Update: What happened to 2023’s top 10 underreported global news stories?

by Virgil Hawkins | 24 October 2024 | Global View, Top 10 news, World

Since 2018, every December GNV has announced the Top 10 Underreported World News. It is a project that ranks events which, despite having a major impact on many people and on regional and global systems and conditions, were scarcely or not at all covered by Japan’s major media.

As the year changes, we analyze newly underreported major stories, but it is also important to continue tracking what happened to issues previously highlighted. In this article, we revisit each of the Top 10 news items ranked in 2023 and look at what developments occurred between the end of 2023 and October 2024.

No. 1: Fossil fuel subsidies quadruple in G20 countries

News in 2023: According to a study by the International Institute for Sustainable Development (IISD), in 2022 G20 countries spent over USD 1 trillion on fossil fuel subsidies—roughly four times the 2021 level.

[Update] October 2024: As global fossil fuel prices, which spiked in 2022, have cooled, fossil fuel subsidies fell sharply in 2023 and are expected to decline further from 2024 onward. However, even with the decline, current subsidy levels still far exceed those of 2015–2021. There are also reports that other subsidies which encourage environmental destruction are increasing, making it unlikely that globally agreed climate targets can be met under the status quo. Meanwhile, demand for coal, oil, and natural gas is expected to peak by 2030, with solar power rising and the use of sustainable energy projected to overtake fossil fuels overall.

GNV related article: “Oil and the World: Is the Media Capturing the Trend?“

Scene at a coal mine (Photo: Carol M. Highsmith Archive / Library of Congress [Public domain])

No. 2: Mass killings of migrants by Saudi border guards leave hundreds dead

News in 2023: A Human Rights Watch investigation revealed that Saudi Arabian border guards have indiscriminately fired at and killed groups of Ethiopian migrants and refugees attempting to cross the Yemen–Saudi Arabia border.

[Update] October 2024: A study by a migration research network shows that indiscriminate firing and killings of migrants and refugees by Saudi border guards continued in 2024. In an April 2024 survey, returnees testified that migrants and refugees attempting to cross from Yemen into Saudi Arabia were killed with machine guns and other weapons. However, due to a lack of compiled and verified casualty statistics, trends in the frequency of such incidents remain unclear. There have also been no evident sanctions from other countries over these human rights abuses. For instance, in August 2024 the United States resumed exports of offensive weapons to Saudi Arabia that had been temporarily suspended over the Yemen conflict.

GNV related article: “The world’s busiest maritime migration corridor?“

Returned migrants and refugees (Photo: Regional Migrant Response Plan / Flickr [CC BY 2.0])

No. 3: Global teacher shortage reaches 44 million

News in 2023: It is estimated that 84 million children worldwide are currently out of school, with teacher shortages being one contributing factor. In October 2023, UNESCO reported a global shortage of 44 million teachers.

[Update] October 2024: One year on from UNESCO’s announcement, there have been no new data releases or the introduction of full-fledged countermeasures. However, several reports have been issued by the UN and others. For example, in February 2024 the UN Secretary-General’s High-Level Panel on the Teaching Profession released comprehensive recommendations to address teacher shortages, with particular emphasis on increasing funding for education and improving salaries and working conditions for education personnel. In October 2024, UNESCO also issued guidelines on teacher management in secondary education. Additionally, the global federation of education unions held its congress in July–August 2024, sounding the alarm about teacher shortages.

A school scene in India (Photo: Global Partnership for Education / Flickr [CC BY-NC-ND 2.0])

No. 4: Iraq’s worst water shortage in a century

News in 2023: Iraq has been experiencing its worst water shortage in a hundred years. It is said to affect about 60% of farmers, with cultivated land significantly reduced and livestock and fish dying.

[Update] October 2024: The record water shortage continued until February 2024, but rainfall increased substantially from March onward, easing the scarcity. However, some regions suffered flooding from heavy rains. As climate change advances, there is a need to improve storage capacity and water management to resolve shortages over the longer term. Negotiations with Turkey and Iran—located upstream and on tributaries—over the allocation of river flows have not progressed, and Iraqi officials have expressed disappointment.

GNV related article: “Iraq: Can It Recover from Consecutive Crises“

Mosul Dam in Iraq seen from the air (Photo: Rehman Abubakr / Wikimedia Commons [CC BY-SA 4.0])

No. 5: Generic production of a TB drug made possible

News in 2023: In September 2023, generic production of bedaquiline—a TB drug used to treat multidrug-resistant tuberculosis—became possible in 134 low- and middle-income countries, after Johnson & Johnson (J&J), one of the world’s largest pharmaceutical companies, relinquished its patent on bedaquiline.

[Update] October 2024: Further steps in 2024 lowered the cost of TB treatment by expanding the relinquishment of patents related to bedaquiline. On July 5, under an agreement with South Africa’s Competition Commission, J&J agreed to waive secondary patents on the active substance of bedaquiline rather than on the drug itself. The same day, India’s patent office rejected J&J’s application for a pediatric formulation of bedaquiline. Meanwhile, in August 2024 the WHO recommended four new treatment regimens for TB; two of them include delamanid—still patented by Japan’s Otsuka Pharmaceutical—the high pricing of which is a concern.

