World Weekly

This title , is a section in the Toronto Star , on week ends. Its a statistical look at the world.

Pollution in China is the lead this week. Talk of air quality has b/come quite open and frank. Terms , such as , major concern and marked deterioration were used in reports from the Ministries of Environment and Public safety. China , as other administrations do , tries to put a brave face on the reality , not now , though.
Life expectancy is 5.5 yrs lower in N. China vs the south b/c of pollution levels ( coal usage is high in all of China )
27 / 113 cities reached air quality standards. An aside here , I think China has over 20 cities w/ populations above 3 million.
Ground water was found to be bad or extremely bad , in 57.3 % of wells tested
The rivers that were polluted or seriously polluted was 30 %
The area covered by heavy smog last year , 1 million sq kilometres.
Oops , probably doesn't cover this one either.

The failed states index , by Foreign policy and the Fund for Peace , ranks the governmental failures
#1 Somalia  and in the top 10 , Chad , Haiti  and Afghanistan.
Falling out of the coveted top 10 is Burma
But Syria , Libya and Egypt jumped into the top 25.
In Yemen , 44 % of people are undernourished
For Afghanistan , 97 % of the GDP comes form foreign aid.
In the Zimbabwe treasury , there was $ 217.00 left before the IMF , kicked in some cash reserves

I suppose there is a good news part of the paper but .............

And I don't know when it happened , I noticed only to-day, this blog has 2 official followers.

Sunday , morning edition , actually , the world report comes out on Saturday. Thus ,you're getting day old statistics , from last year's survey.

Weather , well ' its a beautiful day in the neighbourhood ' a phrase made famous by Mr. Rogers of the TV show , ' Mr Rogers Neighbourhood '. A true summer delight. Winds are up a bit , full sun and little humidity.

Do yourself a favour , and find or play Verdi's Four Seasons , esp Summer , now that summer is  here.  Correction !!!! Vivaldi not Verdi , my error.