In part four, we look at an example from Oregon of price differences between a state university and a private college. Transcript of radio broadcast: 01 October 2008
This is the VOA Special English Education Report.
Today, in week four of our Foreign Student Series, we discuss differences between public and private in American higher education.
A big difference involves money. Public colleges and universities charge for an education just like private schools. But state schools cost less because they get money from the states that started them to educate local citizens. As a result, out-of-state and international students usually pay more than state residents, at least the first year.
The state with the most residents, almost forty million, is California. Its systems of two-year and four-year colleges and universities are among the largest in the world.
A science building at the University of Oregon
But the example we are going to focus on today is to the north of California, in a much smaller state on the West Coast: Oregon.
The University of Oregon, located in Eugene, is one of the campuses in the Oregon University System. The cost for undergraduates this year is six thousand dollars for state residents. Housing is an additional eight thousand. Nonresidents pay the same for housing — but almost twenty thousand dollars for tuition and fees.
Let’s see how these numbers compare to a private college in Oregon.
Lewis and Clark College in Portland has four thousand students, compared to twenty thousand at the University of Oregon. Housing costs eight hundred dollars more than at the state school. But the big difference is tuition. The published price at Lewis and Clark is almost thirty-four thousand dollars.
Yet Lewis and Clark is one of the few American colleges to offer financial aid for international students. Each year it awards financial aid to twenty students from other countries. And it says the average award last year was nineteen thousand dollars. That would make Lewis and Clark cheaper for international students than the University of Oregon.
But, of course, prices alone do not say anything about the quality of a school or the value of an education.
And that’s the VOA Special English Education Report, written by Nancy Steinbach. Our Foreign Student Series is online at voaspecialenglish.com. If you have a general question about American colleges and universities, we might answer your question in our series. Tell us your name and where you are. Use the Contact Us link at voaspecialenglish.com or write to special@voanews.com.
Governments and groups promise $3 billion for a plan that aims to stop the disease in Africa by 2015. Also, the W.H.O. sharply lowered its estimate of malaria cases worldwide. Transcript of radio broadcast: 01 October 2008
This is the VOA Special English Health Report.Governments, businesses and other groups have promised to add three billion dollars to the fight against malaria. The promises came last week at a meeting at the United Nations in New York.
The money will support a new Global Malaria Action Plan. The plan aims to stop the disease in Africa by two thousand fifteen. Malaria is not limited to Africa, but ninety percent of deaths happen south of the Sahara. British Prime Minister Gordon Brown said the plan will not only support bed nets, but research, cutting drug costs and expanding health care systems.
Medical workers in Dakar, Senegal, treat a patient with malaria
Governments and international groups spent a billion dollars on malaria programs last year. But the Roll Back Malaria Partnership says the world should spend more than five times that amount. It says doing so could save four million lives by two thousand fifteen. The partnership includes United Nations agencies, the World Bank and leading drug makers.
Earlier this month, the World Health Organization released its World Malaria Report for two thousand eight. The report presented sharply lower estimates of malaria cases than in the past. W.H.O. officials say the corrections were mostly the result of better methods of collecting information.Until now, the agency has said there were as many as five hundred million infections every year, with a million deaths. The new report estimates the number of malaria cases in two thousand six at about two hundred fifty million. And it estimates the number of deaths at eight hundred eighty-one thousand. The great majority who die are young children.
The W.H.O. says the old numbers came from using malaria maps from the nineteen sixties. But changes have taken place, including the movement of people to cities, especially in Asia. The disease is less common in urban areas.
The report says malaria deaths have decreased in several countries, and a few African nations have reduced deaths by half. Yet the malaria drugs needed for what is known as artemisinin-based combination therapy reached only three percent of African children in need. In the last two years, though, there have been greatly increased efforts to provide families with bed nets. These nets are treated with insecticides to kill the mosquitoes that spread malaria. Campaigns for indoor spraying of insecticides in homes have also increased in Africa and elsewhere.And that’s the VOA Special English Health Report, written by Caty Weaver. For more health news, go to voaspecialenglish.com. I’m Jim Tedder.
