Fashion Closes Gap Between Catwalk and Crafts

The notion of doing right with fashion has been getting a make-over in the past few years. In the West, non-sweatshop clothing and crafts from developing countries have long been confined to a small niche in the marketplace. They were seen at best as garments for the eccentric or unconventional, and at worst as a poor substitute for clothing and accessories peddled by the major manufacturers. Organic or ethically produced products were often stigmatized as unfashionable and frumpy.

In Paris, the Ethical Fashion Show, now in its fourth year, showcases fashion that respects people and the environment while still being glamorous, luxurious and trendy. It has attracted designers from around the world, including Mongolia, Thailand, China, Peru and Bolivia. The show demands that all participants adhere to International Labour Organization conventions – including banning forced and child labour – respect the environment, create local employment and work with craftspeople to ensure skills are retained and the fashion reflects the diversity of the world’s cultures.

As an example of the high growth in ethical fashion in the past year, the UK chain of clothing and food retailers Marks and Spencer has become the world’s biggest buyer of Fairtrade cotton.

“I have only been in the business for the past 12 months, but at first it was hard to find producers,” said Tamzin Berry, owner of the British company Ethical Catwalk. “But now it has really taken off. Celebrities have helped to raise the profile. One line we carry, Red Mother, Madonna’s backing dancers wear it. I have found everybody in the business to be very approachable, genuinely caring and ethical people.”

Style is the big consideration now, said Berry. “More of the trendy labels have taken up the challenge and it seems to be going the same way as the organic food. “

“The fashion industry has one of the worst reputations of any industry,” Dr. Katie Beverley of the University of Leeds’ Nonwovens Research Group told The Guardian newspaper. “But the drive for ethical and environmental considerations in design has never been stronger.”

In Mozambique, catwalk fashions are helping poor people and saving fast-depleting forests. A project by the International Trade Centre (a joint initiative between UNCTAD and the WTO (www.intracen.org)) in the forests of Sofala Province – stretching from Angola to southern Tanzania, Mozambique, and northern South Africa – targets this home of rare hardwoods. Local craftspeople in the town of Dondo were producing crafts for a tourist market that didn’t exist and a local market that couldn’t afford them. But by bringing on board the social entrepreneur Allan Schwarz – an expert in working with forest communities and an Ashoka fellow (www.ashoka.org) – they were able to create bracelets of high enough quality to sell in fashion magazines and be a hit at the Ethical Fashion Show in Paris. On average, workers wages have increased 14 times topping at US $300/month in a country where average income per year is US $250.

By David South, Development Challenges, South-South Solutions

Published: March 2007

Development Challenges, South-South Solutions was launched as an e-newsletter in 2006 by UNDP's South-South Cooperation Unit (now the United Nations Office for South-South Cooperation) based in New York, USA. It led on profiling the rise of the global South as an economic powerhouse and was one of the first regular publications to champion the global South's innovators, entrepreneurs, and pioneers. It tracked the key trends that are now so profoundly reshaping how development is seen and done. This includes the rapid take-up of mobile phones and information technology in the global South (as profiled in the first issue of magazine Southern Innovator), the move to becoming a majority urban world, a growing global innovator culture, and the plethora of solutions being developed in the global South to tackle its problems and improve living conditions and boost human development. The success of the e-newsletter led to the launch of the magazine Southern Innovator.  

Follow @SouthSouth1

Google Books: https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=Hni77Zii2aAC&dq=development+challenges+march+2007&source=gbs_navlinks_s

Slideshare: http://www.slideshare.net/DavidSouth1/development-challenges-march-2007

Southern Innovator Issue 1: https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=Q1O54YSE2BgC&dq=southern+innovator&source=gbs_navlinks_s

Southern Innovator Issue 2: https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=Ty0N969dcssC&dq=southern+innovator&source=gbs_navlinks_s

Southern Innovator Issue 3: https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=AQNt4YmhZagC&dq=southern+innovator&source=gbs_navlinks_s

Southern Innovator Issue 4: https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=9T_n2tA7l4EC&dq=southern+innovator&source=gbs_navlinks_s

Southern Innovator Issue 5: https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=6ILdAgAAQBAJ&dq=southern+innovator&source=gbs_navlinks_s

This work is licensed under a
Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 License.

