44 was about 23–29 minutes.

    Another large study using polysomnography found women slept about 19 minutes longer than men. In this study, women also spent more time in deep sleep: about 23% of the night compared to about 14% for men. The study also found only men’s quality of sleep declined with age.

    The key caveat to these findings is that our individual sleep needs vary considerably. Women may sleep slightly more on average, just as they are slightly shorter on average. But there is no one-size-fits-all sleep duration, just as there is no universal height.

    Suggesting every woman needs 20 extra minutes (let alone two hours) misses the point. It’s the same as insisting all women should be shorter than all men.

    Even though women tend to sleep a little longer and deeper, they consistently report poorer sleep quality. They’re also about 40% more likely to be diagnosed with insomnia.

    This mismatch between lab findings and the real world is a well-known puzzle in sleep research, and there are many reasons for it.

    For instance, many research studies don’t consider mental health problems, medications, alcohol use and hormonal fluctuations. This filters out the very factors that shape sleep in the real world.

    This mismatch between the lab and the bedroom also reminds us sleep doesn’t happen in a vacuum. Women’s sleep is shaped by a complex mix of biological, psychological and social factors, and this complexity is hard to capture in individual studies.

    Let’s start with biology

    Sleep problems begin to diverge between the sexes around puberty. They spike again during pregnancy, after birth and during perimenopause.

    Fluctuating levels of ovarian hormones, particularly oestrogen and progesterone, seem to explain some of these sex differences in sleep.

    For example, many girls and women report poorer sleep during the premenstrual phase just before their periods, when oestrogen and progesterone begin to fall.

    Perhaps the most well-documented hormonal influence on our sleep is the decline in oestrogen during perimenopause. This is linked to increased sleep disturbances, particularly waking at 3am and struggling to get back to sleep.

    Some health conditions also play a part in women’s sleep health. Thyroid disorders and iron deficiency, for instance, are more common in women and are closely linked to fatigue and disrupted sleep.

    How about psychology?

    Women are at much higher risk of depression, anxiety and trauma-related disorders. These very often accompany sleep problems and fatigue. Cognitive patterns, such as worry and rumination, are also more common in women and known to affect sleep.

    Women are also prescribed antidepressants more often than men, and these medications tend to affect sleep.

    Society also plays a role

    Caregiving and emotional labour still fall disproportionately on women. Government data released this year suggests Australian women perform an average nine more hours of unpaid care and work each week than men.

    While many women manage to put enough time aside for sleep, their opportunities for daytime rest are often scarce. This puts a lot of pressure on sleep to deliver all the restoration women need.

    In my work with patients, we often untangle the threads woven into their experience of fatigue. While poor sleep is the obvious culprit, fatigue can also signal something deeper, such as underlying health issues, emotional strain, or too-high expectations of themselves. Sleep is certainly part of the picture, but it’s rarely the whole story.

    For instance, rates of iron deficiency (which we know is more common in women and linked to sleep problems) are also higher in the reproductive years. This is just as many women are raising children and grappling with the “juggle” and the “mental load”.

    Women in perimenopause are often navigating full-time work, teenagers, ageing parents and 3am hot flashes. These women may have adequate or even high-quality sleep (according to objective measures), but that doesn’t mean they wake feeling restored.

    Most existing research also ignores gender-diverse populations. This limits our understanding of how sleep is shaped not just by biology, but by things such as identity and social context.

    So where does this leave us?

    While women sleep longer and better in the lab, they face more barriers to feeling rested in everyday life.

    So, do women need more sleep than men? On average, yes, a little. But more importantly, women need more support and opportunity to recharge and recover across the day, and at night.

    Amelia Scott is a member of the psychology education subcommittee of the Australasian Sleep Association. She receives funding from Macquarie University.

    – ref. Do women really need more sleep than men? A sleep psychologist explains – https://theconversation.com/do-women-really-need-more-sleep-than-men-a-sleep-psychologist-explains-259985

    MIL OSI Analysis –

  • MIL-OSI Russia: NSU student creates app for recognition, digitization and analysis of classical Tibetan texts using machine learning

    Translation. Region: Russian Federal

    Source: Novosibirsk State University –

    An important disclaimer is at the bottom of this article.

    A system for automatic recognition and transliteration of texts in classical Tibetan, focused on old printed documents made using Tibetan syllabic writing, which goes back to the ancient Indian Brahmi script, was created by a student of the Fundamental and Applied Linguistics program working at the Institute of Mathematics and Mathematical Geophysics of the Siberian Branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences. Humanitarian Institute of Novosibirsk State University Anna Murashkina. In her research, she used images of pages of classical Tibetan texts from the 18th-20th centuries from the archive of the Center for Oriental Manuscripts and Xylographs of the Institute of Mongolian, Buddhist and Tibetan Studies of the Siberian Branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences.

    — The relevance of my work is due to the need to preserve and make digitally accessible the Tibetan cultural heritage, presented in the form of many historical manuscripts. Old printed documents, manuscripts and xylographs contain unique information about philosophy, religion, medicine, history and art, playing a key role in the study of the cultural traditions of the region. This knowledge is passed down from generation to generation in Tibet. However, over time, under the influence of natural and anthropogenic factors, paper media are subject to physical destruction, which leads to the loss of priceless information and limits access to these unique materials. Currently, the Tibetan Fund of the Institute of Mongolian, Buddhist and Tibetan Studies of the Siberian Branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences contains up to 70 thousand units of chronicles that are at risk of being lost. One of the most reliable ways to preserve and systematize historical documents is to digitize them, — said Anna Murashkina.

    The young researcher set herself the task of using machine learning to build a model that would recognize Tibetan alphabet symbols from images, translate them into machine-readable form, and at the same time show greater accuracy than existing open solutions, including Tesseract.

    — To do this, I manually performed linguistic markup of Tibetan text lines from the IMBT SB RAS collection. Then, taking into account the specifics of Tibetan graphics, I developed a system for assessing the quality of optical character recognition (OCR). Then I compared existing architectures and chose a convolutional neural network model, which required additional training, — explained Anna Murashkina.

    She implemented additional training of the model on a marked corpus of documents, and as a result, a complete modular OCR algorithm was created, including the stages of pre-processing, segmentation, recognition and post-processing.

    — For me, the value of the project is that I helped digitize an archive that stores history — documents created by people of the past who wanted to pass on their knowledge to future generations. I am glad that I am helping to transfer this knowledge through time, preserve it and make it available to a wider audience. My development will be used by employees of the Institute of Mongolian, Buddhist and Tibetan Studies of the Siberian Branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences. The possibility of cooperation with the Buddhist Center for Digital Technologies, which digitizes the archives of temples and monasteries, is also being discussed. In cooperation with this organization, we will expand the possibilities of digitizing Tibetan manuscripts using open resources developed jointly with researchers from organizations in different countries, so that later everyone can touch this priceless heritage and get acquainted with the documents that are in temples and archive repositories, — said Anna Murashkina.

    Material prepared by: Elena Panfilo, NSU press service

    Please note: This information is raw content obtained directly from the source of the information. It is an accurate report of what the source claims and does not necessarily reflect the position of MIL-OSI or its clients.

    .

    MIL OSI Russia News –

  • MIL-OSI China: FISU World University Games open in Duisburg

    Source: People’s Republic of China – State Council News

    The 2025 Rhine-Ruhr World University Games opened Wednesday at the Schauinsland Reisen Arena, the exact same stadium where the Duisburg 1989 Universiade’s opening ceremony was celebrated.

    Barbel Bas, German federal Minister of Labour and Social Affairs, officially opened the 32nd FISU Summer Universiade, which is co-hosted by six cities in Germany, including Berlin, Essen, Duisburg, Bochum, Mulheim an der Ruhr and Hagen, mainly from the Rhine-Ruhr region.

    The opening ceremony began at 8:15 p.m. and ended at 11:00 p.m., starting with the overture “Now and Together”. The composition, created by Jan Loechel for the 2025 FISU World University Games, was performed by the WDR Funkhaus Orchestra.

    Leonz Eder, President of FISU, delivered an opening speech. “I wish you very success at the competitions, which will be unforgettable experiences and relished wealth in your life,” he said.

    The ceremony opted to underline the festival’s character, combining classical music, big board sound, and modern band performance in an impressive scenography with the defining, central element being music.

    Recalling the Ruhr area’s industrial history was a fundamental conceptual thread of the ceremony. The stage was surrounded by six huge chimney-shaped LED towers on the pitch, functioning as the cornerstones of the arena.