John Quincy Adams won the presidency, but it required a vote in Congress — a vote that led to charges of a corrupt deal. Transcript of radio broadcast: 01 October 2008
Welcome to the MAKING OF A NATION – American history in VOA Special English.
Four of the first five presidents of the United States came from Virginia. They were George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, James Madison and James Monroe.
The second president, John Adams, was a New Englander. In the election of eighteen twenty-four, his son, John Quincy Adams, was one of four leading candidates for president. At the same time, the West began to make its presence felt in national politics.
This week in our series, Maurice Joyce and Stewart Spencer discuss the election of eighteen twenty-four.
(MUSIC)
John Quincy Adams
VOICE ONE:
General Andrew Jackson of Tennessee got the most electoral votes: ninety-nine. But he needed one hundred thirty-one to win a majority.
The secretary of state, John Quincy Adams, was second with eighty-four votes. Treasury Secretary William Crawford received forty-one. And Henry Clay of Kentucky got thirty-seven.
VOICE TWO:
None of the candidates got a majority of the votes. And the decision went to the House of Representatives. The House voted on only the three top candidates for president.
The most powerful man in Congress — Henry Clay — was not, therefore, a candidate. But Clay’s support would be the greatest help any of the candidates could receive. All three wanted his support.
Treasury Secretary Crawford had suffered a serious illness before the election, and his health was bad. Clay felt he could not support him for that reason.
VOICE ONE:
This left Adams and Jackson. Clay did not agree with all of Adams’s policies. But he did believe Adams had the education and ability to be president.
Clay did not like Jackson, the hero of New Orleans during the War of Eighteen Twelve. He knew Jackson was poorly educated and easy to anger. Clay did not think Jackson would be a good president.
So Clay decided to support Adams for president. He said nothing about this for a time. Several of Clay’s friends visited Adams. They told him that Clay’s supporters in the West would be pleased if Adams, as president, named Clay as secretary of state.
Adams told them that if the votes of the West elected him president, he would put a westerner in his cabinet. But he would not promise that the westerner would be Clay, or that the cabinet job would be that of secretary of state.
Henry Clay
VOICE TWO:
Clay still had not said publicly which candidate he supported. But it became known that his choice was Adams. Late in January, the Philadelphia newspaper Columbian Observer published an unsigned letter. The letter charged that Clay and Adams had made a secret agreement.
Clay, the letter said, would give his support to Adams. In exchange, Adams would name Clay his secretary of state.
Clay was furious. He not only denied the charge, but offered to fight a duel with the letter-writer, should his name be known. Much was made of the charge that Clay had sold his vote to Adams. But no proof was ever given.
Clay demanded an investigation. But the man who accused him in the newspaper letter refused to say anything. Clay was sure Jackson’s supporters were responsible.
(MUSIC)
VOICE ONE:
Snow was falling in Washington on the morning of February ninth, the day that Congress would elect the president. At noon, members of the Senate walked into the House of Representatives.
The electoral votes were counted, and it was announced officially that no candidate had won. The senators left, and the House began voting.
Each state had one vote for president. Adams was sure he would get the votes of twelve states. Crawford had the votes of four and Jackson, seven. New York was the question. Seventeen of the New York congressmen were for Adams, and seventeen were opposed to him. Adams needed just one of these opposition votes to get the vote of New York and become president.
Stephen Van Rensselaer
VOICE TWO:
One of those New Yorkers opposed to Adams was a rich old man who represented the Albany area, Stephen Van Rensselaer. Although Van Rensselaer had supported Crawford or Jackson, he really was not sure now whom to support. Henry Clay had taken the old man into his office that morning and talked to him. Daniel Webster also was there.
They both told the New York congressman that the safety of the nation depended on the election of Adams as president. Clay and Webster told the old man that his was the most important vote in the whole Congress. That Stephen Van Rensselaer would decide who would be president.