Dynamic Growth in African ICT is Unlocking Secrets of SME Treasure Trove

A newly released survey of 14 African countries in 2006 has documented the impact of Information and Communication Technology (ICT) on private sector development and how it is contributing to developing a vibrant Small Medium Enterprise (SME) sector in Africa. It discovered how dynamic the SME sector is, how it has rapidly adopted mobile phone technology (96 percent have it), and how if used properly in concert with this new technology, extraordinary economic growth is possible.

The survey – Towards An African e-Index: SME e-Access and Usage in 14 African Countries – covered only businesses employing fewer than 50 people and took in the vast informal sector in the countries. It investigated if they had access to ICTs, how they are using them and if it was making them more productive. SMEs were especially interesting because they do not waste money (most people are just trying to survive) and they only use what is really useful to them to increase income. In the informal sector this has become the mobile phone.

The countries surveyed included Botswana, Cameroon, Ethiopia, Ghana, Kenya, Mozambique, Namibia, Nigeria, Rwanda, South Africa, Tanzania, Uganda, Zambia and Zimbabwe. With most of the continent’s poor working in the SME sector, little was actually known about the impact of ICT and its link to profitability and labour productivity. And surveying only formal businesses would be telling half the story since about two-thirds of non-resource driven GDP generation is derived from SMEs, and a large share of that from informal ones.

“This is a sector that has no access to formal finance,” said Dr. Christopher Stork, a senior researcher at the Witwatersrand University in South Africa. “The mobile phones present an opportunity to tap into this market and offer finance, banking services, cash transfers – we see this already in Kenya – without the risks of other services. These informal businesses can build up a history, learn how to better control their businesses, and receive loans. Where the financial system is dysfunctional or overpriced, airtime credits can be the new cash form.”

Africa has a high proportion of entrepreneurs because people have next to no social supports to fall back on and need to do business to survive. Most fall into the informal sector where they can avoid paying tax, pay low wages, and keep overheads down. According to Stork, if governments are serious about dealing with poverty, then the best approach is to acknowledge this sector, and rather than crush it, draw it in to become more sophisticated and efficient. He sees the mobile phones as key to this strategy.

“Innovative technology can help these entrepreneurs to acquire the tools they need to do business better. There is a lack of skills in all areas, a lack of accounting skills, a lack of basic financial management. This is where ICT can overcome this. SMEs can get a monthly statement with all their business transactions, making it easier to manage things. This would be a great way to distribute micro-finance. Savings clubs could store cash on the phones.”

The e-Index also noted the trend for mobile phone providers to consolidate and offer common regional services. This could fuel an explosion in cross-border trade as it becomes cheaper and easier to communicate via mobile phone for business. The e-Index also found the ever-growing importance of internet cafes remains. They continue to evolve into multi-purpose business centres offering a wide range of services, from post to word processing. At present they still remain the main means of accessing the internet. And with broadband still minimal and very expensive, it falls on mobile phones to offer internet access, though this will remain mainly in the continent’s capitals.

The survey’s sponsor, Research ICT Africa! (RIA!) network, seeks to build an African knowledge base in support of ICT policy and regulatory design. The network emerged out of a growing need for hard data and analysis to help the continent join the information age. Throughout 2007 it is conducting household surveys on e-access and e-usage and will present the findings in 2008.

By David South, Development Challenges, South-South Solutions

Published: February 2007

Development Challenges, South-South Solutions was launched as an e-newsletter in 2006 by UNDP's South-South Cooperation Unit (now the United Nations Office for South-South Cooperation) based in New York, USA. It led on profiling the rise of the global South as an economic powerhouse and was one of the first regular publications to champion the global South's innovators, entrepreneurs, and pioneers. It tracked the key trends that are now so profoundly reshaping how development is seen and done. This includes the rapid take-up of mobile phones and information technology in the global South (as profiled in the first issue of magazine Southern Innovator), the move to becoming a majority urban world, a growing global innovator culture, and the plethora of solutions being developed in the global South to tackle its problems and improve living conditions and boost human development. The success of the e-newsletter led to the launch of the magazine Southern Innovator.  

Follow @SouthSouth1

Google Books: https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=7H6VBgAAQBAJ&dq=development+challenges+february+2007&source=gbs_navlinks_s

Slideshare: http://www.slideshare.net/DavidSouth1/development-challengessouthsouthsolutionsfebruary2007issue

Southern Innovator Issue 1: https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=Q1O54YSE2BgC&dq=southern+innovator&source=gbs_navlinks_s

Southern Innovator Issue 2: https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=Ty0N969dcssC&dq=southern+innovator&source=gbs_navlinks_s

Southern Innovator Issue 3: https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=AQNt4YmhZagC&dq=southern+innovator&source=gbs_navlinks_s

Southern Innovator Issue 4: https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=9T_n2tA7l4EC&dq=southern+innovator&source=gbs_navlinks_s

Southern Innovator Issue 5: https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=6ILdAgAAQBAJ&dq=southern+innovator&source=gbs_navlinks_s

This work is licensed under a
Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 License.