    The ceremony managed to create a connection between the Ruhr region’s industrial past and its future. Approximately 500 people, composed of retired miners and school choirs, sang in chorus the “Steigerlied”, the German miners’ folk song.

    The spectators gave rhythmic hand-clapping throughout the athletes’ parading as volunteers made the leading group heading into the stadium, holding banners saying “no Games without U”.

    Hendrik Wust, Minister-president of the state of North Rhine-Westphalia, gave a welcome speech, saying “University Games are a celebration of respect, tolerance and friendship. I hope this theory spreads around the world driven by your experiences. Each and every one of you is invited to be an ambassador of friendship and peace.”

    The big screen had a brief look back at the flag-handover performance for the 2025 Games during the closing ceremony in Chengdu in 2023.

    The flame arrived at the stadium in the hands of Heide Ecker-Rosendahl, the long jump gold medalist at the 1972 Munich Olympics. She passed it on to six other athletes, who proceeded to and approached the LED towers.

    The flames slowly rose virtually, accompanied by the anthem “Now and Together.” At the climax of Jan Loechet’s song, real flames are ignited on the six towers, representing all the competing cities of the Rhine-Ruhr University Games.

    At the end of the ceremony, the flames on the towers were transferred into six mining lamps.

    The Rhine-Ruhr 2025 Games will see over 9,200 participants from more than 150 countries and regions compete from July 16 to 27.

    Host Germany is represented by its largest delegation ever: 305 athletes and 177 team officials.

    MIL OSI China News –

  • MIL-OSI China: China’s booming low-altitude economy reshaping industries, daily life

    Source: People’s Republic of China – State Council News

    A drone photo taken on July 2, 2025 shows an electric vertical take-off-and-landing (eVTOL) aircraft performing flight demonstration at Luogang Park in Hefei, east China’s Anhui Province. (Xinhua/Zhou Mu)

    Amid the pines of a scenic area in southwest China’s Chongqing, two drones rose with a low hum, weaving through branches to hover 10 meters above the treetops as a fine mist of pesticide drifted down to target hidden pine caterpillars below.

    “This canopy-level spraying hits where pests hide, boosting efficiency 30-fold over manual work and eliminating blind spots,” said Ni Liufa, deputy director of Liangping District’s forest resources monitoring and pest control station.

    This scene exemplifies the quiet revolution of China’s booming low-altitude economy, evolving from novelty to essential practical use.

    Anchored by its inclusion in China’s central government work reports for 2024 and 2025, the sector is soaring. The Civil Aviation Administration of China projects the market size to reach 1.5 trillion yuan (about 209.8 billion U.S. dollars) by 2025, with potential growth up to 3.5 trillion yuan by 2035.

    The 1st West China Low-altitude Economy Expo in Liangping, which concluded Sunday, showcased the rapid diversification. Exhibits ranged from 5-tonne cargo drones and 4-passenger eVTOL (electric vertical take-off and landing) aircraft to advanced communication and air traffic management systems. The applications spanned logistics, passenger transport, tourism, public safety, emergency response, surveying, and agriculture.

    “Low-altitude economy is evolving from traditional services to integrated formats,” said Liu Daxiang, professor at Beihang University. “Deep development in agriculture, logistics, tourism, and emergency response is reshaping entire value chains.”

    Growth is expanding from China’s eastern hubs to the central and western regions, reaching beyond cities into the countryside.

    Chongqing, leveraging its unique landscape, is actively building an ecosystem integrating low-altitude operations with urban life and industry. The city recorded 190,000 flight hours in the first half of 2024, a surge of 109.2 percent year on year, with flight operations jumping 67.3 percent to over 1.15 million.

    Drones are transforming logistics, especially in less accessible areas. “Our ‘air-to-air intermodal transport’ connects drones with China Postal Airlines cargo flights,” said Sun Liye, vice president of United Aircraft. “Fresh plums from Chongqing’s Wushan County can now reach supermarkets in eastern coastal regions such as Nanjing or Shanghai the same afternoon, 17 times faster than before.”

    In south China’s Shenzhen, 483 low-altitude takeoff and landing points and a pioneering city-wide safety network have been established. In Jinzhai County, east China’s Anhui province, drones are used to overcome the mountainous “last mile,” delivering more than 1,000 tonnes of produce each year. In Altay Prefecture, northwest China’s Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region, drones are boosting the efficiency of grassland ecological monitoring.

    “Low-altitude economy isn’t some distant industry; it’s right here,” said Zhou Yuyun, a Chongqing resident exhilarated by a powered paragliding experience. “Seeing the world from above instead of the ground is breathtaking.”

    Experts at the expo concurred that China’s low-altitude economy is experiencing an unprecedented boom, driven by rapid advancements in aircraft manufacturing, flight services and diverse application scenarios, alongside a strengthening industrial chain and accelerating innovation.

    “With continuous policy refinement and technological breakthroughs, China’s low-altitude economy will continue to expand,” said Wang Huizheng, deputy head of the low-altitude economy branch of the China Information Industry Association.

    “This vast ‘blue sky’ market holds immense potential, and is poised to inject powerful new momentum into economic and social development,” Wang added. 

    MIL OSI China News –

  • MIL-OSI New Zealand: Heritage – KAKANUI CHURCH LISTED AS CATEGORY 1 HISTORIC PLACE

    Source: Heritage New Zealand

    The owners of the former Kakanui Church, Michael Simpson and Anna Miles, are thrilled to see their restoration project entered on the New Zealand Heritage List/Rārangi Kōrero as a Category 1 place.

    The Presbyterian church at Kakanui was designed by Robert Arthur Lawson, an important Scottish Dunedin-based architect, who designed many ecclesiastical buildings over his career. The wooden, gothic-style church at Kakanui was built in three months to accommodate 100 people. It was built at a time when Kakanui had just built a port in the hopes of becoming a major export port. This growth never eventuated but the Presbyterian church remained a key community hub.
    The church’s architecture was part of what attracted Michael and Anna to the property when they first saw it was for sale. “We like that it’s Robert Lawson’s smallest, most modest surviving building” says Michael. “It was pretty exciting when we looked at it and saw that it was one of his before we bought it.”
    For Michael and Anna, the purchase and restoration of the church has been a pleasure – they describe the restoration as their “hobby”. When they bought the church, it needed significant work but that didn’t scare the couple. Michael is an experienced carpenter with heritage expertise, and Anna is also hands-on. Gradually they have put new subfloor bearing joists in, replaced corner studs and weatherboards, restored windows, painted, and improved the drainage. “We never had a particular plan except to restore it,” says Michael. “There was no timeframe, no budget and that’s why it’s been such a pleasure. It is going really well at this stage.”
    Part of the journey of restoration has been discovering the emotional ties so many people have to the church. In addition to regular services, the church ran Sunday School classes, which were so popular that in 1933 a dedicated Bible Class Hall was added to the main church. In 1955, two further small buildings were purchased to accommodate the growing Sunday school numbers. The local branch of Brownies used one of these huts as their den.
    When Michael and Anna work on their church they have an open-door policy, they’ve found that people come to visit and chat. “The more we’ve got to know the building, the more we’ve realised it’s a special space that means a lot to a lot of other people”, says Anna. “For us, we’re looking after it at the moment and fixing it up. We see ourselves as stewards of the building.” Now that the church is weathertight and stable, Anna and Michael have opened it up to community use.
    Michael says, “we’ve had weddings in it, gigs, art exhibitions, and carol services. It doesn’t need to be a commercial space, but we’ve realised it should have a life of its own and a reason to exist. We get quite emotional seeing all the life in the building. We never expected that side of what is our hobby. It’s not what we went looking for but it’s rewarding to see.”
    The listing process has highlighted the social and historical value to the Kakanui community. Heritage New Zealand Pouhere Taonga Heritage Assessment Advisor, Alison Breese, has loved working on the project. “This place is highly significant to the Kakanui community and has outstanding aesthetic, architectural and historic significance. As one of only two surviving Presbyterian timber churches in New Zealand designed by Lawson it’s been a pleasure seeing the love and hard mahi the owners have put into it.”
    For Michael and Anna, the church entry on the New Zealand Heritage List/ Rārangi Kōrero is an important recognition of the significance of the church and will support its ongoing protection and recognition.
    ABOUT HERITAGE NEW ZEALAND POUHERE TAONGA
    Heritage New Zealand Pouhere Taonga is the leading national historic heritage agency for Aotearoa New Zealand, operating as an autonomous Crown Entity. Our mission is to identify, protect, and promote heritage – Kia mōhiotia atu, kia tiakina, kia hāpaingia ā tātau taonga tuku iho.
    We actively engage with communities, foster partnerships, and provide valuable resources to support those who are passionate about exploring, learning, and connecting with our rich cultural heritage. For more information, please visit our website at www.heritage.org.nz

    MIL OSI New Zealand News –

  • MIL-OSI Security: USINDOPACOM hosts Transnational Security Cooperation Course 25-1

    Source: United States INDO PACIFIC COMMAND

    CAMP H.M. SMITH, Hawaii — Adm. Samuel J. Paparo, commander of U.S. Indo-Pacific Command, hosted 40 senior U.S. and international military and civilian officials at USINDOPACOM headquarters on Camp H.M. Smith in Honolulu for the Daniel K. Inouye Asia-Pacific Center for Security Studies’ Transnational Security Cooperation Course 25-1, July 16, 2025.