The old man’s head was not too clear after listening to Clay and Webster. He still did not know what to do.
VOICE ONE:
When the New York congressmen voted, Van Rensselaer still was not sure of his choice. And he put his head down on his desk and asked God to help him make the right choice.
After this short prayer, he opened his eyes and saw on the floor at his feet a piece of paper with Adams’s name on it. Van Rensselaer picked it up and put it in the ballot box as his vote.
This gave Adams the vote of the state of New York and made him president of the United States. A committee of congressmen was sent to Mister Adams’s home to tell him of the vote.
One member of the committee described the secretary of state: “Sweat rolled down his face. He shook from head to foot and was so nervous he could hardly stand to speak.”
(MUSIC)
VOICE TWO:
Later in the evening, Adams had control of himself. President Monroe gave a big party at the White House. Adams was there. So was Jackson, and Clay.
During the party, Adams and Jackson met face to face. Jackson had his arm around a young lady.
“How do you do, Mister Adams,” said Jackson. “I give you my left hand, for the right — as you see — is devoted to the fair. I hope you are well, sir.”
“Very well, sir,” answered Adams, coolly. “I hope General Jackson is well.”
VOICE ONE:
Two days later, Adams told President Monroe that he had decided to offer the job of secretary of state to Clay. He said he was doing so because of the western support he had received.
Clay thought deeply for a week about the offer. He asked a number of friends for advice. Most of them urged him to take the job. They told him that a man of the West was needed in the cabinet. And they said being secretary of state would greatly help his own chances of becoming president some day.
Clay accepted the offer. He said he would serve as Adams’s secretary of state. Until now, General Jackson had refused to believe the charges that Clay had sold his vote to Adams for the top cabinet job. Now he was sure of it. He wrote to a friend: “Was there ever before such bare faced corruption. What is this trade of vote for office, if not bribery?”
Andrew Jackson
VOICE TWO:
Many of Jackson’s supporters did not believe John Quincy Adams had the ability to be political leader of the party. They believed that Clay would seize the party leadership and use this power to help himself become elected the next president.
Jackson, himself a senator, showed his feelings when the Senate was asked to approve Clay as secretary of state. He voted no. And thirteen other senators joined him against the nomination. But they were too few to prevent Clay from getting the job.
The next presidential election was four years away. General Andrew Jackson promised himself this would be one election he would not lose. Before he left Washington to return to Tennessee, Jackson wrote a letter that soon became public.
“I became a soldier for the good of my country,” Jackson wrote. “Difficulties met me at every step. I thank God that it was my duty to overcome them. I am in no way responsible to Henry Clay. There is a purer court to which I will put my case — to the intelligent judgment of our patriotic and honest voters.”
VOICE ONE:
General Jackson returned to Nashville to rest and plan. He was still a senator, and he questioned if it might not be best for him to resign from the Senate. He would be free of Washington politics and able to build his political strength for the election in eighteen twenty-eight. He decided to resign.
(MUSIC)
ANNOUNCER:
Our program was written by Frank Beardsley. The narrators were Maurice Joyce and Stewart Spencer. Transcripts of our programs along with podcasts and archives of MP3s can be found at voaspecialenglish.com. Join us each week for THE MAKING OF A NATION – an American history series in VOA Special English.
Much of today’s science of physics is based on Newton’s discovery of the three laws of motion and his theory of gravity. He said of his work: ”If I saw further than other men, it was because I stood on the shoulders of giants.” Transcript of radio broadcast: 01 October 2008
VOICE ONE:
This is Shirley Griffith.
VOICE TWO:
And this is Steve Ember with the VOA Special English program, Explorations. Today we tell about one of the world’s greatest scientists, Isaac Newton.
(MUSIC)
VOICE ONE:
Isaac Newton
Much of today’s science of physics is based on Newton’s discovery of the three laws of motion and his theory of gravity. Newton also developed one of the most powerful tools of mathematics. It is the method we call calculus.