Grassroots Entrepreneurs Now Have Many Ways to Fund their Enterprises

In the past, African entrepreneurs were extremely limited in the options for funding their plans. They had to rely on often ineffective national banks or local networks based on political, tribal or family connections to secure funding for enterprises. That has now changed, and there is an explosion in new thinking on business start-ups and how best to help grassroots entrepreneurs.

Concepts such as socially responsible investing, social enterprises and fair trade have opened up new frontiers for business development. All focus on the so-called triple bottom line: people, planet, profit. Economist Milton Friedman’s refrain that the only social responsibility of business was to increase profits, is being proven wrong. Some even go as far as to say social enterprise is the model for the 21st century.

“There’s lots of money to be made here,” said James Baderman of What If, an innovation company in the UK that employs 300 people and devotes 10 percent of its profits to helping social enterprises develop and grow. “There are huge opportunities; just look at the double-digit growth in fair trade and organic goods over the past decade. Consumers are increasingly making choices based on the ethical nature of products.”

Many in the social enterprise movement believe breaking the cycle of poverty and economic stagnation requires more than charity; it requires the creation of sustainable businesses that will pay local taxes and employ local people. They have also adopted and adapted the techniques used by multinational companies to improve the desirability of their products. A key part of these new socially responsible businesses is branding and marketing.

In Kenya, the UK’s Traidcraft (www.traidcraft.co.uk) – an organization that fights poverty through a wide range of trade-related activities combining a development charity with a trading company – is working with the Kenya Organic Agriculture Network to develop markets for Kenyan herbs, spices and related products in local and international markets. These include gums, resins (e.g. frankincense), herbs such as coriander, oregano, garlic and lemon grass; spices such as paprika, chillies, rosemary, lemon balm, and essential oils such as pepper tree oil, sinoni oil, and megalocapus oil – all grown in marginalised, arid areas.In another development focused on Kenya – but applicable across Africa – is being led by the UK-based Mark Leonard Trust (http://markleonard.net/). Called the Mainstreaming African Crafts project, it seeks to boost demand for Kenyan craft products in the UK market. It will build demand by focusing on growth areas (such as baskets, jewellery, leather), emphasizing the distinctiveness of African craft products and support product development in line with identified market trends. The aim is to launch a branded Kenyan product range at an international trade fair in 2008.

Along with improving the branding and marketing of social enterprises and fair trade businesses, funding options are becoming more varied. One new source of funding for budding social entrepreneurs is the William James Foundation’s 4th Annual Socially Responsible Business Plan Competition. It awards winners who develop business plans that blend people, planet and profit together with over US $40,000 in cash and expert advice to make sure it is spent well. Past winners have included business ventures as varied as an Afghan company that sends SMS text messages on security alerts, to others making hand-made organic clothing and portable vaccine packs for remote areas.

“We’re at a tipping point wherein the entrepreneur who builds in long-term values of sustainability is the one who will be successful,” said Ian Fisk, executive director of the William James Foundation and a long-time sustainable business activist through Net Impact (http://www.netimpact.org/index.cfm). “Most of what people think of as environmental and social activism in business is simply long-term thinking about energy costs and human resources. There are thousands of good ideas out there. The foundation wants to find those that are attached to solid business plans and help them succeed.”

The success of this approach has also attracted the attention of multinational companies like the oil company Shell. At the Shell Foundation (www.shellfoundation.org), they look at all the enterprises they support from a hardnosed, business perspective. Rather than seeing a producer who needs to produce, they look first at the market and the consumer, and then work backwards to get the producer to make the appropriate products that will sell. “No micro-enterprise is sustainable unless there is a viable route to market,” said Sharna Jarvis, Programme Manager for the Shell Foundation. “The problem with the standard model for micro-finance is that it begins with the producer, not the consumer. It is all about what someone wants to make – there is not enough emphasis on whether anyone will buy it.”