    MIL Security OSI –

  • MIL-OSI USA: SIGNED INTO LAW: Bipartisan Legislation That Secures Permanent Scheduling of Fentanyl Analogues

    US Senate News:

    Source: United States Senator for New Hampshire Maggie Hassan

    Washington, D.C. – Today the Halt All Lethal Trafficking of (HALT) Fentanyl Act, bipartisan legislation that U.S. Senators Maggie Hassan and Jeanne Shaheen helped introduce and was supported by Congressman Chris Pappas (NH-01) and Congresswoman Maggie Goodlander (NH-02), was signed into law. This law permanently schedules all fentanyl-related substances as Schedule I drugs under the Controlled Substances Act to ensure law enforcement can keep them off the streets and hold drug traffickers accountable.

    “The vast majority of drug-related deaths in New Hampshire have been caused by the trafficking of illicit fentanyl. That’s why I have consistently engaged with law enforcement, public health experts, and colleagues across the aisle to ensure that the scheduling of fentanyl analogues did not lapse and is finally made permanent,” said Congressman Pappas. “The enactment of this legislation represents an important step forward and will ensure law enforcement retains the full suite of tools they need to take on the opioid crisis and crack down on drug traffickers, but we cannot rest here. I remain committed to delivering the resources our communities need to stop traffickers, bring down drug-related deaths, and support people in recovery.”

    “In the Granite State we’ve lost far too many lives due to fentanyl overdoses, and we must do everything we can to prevent more deaths,” said Senator Shaheen. “I was proud to help introduce this bipartisan legislation in the Senate and I’m glad the President has signed it into law so that we can stop the flow of fentanyl into our communities, hold traffickers accountable and save lives.”

    “Too many families across New Hampshire have experienced the devastating effects of the fentanyl crisis,” said Senator Hassan. “The HALT Fentanyl Act will permanently classify fentanyl analogues at the strongest level allowed under the law, boosting penalties and giving law enforcement more tools to get these deadly illicit drugs off our streets. This bill marks a step forward in combatting fentanyl and I am glad the President has signed it into law.”

    “Illicit fentanyl is the leading driver of overdose deaths in New Hampshire, taking the lives of hundreds of loved ones every year. We can and must do more to combat this epidemic and help save lives,” said Congresswoman Goodlander. “The HALT Fentanyl Act will help stop the flow of these dangerous drugs into our communities and hold illicit distributors accountable. I will continue working to ensure our law enforcement partners have the tools they need to keep New Hampshire communities safe.” 

    Pappas has led efforts to permanently schedule fentanyl-related substances in the House, securing several extensions of the temporary scheduling order while working to ensure the passage of permanent legislation. The HALT Fentanyl Act contains identical key provisions from Pappas’s bipartisan SAFE Act, which he first introduced in the 117th Congress.

    Shaheen has spearheaded crucial legislation and funding to fight the substance use disorder epidemic, including through her leadership on the pivotal U.S. Senate Appropriations Subcommittee on Commerce, Justice, Science and Related Agencies, which funds the U.S. Department of Justice. Shaheen recently introduced her bipartisan Keeping Drugs Out of Schools Act to help prevent youth opioid use and overdoses by establishing a new grant program that allows current or former Drug-Free Communities (DFC) coalitions to partner with schools to provide resources educating students about the dangers of synthetic opioids. Shaheen has also led the bipartisan Cooper Davis Act which would crack down on online drug sales through social media and helped enact the FENTANYL Results Act to increase global cooperation in the fight against synthetic drug trafficking.

    Senator Hassan has worked to stop drug trafficking and support communities devastated by the fentanyl crisis. She helped advance the DETECT Fentanyl and Xylazine Act, which was signed into law last year and is supporting law enforcement with enhanced tools to find and eliminate illegal substances such as fentanyl and xylazine. Senators Hassan, Shaheen, and their colleagues also passed into law the FEND Off Fentanyl Act, which targets the illicit fentanyl supply chain and imposes sanctions on traffickers. Senator Hassan also developed the END FENTANYL Act, signed into law last year, which helps Customs and Border Protection crack down on fentanyl trafficking at the border.

    MIL OSI USA News –

  • MIL-Evening Report: ER Report: A Roundup of Significant Articles on EveningReport.nz for July 17, 2025

    ER Report: Here is a summary of significant articles published on EveningReport.nz on July 17, 2025.

    Do women really need more sleep than men? A sleep psychologist explains
    Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Amelia Scott, Honorary Affiliate and Clinical Psychologist at the Woolcock Institute of Medical Research, and Macquarie University Research Fellow, Macquarie University klebercordeiro/Getty If you spend any time in the wellness corners of TikTok or Instagram, you’ll see claims women need one to two hours more sleep than

    I created a Vivaldi-inspired sound artwork for the Venice Biennale. The star of the show is an endangered bush-cricket
    Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Miriama Young, Associate Professor Music Composition, Melbourne Conservatorium of Music, The University of Melbourne Marco Zorzanello It was late January when I got the call. I’m asked to bring my sound art to a collaborative ecology and design project, Song of the Cricket, for the Venice Biennale

    Is it okay to boil water more than once, or should you empty the kettle every time?
    Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Faisal Hai, Professor and Head of School of Civil, Mining, Environmental and Architectural Engineering, University of Wollongong Avocado_studio/Shutterstock The kettle is a household staple practically everywhere – how else would we make our hot drinks? But is it okay to re-boil water that’s already in the kettle

    What does Australian law have to say about sovereign citizens and ‘pseudolaw’?
    Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Madeleine Perrett, PhD Candidate in Law, University of Adelaide Armed with obscure legal jargon and fringe interpretations of the law, “sovereign citizens” are continuing to test the limits of the Australian justice system’s patience and power. A few weeks ago, two Western Australians were jailed for 30

    Is childbirth really safer for women and babies in private hospitals?
    Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Hannah Dahlen, Professor of Midwifery, Associate Dean Research and HDR, Midwifery Discipline Leader, Western Sydney University A study published this week in the international obstetrics and gynaecology journal BJOG has raised concerns among women due to give birth in Australia’s public hospitals. The study compared the outcomes

    We were part of the world heritage listing of Murujuga. Here’s why all Australians should be proud
    Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Jo McDonald, Professor, Director of Centre for Rock Art Research + Management, The University of Western Australia Senior Ranger, Mardudunhera man Peter Cooper, oversees the Murujuga landscape Jo McDonald, CC BY-SA On Friday, the Murujuga Cultural Landscape in northwest Western Australia was inscribed on the UNESCO World

    Is our mental health determined by where we live – or is it the other way round? New research sheds more light
    Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Matthew Hobbs, Associate Professor and Transforming Lives Fellow, Spatial Data Science and Planetary Health, Sheffield Hallam University Photon-Photos/Getty Images Ever felt like where you live is having an impact on your mental health? Turns out, you’re not imagining things. Our new analysis of eight years of data

    The secret stories of trees are written in the knots and swirls of your floorboards. An expert explains how to read them
    Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Gregory Moore, Senior Research Associate, School of Agriculture, Food and Ecosystem Sciences, The University of Melbourne Magda Ehlers/Pexels, CC BY Have you ever examined timber floorboards and pondered why they look the way they do? Perhaps you admired the super-fine grain, a stunning red hue or a

    Tasmania is limping towards an election nobody wants. Here’s the state of play
    Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Robert Hortle, Deputy Director, Tasmanian Policy Exchange, University of Tasmania In the darkest and coldest months of the year, Tasmanians have been slogging through an election campaign no one wanted. It’s been a curious mix of humdrum plodding laced with cyanide levels of bitterness, with the most