Late in his life, Newton said of his work: “If I saw further than other men, it was because I stood on the shoulders of giants. ”
VOICE TWO:
One of those giants was the great Italian scientist, Galileo. Galileo died the same year Newton was born. Another of the giants was the Polish scientist Nicholas Copernicus. He lived a hundred years before Newton.
Copernicus had begun a scientific revolution. It led to a completely new understanding of how the universe worked. Galileo continued and expanded the work of Copernicus.
Isaac Newton built on the ideas of these two scientists and others. He found and proved the answers for which they searched.
(MUSIC)
VOICE ONE:
Isaac Newton was born in Woolsthorpe, England, on December twenty-fifth, sixteen forty-two.
He was born early. He was a small baby and very weak. No one expected him to survive. But he surprised everyone. He had one of the most powerful minds in history. And he lived until he was eighty-four.
Newton’s father died before he was born. His mother married again a few years later. She left Isaac with his grandmother.
The boy was not a good student. Yet he liked to make things, such as kites and clocks and simple machines.
VOICE TWO:
Newton also enjoyed finding new ways to answer questions or solve problems. As a boy, for example, he decided to find a way to measure the speed of the wind.
On a windy day, he measured how far he could jump with the wind at his back. Then he measured how far he could jump with the wind in his face. From the difference between the two jumps, he made his own measure of the strength of the wind.
Strangely, Newton became a much better student after a boy kicked him in the stomach.
The boy was one of the best students in the school. Newton decided to get even by getting higher marks than the boy who kicked him. In a short time, Newton became the top student at the school.
VOICE ONE:
Newton left school to help on the family farm.
It soon became clear, however, that the boy was not a good farmer. He spent his time solving mathematical problems, instead of taking care of the crops. He spent hours visiting a bookstore in town, instead of selling his vegetables in the market.
An uncle decided that Newton would do better as a student than as a farmer. So he helped the young man enter Cambridge University to study mathematics.
Newton completed his university studies five years later, in sixteen sixty-five. He was twenty-two years old.
(MUSIC)
VOICE TWO:
At that time, a deadly plague was spreading across England. To escape the disease, Newton returned to the family farm. He did more thinking than farming. In doing so, he found the answers to some of the greatest mysteries of science.
Newton used his great skill in mathematics to form a better understanding of the world and the universe. He used methods he had learned as a boy in making things. He experimented. Then he studied the results and used what he had learned to design new experiments.
Newton’s work led him to create a new method in mathematics for measuring areas curved in shape. He also used it to find how much material was contained in solid objects. The method he created became known as integral calculus.
VOICE ONE:
One day, sitting in the garden, Newton watched an apple fall from a tree. He began to wonder if the same force that pulled the apple down also kept the moon circling the Earth. Newton believed it was. And he believed it could be measured.
He called the force “gravity. ” He began to examine it carefully.
He decided that the strength of the force keeping a planet in orbit around the sun depended on two things. One was the amount of mass in the planet and the sun. The other was how far apart they were.
VOICE TWO:
Newton was able to find the exact relationship between distance and gravity. He multiplied the mass of one space object by the mass of the other. Then he divided that number by the square of their distance apart. The result was the strength of the gravity force that tied them to each other.
Newton proved his idea by measuring how much gravity force would be needed to keep the moon orbiting the Earth. Then he measured the mass of the Earth and the moon, and the distance between them. He found that his measurement of the gravity force produced was not the same as the force needed. But the numbers were close.
Newton did not tell anyone about his discovery. He put it aside to work on other ideas. Later, with correct measurements of the size of the Earth, he found that the numbers were exactly the same.
VOICE ONE:
Newton spent time studying light and colors. He used a three-sided piece of glass called a prism.
He sent a beam of sunlight through the prism. It fell on a white surface. The prism separated the beam of sunlight into the colors of a rainbow. Newton believed that all these colors — mixed together in light — produced the color white. He proved this by letting the beam of rainbow-colored light pass through another prism. This changed the colored light back to white light.