A new internet search engine has also been launched that is seeking a new way to create a steady flow of funds to nonprofit enterprises working to reduce poverty. Called GoodSearch (www.GoodSearch.com), it plows 50 percent of its advertising revenue (about a penny a search) back into nonprofits selected by its users. Powered by the well-known portal Yahoo!, if for example 1,000 supporters just searched twice a day, it would raise US $7,300 a year for an organization.

By David South, Development Challenges, South-South Solutions

Published: February 2007

Development Challenges, South-South Solutions was launched as an e-newsletter in 2006 by UNDP's South-South Cooperation Unit (now the United Nations Office for South-South Cooperation) based in New York, USA. It led on profiling the rise of the global South as an economic powerhouse and was one of the first regular publications to champion the global South's innovators, entrepreneurs, and pioneers. It tracked the key trends that are now so profoundly reshaping how development is seen and done. This includes the rapid take-up of mobile phones and information technology in the global South (as profiled in the first issue of magazine Southern Innovator), the move to becoming a majority urban world, a growing global innovator culture, and the plethora of solutions being developed in the global South to tackle its problems and improve living conditions and boost human development. The success of the e-newsletter led to the launch of the magazine Southern Innovator.  

Follow @SouthSouth1

Google Books: https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=7H6VBgAAQBAJ&dq=development+challenges+february+2007&source=gbs_navlinks_s

Slideshare: http://www.slideshare.net/DavidSouth1/development-challengessouthsouthsolutionsfebruary2007issue

Southern Innovator Issue 1: https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=Q1O54YSE2BgC&dq=southern+innovator&source=gbs_navlinks_s

Southern Innovator Issue 2: https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=Ty0N969dcssC&dq=southern+innovator&source=gbs_navlinks_s

Southern Innovator Issue 3: https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=AQNt4YmhZagC&dq=southern+innovator&source=gbs_navlinks_s

Southern Innovator Issue 4: https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=9T_n2tA7l4EC&dq=southern+innovator&source=gbs_navlinks_s

Southern Innovator Issue 5: https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=6ILdAgAAQBAJ&dq=southern+innovator&source=gbs_navlinks_s

This work is licensed under a
Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 License.

African Tourism Leads the World and Brings New Opportunities

Tourism around the world is growing rapidly again after the setbacks caused by the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks. Tourism is also finally acknowledging Africa – home to 888 million people (2005, UN) – and where 46 percent of sub-Saharan Africa’s people live on less than US$1 a day. Led by Kenya and South Africa, the continent has come out on top in world tourism growth according to the United Nations World Tourism Organisation (UNWTO) (http://www.unwto.org/). While global tourism is forecast to grow by four percent in 2007, Africa as a whole enjoyed growth of 10.6 percent in 2006.

Tourism, because it is a labour intensive industry, is seen as a great way to both reduce poverty and meet all the Millennium Development Goals. It favours small scale businesses, it is decentralized and can diversify regional economies, it is relatively non-polluting and can contribute to the conservation and promotion of natural and cultural heritage, and most importantly it can act as a catalyst for kick-starting other sectors of the economy.

Tourism is now generally recognized to be one of the largest industries-if not the largest-in the world. It has grown rapidly and almost continuously over the past 20 years, and is now one of the world’s most significant sources of employment and of Gross Domestic Product (GDP). Tourism particularly benefits the economies of developing countries, where most of the sector’s new tourism jobs and businesses are being created. This rapid growth has encouraged many developing nations to view tourism as key to promoting economic growth, and global development assistance agencies see it as having real potential to help achieve many of their own development goals.

Tourism provides opportunities for diversifying local economies and promoting formation of micro and small enterprises, many of them women-owned. These enterprises promote better lives for poor entrepreneurs, especially in rural areas where there may be few other livelihood options. Tourism is generally labor-intensive and it tends to employ relatively higher proportions of women and young people than most other sectors. Tourism introduces technology and basic infrastructure, and strengthens linkages with the outside world. Well-planned and -implemented tourism projects can improve local governance, natural resources management, biodiversity conservation and other important development goals.

Within Africa, sub-Saharan Africa led the way with 12.6 percent growth. The countries benefiting the most included Kenya, South Africa, Mozambique, Swaziland and the Seychelles. Kenya received almost a million tourists in 2006, and earned US $857 million in revenue.

Kenya’s success rests on the fact it set aside 10 percent of the country for wildlife and biodiversity conservation. The majority of its tourists come to see the ‘big five’ – elephant, rhino, lion, buffalo, and leopard. Tourism currently employs 11 percent of the country’s workforce.