    What is astigmatism? Why does it make my vision blurry? And how did I get it?
    Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Flora Hui, Research Fellow, Centre for Eye Research Australia and Honorary Fellow, Department of Surgery (Ophthalmology), The University of Melbourne Ground Picture/Shutterstock Have you ever gone to the optometrist for an eye test and were told your eye was shaped like a football? Or perhaps you’ve noticed

    From Sister Rosetta Tharpe to Ronnie Yoshiko Fujiyama: how electric guitarists challenge expectations of gender
    Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Janelle K Johnstone, Associate Lecturer Crime, Justice and Legal Studies, PhD Candidate School of Social Inquiry, La Trobe University American gospel singer and guitarist Sister Rosetta Tharpe playing a Gibson Les Paul electric guitar on stage in 1957. Chris Ware/Keystone Features/Hulton Archive/Getty Images I’ve been playing a

    Ken Henry urges nature law reform after decades of ‘intergenerational bastardry’
    Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Phillipa C. McCormack, Future Making Fellow, Environment Institute, University of Adelaide Former Treasury Secretary Ken Henry has warned Australia’s global environmental reputation is at risk if the Albanese government fails to reform nature laws this term. In his speech to the National Press Club on Wednesday, Henry

    David Robie: New Zealand must do more for Pacific and confront nuclear powers
    Rongelap Islanders on board the Greenpeace flagship Rainbow Warrior travelling to their new home on Mejatto Island in 1985 — less than two months before the bombing. Image: ©1985 David Robie/Eyes of Fire He accused the coalition government of being “too timid” and “afraid of offending President Donald Trump” to make a stand on the

    First-hand view of peacemaking challenge in the ‘Holy Land’
    Occupied West Bank-based New Zealand journalist Cole Martin asks who are the peacemakers? BEARING WITNESS: By Cole Martin As a Kiwi journalist living in the occupied West Bank, I can list endless reasons why there is no peace in the “Holy Land”. I live in a refugee camp, alongside families who were expelled from their

    Politics with Michelle Grattan: Malcolm Turnbull on Australia’s ‘dumb’ defence debate
    Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michelle Grattan, Professorial Fellow, University of Canberra The Albanese government remains in complicated territory on the international stage. It has to tread carefully with China, despite the marked warming of the bilateral relationship. It is yet to find its line and length with the unpredictable Trump administration.

    Why is Israel bombing Syria?
    Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Ali Mamouri, Research Fellow, Middle East Studies, Deakin University Conflict in Syria has escalated with Israel launching bombing raids against its northern neighbour. It follows months of fluctuating tensions in southern Syria between the Druze minority and forces aligned with the new government in Damascus. Clashes erupted

    Bougainville election: More than 400 candidates vie for parliament
    By Don Wiseman, RNZ Pacific senior journalist More than 400 candidates have put their hands up to contest the Bougainville general election in September, hoping to enter Parliament. Incumbent President Ishmael Toroama is among the 404 people lining up to win a seat. Bougainville is involved in the process of achieving independence from Papua New

    Scientists could be accidentally damaging fossils with a method we thought was safe
    Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Mathieu Duval, Adjunct Senior Researcher at Griffith University and La Trobe University, and Ramón y Cajal (Senior) Research Fellow, Centro Nacional de Investigación sobre la Evolución Humana (CENIEH) 185,000-year-old human fossil jawbone from Misliya Cave, Israel. Gerhard Weber, University of Vienna, CC BY-ND Fossils are invaluable archives

    Right-wing political group Advance is in the headlines. What is it and what does it stand for?
    Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Mark Riboldi, Lecturer in Social Impact and Social Change, UTS Business School, University of Technology Sydney Advance/Facebook Political lobby group Advance has been back in the headlines this week. It was revealed an organisation headed by the husband of the Special Envoy for Combatting Antisemitism, Jillian Segal,

    We travelled to Antarctica to see if a Māori lunar calendar might help track environmental change
    Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Holly Winton, Senior Research Fellow in Climatology, Te Herenga Waka — Victoria University of Wellington Holly Winton, CC BY-SA Antarctica’s patterns of stark seasonal changes, with months of darkness followed by a summer of 24-hour daylight, prompted us to explore how a Māori lunar and environmental calendar

    MIL OSI Analysis – EveningReport.nz –

  • MIL-Evening Report: I created a Vivaldi-inspired sound artwork for the Venice Biennale. The star of the show is an endangered bush-cricket

    Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Miriama Young, Associate Professor Music Composition, Melbourne Conservatorium of Music, The University of Melbourne

    Marco Zorzanello

    It was late January when I got the call. I’m asked to bring my sound art to a collaborative ecology and design project, Song of the Cricket, for the Venice Biennale of Architecture. When such as invitation arrives, you have no choice but to jump in.

    I see an image of the site for the project: the Gaggiandre at the Arsenale – a medieval shipyard that serviced the Venetian military at its imperial peak.

    Once a resplendent hive of industry, it is even detailed by Dante Alighieri in The Divine Comedy:

    As in the arsenal of the Venetians,
    all winter long a stew of sticky pitch
    boils up to patch their sick and tattered ships
    that cannot sail (instead of voyaging,
    some build new keels, some tow and tar the ribs
    of hulls worn out by too much journeying;
    some hammer at the prow, some at the stern,
    and some make oars, and some braid ropes and cords;
    one mends the jib, another, the mainsail)

    The Gaggiandre is a cavernous, church-like space flanked by stone colonnades, wooden roof beams, and situated, in true Venetian style, on a bed of water. With long reverberation times, music in this space would need to be slowly unfolding, drawing the listener in and inviting them to meditate.

    It is a place of reflection, both metaphorically and physically. To a sound artist, creating for the Gaggiandre is a dream.

    Art and the Anthropocene

    The Song of the Cricket exhibit has been on display at the Biennale since May. Its purpose is to bridge ecological research with sound art to raise awareness for our fragile biodiversity, with a focus on the critically endangered Adriatic bush-cricket, Zeuneriana marmorata.

    Zeuneriana marmorata is a rare species found in wetlands in north-eastern Italy and Slovenia.
    Wikimedia, CC BY-SA

    What better place than Venice – a city slowly sinking – to reflect on where we stand in this moment of environmental collapse?

    The exhibit was created by a large team of collaborators. It features several mobile habitats populated with Zeuneriana. Some of these habitats sit on the Arsenale lawn, while other symbolic habitats float on the water as life rafts. Alongside the enclosures, my pre-composed “sound garden” plays through speakers onto the lawn.

    At the end of the Biennale, the team, led by landscape architect and ecologist Alex Felson, intends to use the life rafts to ceremonially transport incubated eggs to a new home on the mainland.

    The installation features mobile cricket habitats on the lawn, as well as symbolic life rafts on the water.
    Miriama Young

    Sounds of nature and Vivaldi

    On the lawn, the chirrup of live courting bush-crickets blends with pre-recorded sounds of their ancestors. These ancestral sounds might double as a lullaby for newly orphaned eggs, as adults only live a few months.

    The accompanying sound garden is richly diverse, created from an array of fauna sounds drawn from Northern Italian wetland environments, including the Eurasian reed warbler, the cuckoo and, my personal favourite, the green toad.

    My intention is for the soundscape to transport audiences to a different time and place: to a future where these species thrive in a healthy ecology.

    Excerpt from the Song of Crickets sound installation.
    Miriama Young and Monica Lim1.73 MB (download)

    There is a second element to the sound installation, created with support from sound technologist Monica Lim. Informed by the music of Antonio Vivaldi, this element serves to further activate the untapped airspace and enhance visitors’ experience of the site.

    Born in Venice in 1678, Vivaldi is a ubiquitous and avoidable cliché for locals. Yet his music was the perfect inspiration for this project, as it encodes a hidden ecological story.

    Vivaldi incorporated the literal sounds of nature into The Four Seasons (1723), with particular species’ songs annotated onto the score.

    The Song of the Cricket borrows elements from Vivaldi’s Summer: Allegro non Molto. In the short section I drew from, the cuckoo, turtledove and goldfinch are all musically described and credited by Vivaldi.

    And although they are not expressly mentioned, I imagine bush-crickets also pervade Vivaldi’s Summer movement, as we know they were once prolific in the Venice lagoon, and would have filled the summer air during his lifetime. You might hear them in the rapidly repeating (tremolo) string gestures.