GNV related article: “Global Medicine Inequality: Profit or Lives?“

TB patient (Photo: Pan American Health Organization / Flickr [CC BY-NC 2.0])

No. 6: First-ever African Climate Summit held

News in 2023: In September 2023, the first African Climate Summit was held, against a backdrop of the growing impacts of climate change. Although Africa accounts for only 3.8% of the world’s cumulative carbon emissions to date, it has suffered major damage from climate change.

[Update] October 2024: The Nairobi Declaration adopted at the 2023 summit calls on governments within and beyond Africa to take various actions, and some responses have followed. For example, in December 2023 the Accelerated Partnership for Renewables in Africa (APRA) was launched, and in October 2024 it held an investment forum to increase renewable energy development and deployment. However, large-scale deployment of renewable energy projects in Africa remains tightly constrained by limited financing opportunities. In this context, there are growing calls for high-income countries—which achieved economic development using large amounts of fossil fuels—to shoulder responsibility for providing funding.

Solar power, Rwanda (Photo: GPA Photo Archive / Flickr [CC BY-NC 2.0])

No. 7: EU agrees to ban exports of plastic waste to non-OECD countries

News in 2023: On November 17, 2023, the European Parliament updated the waste shipment regulation and reached a provisional agreement to ban the export of non-hazardous plastic waste to non-OECD countries.

[Update] October 2024: The new regulation on waste shipments entered into force in May 2024. Exports of plastic waste to non-OECD countries will be banned for two and a half years starting November 21, 2026. After that, exports may resume in line with the new rules. However, in 2024 exports of plastic waste from EU countries have risen. In the first half of 2024, volumes increased by 16% year on year, with about 740,000 tonnes shipped to other countries, most of it going to Turkey, Malaysia, Indonesia, and Vietnam. With global plastic production and use projected to increase significantly, restrictions are urgently needed not only on disposal but also on production and use.

GNV related article: “The Fate of Plastic“

Discarded plastic waste (Photo: Gaurav Ranjitkar / Pexels [Pexels License])

No. 8: Conflict and terrorism intensify in Burkina Faso

News in 2023: The armed conflict that has continued since 2015 in Burkina Faso has intensified. The conflict began when armed groups entered from neighboring Mali, and more than 17,000 people have been killed; deaths have surged since 2022.

[Update] October 2024: According to the Institute for Economics & Peace’s 2024 report, Burkina Faso was the country most affected by terrorism in 2023, accounting for a quarter of global terrorism fatalities. The situation has not improved in 2024. For example, on August 24 an attack by an al-Qaeda-affiliated armed group killed about 200 people, mainly civilians. The government is deepening political and military ties with neighboring Mali and Niger, which face similar security challenges. However, as all three are military regimes that came to power via coups, international support is limited. Government measures and cooperation with neighbors have yet to yield results.

GNV related article: “What Is Happening in Burkina Faso?“

Burkina Faso military in training (Photo: Defense Visual Information Distribution Service / Picryl [Public domain])

No. 9: World Food Programme (WFP) food assistance declines

News in 2023: In September 2023, WFP announced that due to funding shortages, global food assistance was plummeting and the number of people facing emergency levels of hunger could increase by 50% over the next 12 months. Currently, 40 million people are at emergency levels of hunger.

[Update] October 2024: WFP continues to face funding shortfalls in 2024. Although food assistance to Rohingya refugees in Bangladesh has increased, aid has been reduced for refugees in conflict-affected Yemen and those in Kenya. WFP is also struggling to raise funds for the drought response in Southern Africa. As of August 2024, the number of people globally classified at the most severe level of food crisis—famine—had doubled to 1.9 million compared with the same period the previous year, mainly due to armed conflicts in Sudan and the Gaza Strip. At the same time, conditions improved from 2023 peak shortages in Afghanistan, Kenya, and the Democratic Republic of the Congo, thanks in part to better harvests, among other factors noted.

GNV related article: “The Course of the Sudan Conflict“

WFP food assistance, Laos (Photo: EU Civil Protection and Humanitarian Aid / Flickr [CC BY-SA 2.0])

No. 10: Opium poppy cultivation in Afghanistan down 95%

News in 2023: In 2023, Afghanistan’s cultivation of opium poppy—the plant used to produce opioid drugs such as heroin and opium—declined by 95%. The reason is the Taliban government, which retook power in 2021, banning poppy cultivation in April 2022 and enforcing the ban.

[Update] October 2024: The Taliban’s ban and enforcement against poppy cultivation appear to be largely maintained. However, there is no sign that farmers are shifting to alternative cash crops, which experts warn is unsustainable. Protests by farmers have also been reported. Meanwhile, the global supply of heroin and other opioids derived from poppies has not decreased, partly because consecutive bumper harvests in Afghanistan before the ban created stockpiles—meaning exports continue even if cultivation has stopped. Another factor is that poppy production in Myanmar, where conflict is intensifying, continues to rise.

GNV related article: “Afghanistan: Turmoil and Stability“