In October 2004 the World Tourism Organization released the Washington Declaration on Tourism as a Sustainable Development Strategy. Governments, international aid agencies, and the world’s leading universities agreed to make sustainable tourism development a top priority in their strategies to reduce poverty and meet other MDGs.

Aid agencies like USAID have targeted women for micro-funding for tourism projects. They have been able to help women start businesses making crafts in Tanzania and Botswana. The UK’s DfID helped Toni Shina from the Cape Town-based The Backpack to become a fair trade business. “Fair Trade Tourism South Africa recognises our commitment to uplifting our staff and community, and our utilisation of local service providers,” she said. “As a business we also have a strong and positive attitude to working with and supporting staff who are affected by HIV and Aids and we abide strongly with required labour and legal standards.”

And the fair trade concept is getting greater recognition. In a recent survey of the local tourism industry in South Africa, half recognised the Fair Trade in Tourism South Africa brand.

On the other hand, the scale of missed opportunities is illuminated in Rwanda. A consultant on a tourism management plan for the Volcano National Park, Edwin Sabuhoro, is urging communities living nearby to embrace eco-tourism and cash in on the tourists visiting nearby gorillas.

“According to our research,” he told Kigali’s The New Times, “some tourists say they carry their money back to their countries because they can’t find what to spend on.” And he pointed out the fate of the gorillas were directly linked to the poverty of the community: poachers would not be stopped if the community remained poor and had no other source of income.

How popular Africa has become is exemplified by Ethiopia’s rise into the top ten travel destinations for 2007, according to travel guide specialist Frommer’s. According to the guide, “Ethiopia has finally emerged out of the shadows caused by years of political strife, economic hardship and famine. The improved infrastructure has made travelling in Ethiopia increasingly popular, especially among independent-minded travellers and those seeking adventure.”

Another country, Tanzania, is targeting tourism as a key growth area. The country is trumpeting its peaceful and stable status and low-crime to attract tourists.

By David South, Development Challenges, South-South Solutions

Published: February 2007

Development Challenges, South-South Solutions was launched as an e-newsletter in 2006 by UNDP's South-South Cooperation Unit (now the United Nations Office for South-South Cooperation) based in New York, USA. It led on profiling the rise of the global South as an economic powerhouse and was one of the first regular publications to champion the global South's innovators, entrepreneurs, and pioneers. It tracked the key trends that are now so profoundly reshaping how development is seen and done. This includes the rapid take-up of mobile phones and information technology in the global South (as profiled in the first issue of magazine Southern Innovator), the move to becoming a majority urban world, a growing global innovator culture, and the plethora of solutions being developed in the global South to tackle its problems and improve living conditions and boost human development. The success of the e-newsletter led to the launch of the magazine Southern Innovator.  

Follow @SouthSouth1

Google Books: https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=7H6VBgAAQBAJ&dq=development+challenges+february+2007&source=gbs_navlinks_s

Slideshare: http://www.slideshare.net/DavidSouth1/development-challengessouthsouthsolutionsfebruary2007issue

Southern Innovator Issue 1: https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=Q1O54YSE2BgC&dq=southern+innovator&source=gbs_navlinks_s

Southern Innovator Issue 2: https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=Ty0N969dcssC&dq=southern+innovator&source=gbs_navlinks_s

Southern Innovator Issue 3: https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=AQNt4YmhZagC&dq=southern+innovator&source=gbs_navlinks_s

Southern Innovator Issue 4: https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=9T_n2tA7l4EC&dq=southern+innovator&source=gbs_navlinks_s

Southern Innovator Issue 5: https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=6ILdAgAAQBAJ&dq=southern+innovator&source=gbs_navlinks_s

This work is licensed under a
Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 License.

False data makes border screening corruptible

“Big Brother” system could violate rights of Canada’s visitors

By David South

Now Magazine (Toronto, Canada), May 21-27, 1992

New technology that can spew out a person’s life history in less than six seconds is now available to Canada’s customs and immigration officials.

And while Canada customs and immigration officers say this toy is a boon – replacing the need to memorize names of so-called undesirables – civil rights workers and refugee activists point out that the gizmo could have serious consequences, with little recourse.

The technology is called PALS, or primary automated look out system, and is already in operation at airports in Toronto, Montreal, Calgary, Winnipeg, Ottawa and Vancouver.

PALS’ operation is based on the use of computer-readable passports. Canada is one of several countries that have started including computer strips on passports and identity cards. Officers use PALS by either keying in a special number printed on the passport or identity card or using a scanning machine to read the strip.