    The cricket’s song serves as a indicator of an ecosystem’s health. But the sound of crickets in Venice today is largely missing.

    Our take on Vivaldi is slowed down 30 times, magnified and fragmented, voiced through synthesizers, and piped into the Gaggiandre through five speakers – creating an immersive experience that feels at once futuristic and Baroque.

    Mobile habitats awaiting the Zeuneriana marmorata eggs float on the water.
    Marco Zorzanello

    Bridging the past and an imagined future

    The decision to borrow from music of the Western historical canon (in this case Vivaldi) fits into a burgeoning movement that composer Valentin Silvestrov coined “eschatophony”.

    This is presumably a portmanteau of “eschatology”, the study of the end of the world, and “phony”, which in this case relates to sound (such as symphony). Here, we are left only to wrestle with and re-contextualise our musical past, to create “echoes of history”.

    The inclusion of sound is still a novelty at the architecture Biennale. Of the 300 exhibits this year, I can count on one hand the projects that incorporated sound. All of them were special.

    Sound creates a remarkable theatre, both through its immediacy, as well as its capacity to elevate a project beyond the prosaic, into the poetic.

    Venice is a city where history pervades at every turn. The Song of the Cricket invites listeners in, offering them space to reflect, and to imagine a future where ecosystems might once again thrive.

    This article is part of Making Art Work, our series on what inspires artists and the process of their work.

    Miriama Young does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

    – ref. I created a Vivaldi-inspired sound artwork for the Venice Biennale. The star of the show is an endangered bush-cricket – https://theconversation.com/i-created-a-vivaldi-inspired-sound-artwork-for-the-venice-biennale-the-star-of-the-show-is-an-endangered-bush-cricket-259681

    MIL OSI Analysis – EveningReport.nz –

  • MIL-Evening Report: I created a Vivaldi-inspired sound artwork for the Venice Biennale. The star of the show is an endangered bush-cricket

    Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Miriama Young, Associate Professor Music Composition, Melbourne Conservatorium of Music, The University of Melbourne

    Marco Zorzanello

    It was late January when I got the call. I’m asked to bring my sound art to a collaborative ecology and design project, Song of the Cricket, for the Venice Biennale of Architecture. When such as invitation arrives, you have no choice but to jump in.

    I see an image of the site for the project: the Gaggiandre at the Arsenale – a medieval shipyard that serviced the Venetian military at its imperial peak.

    Once a resplendent hive of industry, it is even detailed by Dante Alighieri in The Divine Comedy:

    As in the arsenal of the Venetians,
    all winter long a stew of sticky pitch
    boils up to patch their sick and tattered ships
    that cannot sail (instead of voyaging,
    some build new keels, some tow and tar the ribs
    of hulls worn out by too much journeying;
    some hammer at the prow, some at the stern,
    and some make oars, and some braid ropes and cords;
    one mends the jib, another, the mainsail)

    The Gaggiandre is a cavernous, church-like space flanked by stone colonnades, wooden roof beams, and situated, in true Venetian style, on a bed of water. With long reverberation times, music in this space would need to be slowly unfolding, drawing the listener in and inviting them to meditate.

    It is a place of reflection, both metaphorically and physically. To a sound artist, creating for the Gaggiandre is a dream.

    Art and the Anthropocene

    The Song of the Cricket exhibit has been on display at the Biennale since May. Its purpose is to bridge ecological research with sound art to raise awareness for our fragile biodiversity, with a focus on the critically endangered Adriatic bush-cricket, Zeuneriana marmorata.

    Zeuneriana marmorata is a rare species found in wetlands in north-eastern Italy and Slovenia.
    Wikimedia, CC BY-SA

    What better place than Venice – a city slowly sinking – to reflect on where we stand in this moment of environmental collapse?

    The exhibit was created by a large team of collaborators. It features several mobile habitats populated with Zeuneriana. Some of these habitats sit on the Arsenale lawn, while other symbolic habitats float on the water as life rafts. Alongside the enclosures, my pre-composed “sound garden” plays through speakers onto the lawn.

    At the end of the Biennale, the team, led by landscape architect and ecologist Alex Felson, intends to use the life rafts to ceremonially transport incubated eggs to a new home on the mainland.

    The installation features mobile cricket habitats on the lawn, as well as symbolic life rafts on the water.
    Miriama Young

    Sounds of nature and Vivaldi

    On the lawn, the chirrup of live courting bush-crickets blends with pre-recorded sounds of their ancestors. These ancestral sounds might double as a lullaby for newly orphaned eggs, as adults only live a few months.

    The accompanying sound garden is richly diverse, created from an array of fauna sounds drawn from Northern Italian wetland environments, including the Eurasian reed warbler, the cuckoo and, my personal favourite, the green toad.

    My intention is for the soundscape to transport audiences to a different time and place: to a future where these species thrive in a healthy ecology.

    Excerpt from the Song of Crickets sound installation.
    Miriama Young and Monica Lim1.73 MB (download)

    There is a second element to the sound installation, created with support from sound technologist Monica Lim. Informed by the music of Antonio Vivaldi, this element serves to further activate the untapped airspace and enhance visitors’ experience of the site.

    Born in Venice in 1678, Vivaldi is a ubiquitous and avoidable cliché for locals. Yet his music was the perfect inspiration for this project, as it encodes a hidden ecological story.

    Vivaldi incorporated the literal sounds of nature into The Four Seasons (1723), with particular species’ songs annotated onto the score.

    The Song of the Cricket borrows elements from Vivaldi’s Summer: Allegro non Molto. In the short section I drew from, the cuckoo, turtledove and goldfinch are all musically described and credited by Vivaldi.

    And although they are not expressly mentioned, I imagine bush-crickets also pervade Vivaldi’s Summer movement, as we know they were once prolific in the Venice lagoon, and would have filled the summer air during his lifetime. You might hear them in the rapidly repeating (tremolo) string gestures.

    The cricket’s song serves as a indicator of an ecosystem’s health. But the sound of crickets in Venice today is largely missing.

    Our take on Vivaldi is slowed down 30 times, magnified and fragmented, voiced through synthesizers, and piped into the Gaggiandre through five speakers – creating an immersive experience that feels at once futuristic and Baroque.

    Mobile habitats awaiting the Zeuneriana marmorata eggs float on the water.
    Marco Zorzanello

    Bridging the past and an imagined future

    The decision to borrow from music of the Western historical canon (in this case Vivaldi) fits into a burgeoning movement that composer Valentin Silvestrov coined “eschatophony”.

    This is presumably a portmanteau of “eschatology”, the study of the end of the world, and “phony”, which in this case relates to sound (such as symphony). Here, we are left only to wrestle with and re-contextualise our musical past, to create “echoes of history”.

    The inclusion of sound is still a novelty at the architecture Biennale. Of the 300 exhibits this year, I can count on one hand the projects that incorporated sound. All of them were special.

    Sound creates a remarkable theatre, both through its immediacy, as well as its capacity to elevate a project beyond the prosaic, into the poetic.

    Venice is a city where history pervades at every turn. The Song of the Cricket invites listeners in, offering them space to reflect, and to imagine a future where ecosystems might once again thrive.

    This article is part of Making Art Work, our series on what inspires artists and the process of their work.

    Miriama Young does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

    – ref. I created a Vivaldi-inspired sound artwork for the Venice Biennale. The star of the show is an endangered bush-cricket – https://theconversation.com/i-created-a-vivaldi-inspired-sound-artwork-for-the-venice-biennale-the-star-of-the-show-is-an-endangered-bush-cricket-259681

    MIL OSI Analysis – EveningReport.nz –

  • MIL-Evening Report: Do women really need more sleep than men? A sleep psychologist explains

    Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Amelia Scott, Honorary Affiliate and Clinical Psychologist at the Woolcock Institute of Medical Research, and Macquarie University Research Fellow, Macquarie University

    klebercordeiro/Getty

    If you spend any time in the wellness corners of TikTok or Instagram, you’ll see claims women need one to two hours more sleep than men.

    But what does the research actually say? And how does this relate to what’s going on in real life?

    As we’ll see, who gets to sleep, and for how long, is a complex mix of biology, psychology and societal expectations. It also depends on how you measure sleep.

    What does the evidence say?

    Researchers usually measure sleep in two ways:

    • by asking people how much they sleep (known as self-reporting). But people are surprisingly inaccurate at estimating how much sleep they get

    • using objective tools, such as research-grade, wearable sleep trackers or the gold-standard polysomnography, which records brain waves, breathing and movement while you sleep during a sleep study in a lab or clinic.