VOICE TWO:
Newton’s telescope used a mirror instead of a lens
Newton’s study of light led him to learn why faraway objects seen through a telescope do not seem sharp and clear. The curved glass lenses at each end of the telescope acted like prisms. They produced a circle of colored light around an object. This created an unclear picture.
A few years later, Newton built a different kind of telescope. It used a curved mirror to make faraway objects seem larger.
Light reflected from the surface of the mirror, instead of passing through a curved glass lens. Newton’s reflecting telescope produced much clearer pictures than the old kind of telescope.
(MUSIC)
VOICE ONE:
Years later, the British astronomer Edmund Halley visited Newton. He said he wanted Newton’s help in finding an answer to a problem no one had been able to solve. The question was this: What is the path of a planet going around the sun?
Newton immediately gave Haley the answer: an egg-shaped path called an ellipse.
Halley was surprised. He asked for Newton’s proof. Newton no longer had the papers from his earlier work. He was able to recreate them, however. He showed them to Halley. He also showed Halley all his other scientific work.
VOICE TWO:
Halley said Newton’s scientific discoveries were the greatest ever made. He urged Newton to share them with the world.
Newton began to write a book that explained what he had done. It was published in sixteen eighty-seven. Newton called his book “The Mathematical Principles of Natural Philosophy.” The book is considered the greatest scientific work ever written.
VOICE ONE:
In his book, Newton explains the three natural laws of motion. The first law is that an object not moving remains still. And one that is moving continues to move at an unchanging speed, so long as no outside force influences it.
Objects in space continue to move, because nothing exists in space to stop them.
Newton’s second law of motion describes force. It says force equals the mass of an object, multiplied by the change in speed it produces in an object.
His third law says that for every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction.
VOICE TWO:
From these three laws, Newton was able to show how the universe worked. He proved it with easily understood mathematics. Scientists everywhere accepted Newton’s ideas.
The leading English poet of Newton’s time, Alexander Pope, honored the scientist with these words: “Nature and nature’s laws lay hid in night. God said, –’Let Newton be!’ - and all was light. ”
(MUSIC)
VOICE ONE:
This Special English program was written by Marilyn Christiano and Frank Beardsley. This is Shirley Griffith.
VOICE TWO:
And this is Steve Ember. Listen again next week for another Explorations program on the Voice of America.
Materials called metamaterials make possible a prism that may someday lead to major disappearing acts. Also, how some people can be both fat and healthy. Transcript of radio broadcast: 29 September 2008
VOICE ONE:
This is SCIENCE IN THE NEWS in VOA Special English. I’m Bob Doughty.
VOICE TWO:
And I’m Barbara Klein. This week, we will tell about evidence that some people can be both fat and healthy. We will also tell about brain aneurysms — a rare but deadly disorder. And, we will tell about materials that could help make objects seem to disappear.
(MUSIC)
VOICE ONE:
Two studies are suggesting that some overweight people do not always face an increased risk of developing heart disease. Researchers also found that some normal body weight individuals have an increased risk of the disease.
Being overweight does increase your risk of medical problems. But the studies found that not all heavy people are less healthy than thin people.
VOICE TWO:
In one study, American researchers examined medical records from more than five thousand men and women. Each person had taken part in a separate study from nineteen ninety-nine to two thousand four.
The researchers found that about fifty-one percent of the subjects were overweight or obese. About thirty-two percent were obese, but considered metabolically healthy. This means they had no evidence of problems in tests for high blood pressure or other measures linked to heart disease.
However, more than twenty-three percent of people who were at a healthy weight had two or more unhealthy measurements in the tests.
VOICE ONE:
Judith Wylie-Rosett helped supervise the American study. She is a professor at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine at Yeshiva University in New York. Professor Wylie-Rosett says the findings show that an obese person can still be healthy. She believes that having body fat is not as important to health as where the fat is found on body.
America’s Centers for Disease Control and Prevention notes that two-thirds of Americans are considered overweight or obese.