The system went into effect at Toronto’s Pearson airport on January 20, after a three-year pilot project in Vancouver, adding Canada to the 11 countries that have machine readers for passports. Under the old system, customs officers combined judgement, questioning and the most-wanted list to decide if a passenger required further interrogation and search.

During a demonstration of the system, customs officials at Pearson airport boast about the system’s role in apprehending a drug smuggler in PALS’ first week of operation.

Sinister sign

But to civil libertarians with experience of such systems in other countries, PALS has a sinister implication. Many say that PALS spews out what is fed into it. And depending on the country involved, what is fed into it may not necessarily be true.

While customs emphasizes PALS’ role in apprehending popular targets like drug smugglers, terrorists and child kidnappers, its reach also includes people who have smuggled in too many cigarettes or bottles of alcohol, convicted criminals who have finished serving their time, immigrants, refugees and a range of petty offenders.

All of these face a second interrogation and detention based on what their governments have decided to incorporate into the computer strip. And it is this that worries civil libertarians and refugee workers.

Consider the case of a legally sponsored Portuguese immigrant who arrived at Pearson just after PALS had been introduced. He was detained based on information stored in PALS. His immigration lawyer Ali Mohideen recalls how the man was held because of a cheque that he bounced in his native Portugal about eight years ago.

Ed Lam, director of research for the Canadian Ethnocultural Council, feels customs and immigration already have “too many powers.” He regularly receives complaints from visible minorities and immigrants who feel they are singled out for harassment at the airport.

“This is big brother. Legal protection is not enough,” he argues. “It leads to costly court battles with the government. I would like to see an ombudsperson or complaints bureau set up. As for refugees turned back at the border, we will never hear from them.”

False data

Other critics, especially those in the US, where a PALS-type system has been in operation for more than a decade, worry that the system will simply accept information given by tyrannical governments.

“It is hard to trace false information to a foreign government,” says Jeanne Woods, legislative counsel to the American Civil Liberties Union, which monitors abuse under the United States system.

“People have been accused of being communists or terrorists who have denied it. The El Salvadoran government is one example of a regime which has called prominent human rights activists and lawyers terrorists.”

She would like the Canadian Parliament to pass a law similar to one passed last November in the US requiring the state department to report to Congress when somebody is denied access because they have been called a terrorist, so that the origin of the information can be tracked.

The Canadian database draws its information from several sources, according to customs spokesperson Suzanne Bray. The sources include immigration records and the Police Information Retrieval System, which is a database shared between customs and the RCMP.

Bray refuses to divulge any other sources, citing security, but both RCMP and customs operate their own intelligence services, sharing information with their counterparts all over the world, especially the US. Information is also drawn from the Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS) and its sister organizations such as the CIA. However, CSIS spokesperson Ray Boisvert says they have adequate safeguards against false information provided by countries known to be human rights abusers.

“CSIS does look at bias in intelligence reports,” he says.

The US equivalent of PALS has been criticized after several cases of abuse were detected. Gara LaMarche, executive director of the Fund for Free Expression, a project of US-based Human Rights Watch, has documented abuse on political and ideological grounds.

“The US public has a right to hear dissenting views under the first amendment of the Constitution,” he says. “I don’t think improving the technology of border control violates civil liberties, but keeping a massive database of information which includes people’s political associations is bad.”

Similar concerns are expressed by John Tackaberry of Amnesty International in Ottawa, which is only now beginning its own analysis of PALS. “We have concerns over data input, who controls information and basic civil liberties.”

Even as Canadian civil rights activists take stock of PALS, Canada customs is planning to use it to check cross-border shopping by expanding the system to all land entry points.

As for those visitors who feel wronged by PALS, they may have a problem seeking redress from such organizations as the Canadian Human Rights Commission. A spokesperson says the CHRC can only help those who have been admitted to Canada. And visitors turned back at the border are not considered admitted.

Sherry Gerstl, a customs superintendent responsible for the implementation of PALS at Pearson, says that people can also appeal to the Privacy Act to see information that is kept on them. But two fact sheets explaining how this can be done are located in a corner, pretty much out of public view.

Bray acknowledges that “honest” passengers could face the prospect of a search with PALS, but given its positive attributes, she says, passengers involved in such delays should simply “grin and bear it.”

"False data makes border screening corruptible": Now Magazine 1992

This work is licensed under a
Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 License.