    Looking at the objective data, well-conducted studies usually show women sleep about 20 minutes more than men.

    One global study of nearly 70,000 people who wore wearable sleep trackers found a consistent, small difference between men and women across age groups. For example, the sleep difference between men and women aged 40–44 was about 23–29 minutes.

    Another large study using polysomnography found women slept about 19 minutes longer than men. In this study, women also spent more time in deep sleep: about 23% of the night compared to about 14% for men. The study also found only men’s quality of sleep declined with age.

    The key caveat to these findings is that our individual sleep needs vary considerably. Women may sleep slightly more on average, just as they are slightly shorter on average. But there is no one-size-fits-all sleep duration, just as there is no universal height.

    Suggesting every woman needs 20 extra minutes (let alone two hours) misses the point. It’s the same as insisting all women should be shorter than all men.

    Even though women tend to sleep a little longer and deeper, they consistently report poorer sleep quality. They’re also about 40% more likely to be diagnosed with insomnia.

    This mismatch between lab findings and the real world is a well-known puzzle in sleep research, and there are many reasons for it.

    For instance, many research studies don’t consider mental health problems, medications, alcohol use and hormonal fluctuations. This filters out the very factors that shape sleep in the real world.

    This mismatch between the lab and the bedroom also reminds us sleep doesn’t happen in a vacuum. Women’s sleep is shaped by a complex mix of biological, psychological and social factors, and this complexity is hard to capture in individual studies.

    Let’s start with biology

    Sleep problems begin to diverge between the sexes around puberty. They spike again during pregnancy, after birth and during perimenopause.

    Fluctuating levels of ovarian hormones, particularly oestrogen and progesterone, seem to explain some of these sex differences in sleep.

    For example, many girls and women report poorer sleep during the premenstrual phase just before their periods, when oestrogen and progesterone begin to fall.

    Perhaps the most well-documented hormonal influence on our sleep is the decline in oestrogen during perimenopause. This is linked to increased sleep disturbances, particularly waking at 3am and struggling to get back to sleep.

    Some health conditions also play a part in women’s sleep health. Thyroid disorders and iron deficiency, for instance, are more common in women and are closely linked to fatigue and disrupted sleep.

    How about psychology?

    Women are at much higher risk of depression, anxiety and trauma-related disorders. These very often accompany sleep problems and fatigue. Cognitive patterns, such as worry and rumination, are also more common in women and known to affect sleep.

    Women are also prescribed antidepressants more often than men, and these medications tend to affect sleep.

    Society also plays a role

    Caregiving and emotional labour still fall disproportionately on women. Government data released this year suggests Australian women perform an average nine more hours of unpaid care and work each week than men.

    While many women manage to put enough time aside for sleep, their opportunities for daytime rest are often scarce. This puts a lot of pressure on sleep to deliver all the restoration women need.

    In my work with patients, we often untangle the threads woven into their experience of fatigue. While poor sleep is the obvious culprit, fatigue can also signal something deeper, such as underlying health issues, emotional strain, or too-high expectations of themselves. Sleep is certainly part of the picture, but it’s rarely the whole story.

    For instance, rates of iron deficiency (which we know is more common in women and linked to sleep problems) are also higher in the reproductive years. This is just as many women are raising children and grappling with the “juggle” and the “mental load”.

    Women in perimenopause are often navigating full-time work, teenagers, ageing parents and 3am hot flashes. These women may have adequate or even high-quality sleep (according to objective measures), but that doesn’t mean they wake feeling restored.

    Most existing research also ignores gender-diverse populations. This limits our understanding of how sleep is shaped not just by biology, but by things such as identity and social context.

    So where does this leave us?

    While women sleep longer and better in the lab, they face more barriers to feeling rested in everyday life.

    So, do women need more sleep than men? On average, yes, a little. But more importantly, women need more support and opportunity to recharge and recover across the day, and at night.

    Amelia Scott is a member of the psychology education subcommittee of the Australasian Sleep Association. She receives funding from Macquarie University.

    – ref. Do women really need more sleep than men? A sleep psychologist explains – https://theconversation.com/do-women-really-need-more-sleep-than-men-a-sleep-psychologist-explains-259985

    MIL OSI Analysis – EveningReport.nz –

  • MIL-Evening Report: Do women really need more sleep than men? A sleep psychologist explains

    Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Amelia Scott, Honorary Affiliate and Clinical Psychologist at the Woolcock Institute of Medical Research, and Macquarie University Research Fellow, Macquarie University

    klebercordeiro/Getty

    If you spend any time in the wellness corners of TikTok or Instagram, you’ll see claims women need one to two hours more sleep than men.

    But what does the research actually say? And how does this relate to what’s going on in real life?

    As we’ll see, who gets to sleep, and for how long, is a complex mix of biology, psychology and societal expectations. It also depends on how you measure sleep.

    What does the evidence say?

    Researchers usually measure sleep in two ways:

    • by asking people how much they sleep (known as self-reporting). But people are surprisingly inaccurate at estimating how much sleep they get

    • using objective tools, such as research-grade, wearable sleep trackers or the gold-standard polysomnography, which records brain waves, breathing and movement while you sleep during a sleep study in a lab or clinic.

    Looking at the objective data, well-conducted studies usually show women sleep about 20 minutes more than men.

    One global study of nearly 70,000 people who wore wearable sleep trackers found a consistent, small difference between men and women across age groups. For example, the sleep difference between men and women aged 40–44 was about 23–29 minutes.

    Another large study using polysomnography found women slept about 19 minutes longer than men. In this study, women also spent more time in deep sleep: about 23% of the night compared to about 14% for men. The study also found only men’s quality of sleep declined with age.

    The key caveat to these findings is that our individual sleep needs vary considerably. Women may sleep slightly more on average, just as they are slightly shorter on average. But there is no one-size-fits-all sleep duration, just as there is no universal height.

    Suggesting every woman needs 20 extra minutes (let alone two hours) misses the point. It’s the same as insisting all women should be shorter than all men.

    Even though women tend to sleep a little longer and deeper, they consistently report poorer sleep quality. They’re also about 40% more likely to be diagnosed with insomnia.

    This mismatch between lab findings and the real world is a well-known puzzle in sleep research, and there are many reasons for it.

    For instance, many research studies don’t consider mental health problems, medications, alcohol use and hormonal fluctuations. This filters out the very factors that shape sleep in the real world.

    This mismatch between the lab and the bedroom also reminds us sleep doesn’t happen in a vacuum. Women’s sleep is shaped by a complex mix of biological, psychological and social factors, and this complexity is hard to capture in individual studies.

    Let’s start with biology

    Sleep problems begin to diverge between the sexes around puberty. They spike again during pregnancy, after birth and during perimenopause.

    Fluctuating levels of ovarian hormones, particularly oestrogen and progesterone, seem to explain some of these sex differences in sleep.

    For example, many girls and women report poorer sleep during the premenstrual phase just before their periods, when oestrogen and progesterone begin to fall.

    Perhaps the most well-documented hormonal influence on our sleep is the decline in oestrogen during perimenopause. This is linked to increased sleep disturbances, particularly waking at 3am and struggling to get back to sleep.

    Some health conditions also play a part in women’s sleep health. Thyroid disorders and iron deficiency, for instance, are more common in women and are closely linked to fatigue and disrupted sleep.

    How about psychology?

    Women are at much higher risk of depression, anxiety and trauma-related disorders. These very often accompany sleep problems and fatigue. Cognitive patterns, such as worry and rumination, are also more common in women and known to affect sleep.

    Women are also prescribed antidepressants more often than men, and these medications tend to affect sleep.

    Society also plays a role

    Caregiving and emotional labour still fall disproportionately on women. Government data released this year suggests Australian women perform an average nine more hours of unpaid care and work each week than men.

    While many women manage to put enough time aside for sleep, their opportunities for daytime rest are often scarce. This puts a lot of pressure on sleep to deliver all the restoration women need.

    In my work with patients, we often untangle the threads woven into their experience of fatigue. While poor sleep is the obvious culprit, fatigue can also signal something deeper, such as underlying health issues, emotional strain, or too-high expectations of themselves. Sleep is certainly part of the picture, but it’s rarely the whole story.

    For instance, rates of iron deficiency (which we know is more common in women and linked to sleep problems) are also higher in the reproductive years. This is just as many women are raising children and grappling with the “juggle” and the “mental load”.