VOICE TWO:
A second study is suggesting that fat in the liver may be important to health risks. Norbert Stefan and his team work at Germany’s University of Tubingen. They closely examined three hundred fourteen people. They measured how much body fat each person had, and where it was on the body. To do this, they used medical imaging tests. They too discovered that obese people could have healthy hearts. Their results suggest that fat in the liver is more dangerous than fat in other areas.
The results of both studies were published recently in the Archives of Internal Medicine.
VOICE ONE:
Professor Wylie-Rosett says the findings do not mean that people should not be concerned about becoming obese. Experts say there are several diseases linked to obesity that make it more dangerous to be fat than thin. They say that people should see their doctor to learn what health risks they may be facing and what behaviors should be changed to improve health.
(MUSIC)
VOICE TWO:
We often hear the term brain aneurysm. Joseph Biden had two brain aneurysms twenty years ago. Doctors saved his life. Recently, the senator from Delaware was named the vice presidential choice of the Democratic Party.
Ohio’s first black congresswoman was not so lucky, however. Representative Stephanie Tubbs Jones died last month within hours after a brain aneurysm burst. Doctors said she may have had no warning.
VOICE ONE:
A brain aneurysm is a weak or thin area along an artery wall in the brain. It can become so thin that it ruptures and bleeds.
The most common form looks like a small, round berry hanging from the artery. The Mayo Clinic in Minnesota says as many as fifteen million people in the United States, or five percent, have a berry aneurysm. Fewer than thirty thousand will ever suffer a rupture.
The National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke says forty percent of victims die within twenty-four hours. Another twenty-five percent die within six months.
VOICE TWO:
People may live a long and healthy life and never know they have an aneurysm. But sometimes, if it gets big enough, it can cause pain or other problems that lead to its discovery.
In Senator Biden’s case, his neck hurt for several weeks. Doctors thought he had a pinched nerve and a virus. But in February of nineteen eighty-eight, tests showed a leaking artery at the base of his brain. Doctors operated successfully, and again three months later for an aneurysm in another area.
Experts say most brain aneurysms happen in people born with an abnormality in an artery wall. Other causes can include head injuries, high blood pressure, infections, tobacco use and use of stimulant drugs.
(MUSIC)
VOICE ONE:
For years, scientists have dreamed of someday guiding or directing light in unusual ways. If they could, objects might seem to disappear. The objects would be invisible — hidden from sight.
Now, scientists in the United States have produced materials that may help to make invisibility possible. Researchers at the University of California in Berkeley performed the experiments. Their study took steps toward “cloaking”, or appearing to hide, objects.
The Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory also took part in the experiments. Support for the work came from America’s National Science Foundation and the United States military.
VOICE TWO:
Before now, invisibility experiments succeeded in guiding light around only very thin objects of two dimensions. Such objects had length and width, but no depth. The new study marks the first time experiments have been successfully done in three dimensions using visible light, or light that can be seen.
We normally see objects because light strikes them. Then our eyes receive some of the light from the objects. To make an object seem to disappear, it is necessary to direct the light so it hides the object.
The California researchers successfully did this by using materials called metamaterials. Metamaterials are small almost beyond human imagination. They are made with a process called nanoengineering.
VOICE ONE:
It was thought that directing light with natural materials was not possible. But with nanoengineered materials, the researchers were able to build a special prism. Normally, a prism has many flat surfaces. It divides white light into colors. A nanoengineered prism does the opposite. It creates white light from colors.
Results of the experiment were reported in “Science” magazine. Results with the other metamaterial appeared in the publication “Nature.” University of California Professor Xiang Xhang led the research teams that developed both materials. They contained substances including metals, earthenware and fiber.
VOICE TWO:
The researchers designed one metamaterial like a net used to trap fish. It was made of silver nanowires. Each wire was about ten thousand times thinner than a human hair. The other metamaterial used twenty-one grids of silver and magnesium fluoride. The box-like grids formed lines. They were also unimaginably small.
Two years ago, two other researchers also reported on invisibility experiments. But they used microwaves instead of visible light. The two men were David Smith of Duke University in the United States and John Pendry of Imperial College in London.