    Women in perimenopause are often navigating full-time work, teenagers, ageing parents and 3am hot flashes. These women may have adequate or even high-quality sleep (according to objective measures), but that doesn’t mean they wake feeling restored.

    Most existing research also ignores gender-diverse populations. This limits our understanding of how sleep is shaped not just by biology, but by things such as identity and social context.

    So where does this leave us?

    While women sleep longer and better in the lab, they face more barriers to feeling rested in everyday life.

    So, do women need more sleep than men? On average, yes, a little. But more importantly, women need more support and opportunity to recharge and recover across the day, and at night.

    Amelia Scott is a member of the psychology education subcommittee of the Australasian Sleep Association. She receives funding from Macquarie University.

    – ref. Do women really need more sleep than men? A sleep psychologist explains – https://theconversation.com/do-women-really-need-more-sleep-than-men-a-sleep-psychologist-explains-259985

    MIL OSI Analysis – EveningReport.nz –

  • MIL-OSI Submissions: Catholic clergy are speaking out on immigration − more than any other political issue except abortion

    Source: The Conversation – USA (3) – By Evan Stewart, Assistant Professor of Sociology, UMass Boston

    Catholic bishops invited by Mark Seitz, center, the bishop of El Paso, Texas, lead a march in solidarity with migrants on March 24, 2025, in downtown El Paso. AP Photo/Andres Leighton

    Catholic priests across the U.S. discuss immigration with their congregations more than leaders in many other faith traditions, according to our new research published in the journal Sociological Focus.

    Catholic priests also said they discussed immigration more than nearly all other political issues, including hunger in their communities, capital punishment, health care and the environment. Abortion was the only one priests discussed slightly more often.

    Our study, which uses data from the 2022 National Survey of Religious Leaders, found that 71% of Catholic priests surveyed said they spoke about any political issue with their congregations. Among them, just over half talked about immigration.

    In white conservative Protestant congregations, Black Protestant congregations and non-Christian congregations, only about a quarter of leaders who discussed political issues said they talked about immigration. Leaders of white liberal Protestant congregations, however, talked about the topic almost as much as Catholic leaders did.

    Why it matters

    The United States has a long history of religious leaders addressing political matters, on both the left and the right – and today is no different.

    With immigration raids on the rise across the country and an unprecedented level of funding approved for deportations, Catholic bishops in the U.S. are speaking out. Many of them have called for compassion and care for migrants and the need to uphold human dignity and due process, regardless of someone’s immigration status – in line with Catholic social teaching.

    As sociologists who study politics and religion, we wanted to know what is happening on the ground in congregations. Given the church’s teachings about caring for the vulnerable, we expected that Catholic clergy might be particularly likely to speak out.

    However, the percentage of people affiliated with a religious congregation is decreasing, and those who do attend are increasingly politically conservative. Rank and file Catholics are very divided on their support for immigrants, according to a 2024 national survey by the Center for Applied Research in the Apostolate.

    In this context, we were curious about whether clergy would discuss a political issue such as immigration with their congregations or say they avoid it altogether.

    What still isn’t known

    The survey we used is from 2022, before some of today’s immigration enforcement policies took effect. That said, these findings demonstrate that immigration was on the radar for Catholic leaders before the recent changes under the current administration.

    Because we focused on survey data, we got a good picture of trends among Catholic leaders nationwide. However, we could look only at whether religious leaders reported discussing immigration; we could not know exactly what they said, or how. There is much more to learn about what kinds of political messages come from the pulpit today and what messages tend to stick with congregants.

    We did find that Catholic leaders of congregations where the majority of worshipers are Hispanic were much more likely to talk about immigration, compared with leaders of non-Catholic Hispanic congregations and Catholic leaders of mostly white congregations. Because Hispanic communities in the U.S. are facing the brunt of the immigration crackdown, this finding shows that Catholic leaders have been addressing the needs of their communities.

    What’s next

    Catholic parishioners may be exposed to different opinions about immigration from religious and political leaders. Diane, one of the authors, is furthering this research by conducting interviews with Catholics in Greater Boston. By asking church members to talk through their attitudes toward immigrants, we can learn more about how people make sense of complicated ethical questions.

    The Research Brief is a short take on interesting academic work.

    Diane Beckman received funding from Duke University to conduct research using data from the National Survey of Religious Leaders.

    Evan Stewart does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

    – ref. Catholic clergy are speaking out on immigration − more than any other political issue except abortion – https://theconversation.com/catholic-clergy-are-speaking-out-on-immigration-more-than-any-other-political-issue-except-abortion-260485

    MIL OSI –

  • MIL-OSI China: Heatwave grips Egypt, prompts widespread warnings

    Source: People’s Republic of China – State Council News

    People cool off at a beach of the Mediterranean Sea during a heatwave in Alexandria, Egypt, on July 16, 2025. [Photo/Xinhua]

    Egypt is experiencing an exceptional heatwave, with high temperatures and humidity posing significant risks to public health and impacting key sectors such as agriculture and industry.

    The Egyptian Meteorological Authority said Wednesday’s temperatures on the northern coasts range from 31 degrees Celsius to 32 degrees, in Greater Cairo from 37 degrees to 38 degrees, and in the southern region from 40 degrees to 44 degrees.

    The severe heat is expected to persist in the coming days, with both daytime and nighttime temperatures forecast to rise by up to 3 degrees Celsius above seasonal averages, according to Director of Analysis and Forecasts at the Egyptian Meteorological Authority Mahmoud Shahin.

    Agriculture and food security

    Ibrahim Darwish, professor of Agriculture at Menoufia University, said that rising temperatures pose a serious challenge to food and water security in agricultural countries.

    He told Xinhua that high temperatures lead to a decrease in agricultural productivity due to their negative impact on photosynthesis, respiration, and biosynthesis within plants.

    Darwish noted that the heatwave is likely to alter planting and ripening times, as high temperatures accelerate the plant’s life cycle, leading to premature and incomplete ripening, which in turn prevents sufficient dry matter formation, especially in grains.

    Darwish added that the heatwave may also increase the incidence of insect pests and plant diseases, damage plant tissues, and inhibit root development. Crops require more water to compensate for these effects, reducing water-use efficiency and increasing strain on water resources, he added.

    Impact on industry

    Engineer Ahmed Abdel-Rashid, a factory manager for air conditioners at Haier Egypt Environmental Complex, said high temperatures will result in a decrease in work efficiency and raise the risk of workplace accidents.

    Abdel-Rashid pointed out that the heatwave will also lead to higher electricity consumption due to increased reliance on cooling systems, and raise the risk of breakdowns in heat-sensitive machinery, potentially leading to production delays or shutdowns.

    However, Abdel-Rashid pointed out potential upsides, including improved solar energy output from increased solar radiation. The heatwave may also spur demand for air conditioners, fans, and insulation materials — boosting local markets and creating opportunities for innovation in sustainable cooling technologies and energy-efficient building solutions.

    Public health risks

    Magdy Badran, a member of the Egyptian Society of Allergy and Immunology, said among the most significant negative health impacts citizens may experience during the current heatwave are heat stress and heatstroke.

    “These are among the most common health risks in hot weather, resulting from the body losing large amounts of water and salts due to excessive sweating, leading to dizziness, headache, nausea, and general fatigue. If not promptly addressed, the condition can escalate to heatstroke,” he told Xinhua.

    He added that the exacerbation of chronic diseases is a common outcome of continuous exposure to high temperatures, noting that heart patients may experience an increased burden due to fluid loss and sudden drops in blood pressure.

    “Respiratory patients, such as those with asthma or chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, may face greater difficulty breathing due to increased humidity or heat-related air pollution. Similarly, patients with high blood pressure are susceptible to severe drops in blood pressure due to excessive sweating,” Bardan warned. 

    MIL OSI China News –

  • MIL-OSI China: China hailed as stabilizing global force

    Source: People’s Republic of China – State Council News

    China Daily | July 17, 2025

    China, which is advancing on its unique path to modernization, has consistently acted as a stabilizing force in and major contributor to global growth, through initiatives such as green transformation and technological innovation, said senior international executives.

    Beijing has demonstrated its commitment to sustainable and high-quality development, attracting global investment, said John McLean, chairman of the City of London Branch of the Institute of Directors in the United Kingdom.

    With a commitment to high-quality development, China is accelerating green, digital and smart transformation, which, coupled with the country’s sophisticated industrial ecosystem, provides the best testing ground for the latest outcomes of technological revolution and industrial upgrading.

    Such transformation has not only boosted domestic economic growth, but also strengthened China’s position as a key player in the global economy, McLean said in an exclusive interview with China Daily.

    He said this reflects the consistent perseverance of China’s top leadership to deepen opening-up policies and foster a fair, transparent and predictable business environment for global investors.

    During a meeting with more than 40 representatives of the international business community in Beijing in March, President Xi Jinping pledged to strengthen communication with foreign businesses, provide as much convenience as possible for them to trade and invest in China, and protect the legitimate rights and interests of foreign businesses in accordance with the law.

    From “Made in China” to “new quality productive forces”, China has empowered industrial transformation and upgrading through innovation, and is set to realize higher-quality and more sustainable development, said foreign business leaders.

    For years, China has been attracting global investors with its strong economic growth, adaptability and collaborative potential, McLean said while sharing his perspectives on China’s economic potential, the evolving global trade landscape, and the strengthening of ties between China and the international business community.

    Drawing on over 26 years of experience in China, McLean expressed strong confidence in the nation’s economic management and resilience. He highlighted China’s remarkable achievements over the past two decades, including advancements in technology, clean energy and artificial intelligence, which have positioned it as a global leader in innovation.

    McLean said China’s economic growth target of around 5 percent for this year is a reasonable and attainable goal that will bolster confidence and stability amid increasing global uncertainty.

    “China’s growth has always been under scrutiny — whether it’s 10 percent, 8 percent or 5 percent. But its leadership in global markets has consistently demonstrated the ability to adapt and drive progress,” McLean said, noting that China’s GDP grew 5 percent year-on-year in 2024, ranking among the world’s fastest-growing major economies.

    He said China’s recent opening-up policies, such as visa-free travel measures, are helping to reshape perceptions and attract foreign entrepreneurs to conduct business in the country.

    To further encourage global exchanges, China has expanded the list of unilateral visa-free countries to 47 and transit visa-free countries to 55. McLean described such policies as “a significant step in the right direction”, emphasizing their role in fostering greater mobility and openness.

    These efforts have yielded results. Data from the National Immigration Administration showed that China recorded 163 million passenger trips in the first quarter of 2025, up 15.3 percent year-on-year.

    Meanwhile, the Ministry of Commerce reported that actual use of foreign direct investment in the Chinese mainland climbed 13.2 percent year-on-year in March. In the first quarter of 2025 alone, 12,603 new foreign-invested enterprises were established nationwide, representing a year-on-year rise of 4.3 percent.

    Bernd Einmeier, president of the German-Chinese Association for Economy, Education and Culture, said the stable growth momentum of China’s economy serves as an important global public good, helping to buffer uncertainty across international markets.

    Foreign business operations and investments in China have driven economic growth and employment, boosted technological and managerial progress and facilitated reform and opening-up. In this process, foreign businesses have thrived and generally enjoyed handsome returns, and they also have achieved win-win results and forged profound friendships with the Chinese people, he added.

    During an earlier business trip to China, Jeff Williams, Apple’s chief operating officer, visited Apple supplier Goertek in Shandong province and praised its use of automated manufacturing and artificial intelligence technology on production lines.

    “China is a central part of our critical supply chain, and we’ve been investing here for 30 years,” said Williams. “We will continue to invest in China in a big way.”

    Maximilian Butek, executive director and board member of the German Chamber of Commerce in China-East China, said, “Foreign companies can invest here because they find a good business environment, and those investments are also long-term.”

    “China’s continuous efforts in modernization and its openness to foreign investment have created a dynamic market that benefits both domestic and international stakeholders,” Butek said.

    As China moves forward, its role as a stabilizing force in the global economy will grow stronger, fostering prosperity and deeper collaboration, he added.

    MIL OSI China News –

  • MIL-OSI USA: Kaine Statement on Trump Administration Illegally Withholding $140 Million in Federal Funding to Address Fentanyl Crisis

    US Senate News:

    Source: United States Senator for Virginia Tim Kaine

    WASHINGTON, D.C.— Today, U.S. Senator Tim Kaine (D-VA), a member of the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee, released the following statement regarding the Trump Administration’s illegal withholding of $140 million in federal funding passed by Congress to support fentanyl overdose response efforts:

    “I’m relieved that thanks to steps we took during the Biden Administration—including the passage of my Disrupt Fentanyl Trafficking Act—that fentanyl overdose deaths in Virginia have declined significantly. But one overdose death is too many, and it’s inexplicable that the Trump Administration is illegally withholding $140 million in federal funding to build on our progress and better protect communities from fentanyl. The fact that this news is being reported immediately after President Trump signed into law massive tax cuts for billionaires—paid for with cuts to programs working families rely on—makes it crystal clear who this Administration values. I’ll be doing all that I can to encourage my Republican colleagues to join me in raising hell about this decision to hamstring our efforts to address the fentanyl crisis.”

    Kaine has long advocated for more resources to combat the fentanyl crisis. Kaine introduced and Congress passed the bipartisan Disrupt Fentanyl Trafficking Act to direct increased federal attention to fentanyl trafficking by declaring fentanyl trafficking a national security threat, utilizing Pentagon resources like counter-drug intelligence, and involving Mexico as an active partner to combat the crisis. Kaine also helped pass a supplemental national security funding package that included the FEND Off Fentanyl Act, bipartisan legislation cosponsored by Kaine, to require the President to sanction drug rings involved in international drug trafficking. In July 2024, Kaine traveled to Brownsville and McAllen, Texas to discuss fentanyl interdiction at the southern border with various law enforcement agencies and international partners from Mexico. In March 2024, Kaine also introduced the bipartisan Strengthening Tracking Of Poisonous Tranq Requiring Analyzed National Quantification Act, or the STOP TRANQ Act to require the State Department to include reporting on xylazine, or “tranq,” in its annual International Narcotics Control Strategy Report (INCSR). In February, Kaine introduced the bipartisan, bicameral Combating Illicit Xylazine Act, which would list xylazine as a Schedule III controlled substance while protecting the drug’s legal use by veterinarians, farmers, and ranchers.

    MIL OSI USA News –

  • MIL-OSI USA: Senator Collins, Colleagues Write to OMB Urging Release of Critical Education Funding

    US Senate News:

    Source: United States Senator for Maine Susan Collins

    Washington, D.C. – U.S. Senator Susan Collins, Chair of the Senate Appropriations Committee, joined Senator Shelley Moore Capito (R-WV) and eight of her Senate colleagues in sending a letter to Russell Vought, Director of the Office of Management and Budget (OMB), advocating for the release of paused education formula funding, which states had anticipated receiving on July 1. The pause could result in a loss of nearly $28,000,000 for Maine’s public schools.

    Specifically, the letter requests that the Administration faithfully implement the Fiscal Year (FY) 2025 Full-Year Continuing Resolution Act, which President Trump signed into law earlier this year. This legislation contains critical funding that states and local school districts rely on to help students, families, and local economies.

    “The Continuing Resolution contained funding for Supporting Effective Instruction State Grants; 21st Century Community Learning Centers; Student Support and Academic Enrichment Grants; English Language Acquisition; Migrant Education; Adult Basic and Literacy Education State Grants (including Integrated English Literacy and Civics Education State Grants). Withholding these funds will harm students, families, and local economies,” the Senators wrote.

    “The decision to withhold this funding is contrary to President Trump’s goal of returning K-12 education to the states. This funding goes directly to states and local school districts, where local leaders decide how this funding is spent, because as we know, local communities know how to best serve students and families. Withholding this funding denies states and communities the opportunity to pursue localized initiatives to support students and their families,” they continued.

    “We welcome the opportunity to work with you and Secretary McMahon to ensure that all federal education funding goes towards programs that help states and school districts provide students an excellent education. We want to see students in our states and across the country thrive, whether they are adult learners, students who speak English as a second language, or students who need after-school care so that their parents can work. We believe you share the same goal. We encourage you to reverse your decision and release this Congressionally-approved funding to states,” the Senators concluded.

    In addition to Senators Collins and Capito, the letter was signed by Senators John Boozman (R-AR), Katie Britt (R-AL), Deb Fischer (R-NE), John Hoeven (R-ND), Jim Justice (R-WV), Mitch McConnell (R-KY), Lisa Murkowski (R-AK), and Mike Rounds (R-SD).

    The complete text of the letter can be read here.

    MIL OSI USA News –