Last year, scientists at America’s Purdue University reported success in guiding light around objects placed in a design. The design employs small needles called – you guessed it – nanoneedles. Mister Pendry, Mister Smith and David Schurig developed some of the required mathematics for that research. At the same time, so did Ulf Leonhardt of the University of Saint Andrews in Scotland.
VOICE ONE:
All this recent interest in invisibility is not surprising. People have been talking about making things invisible for thousands of years. In Plato’s “Republic”, there is an invisible ring. In the last century, “The Shadow” was a popular radio program. It told of a man who could become invisible. That meant he could defeat all evil.
More recently, the British secret agent of many films, James Bond, had an invisible car. And Harry Potter, hero of many books and films, sometimes had a magic cloak. He was able to protect himself by wearing it.
(MUSIC)
VOICE TWO:
This SCIENCE IN THE NEWS program was written by Jerilyn Watson, Caty Weaver and Brianna Blake, who also was our producer. I’m Barbara Klein.
VOICE ONE:
And I’m Bob Doughty. We would like to hear from you. You can read and listen to our programs at voaspecialenglish.com. Join us again next week for more news about science in Special English on the Voice of America.
A study shows that when fishermen own a guaranteed percentage of the catch, the rate of collapse is lower than in traditional fisheries. Transcript of radio broadcast: 29 September 2008
This is the VOA Special English Agriculture Report.
Too much fishing has reduced many fishery populations by ninety percent or more from their highest recorded numbers. Some fishing seasons last only a few days because the catch limit is quickly reached.
Two years ago, a Canadian scientist, Boris Worm, predicted the risk of a worldwide fishery collapse by two thousand forty-eight. But a new study says a management system called “catch shares” could offer a solution.
It divides the total permitted catch in a fishery into shares. These are bought and sold like shares of stock in a company. Shareholders in the fishery are each guaranteed a percentage of the catch.
Catch share systems are common in Australia, New Zealand and Iceland. And they have been gaining popularity in the United States and Canada.
Systems differ from place to place. But in general, experts set yearly limits, or quotas, on a fishery. The number of fish that each company or individual may catch is usually based on past averages.
Shares become more valuable as fish populations increase. With more fish in the fishery, catch limits also increase.
Human nature would tell us that shareholders are more likely to think about the long-term health of the fishery. They have a greater interest to protect the supply than in traditional, open access fisheries. But does that really happen?
Researchers looked at more than fifty years of records from eleven thousand fisheries worldwide. They compared open access fisheries with one hundred twenty-one fisheries that use catch share systems.
The study found that almost a third of the traditional fisheries have collapsed. But the number was only half that for the catch share fisheries. The findings appeared this month in the journal Science.
Researchers from the University of California, Santa Barbara, and the University of Hawaii did the study. The economist who led the research, Christopher Costello at Santa Barbara, called the results very hopeful. He says the system can improve the world’s fishing grounds and rebuild collapsed fisheries.
Still, not everyone likes the idea. Some environmental activists say the catch share system makes a public resource into a private enterprise. Generally speaking, anybody can work a traditional fishery. There is no need to organize into a group or company. Yet if scientists’ warnings are correct, those fisheries may not have many fish left to catch by the middle of the century.
And that’s the VOA Special English Agriculture Report, written by Jerilyn Watson. I’m Bob Doughty.
There are 65 separate steps required to make a dollar bill. But, do not try this at home! Transcript of radio broadcast: 27 September 2008
VOICE ONE:
Welcome to THIS IS AMERICA in VOA Special English. I’m Bob Doughty.
And I’m Barbara Klein. Today on our program, we visit the Bureau of Engraving and Printing in Washington, D.C. to learn about how American dollars are made. Last year, the Bureau produced about thirty-eight million bills a day. Printing money requires both artistic and technological skills. The bills are made so that they are interesting to look at but very hard to copy. In total, there are sixty-five separate steps required to make a dollar bill.
(MUSIC: “Give Me Money?”)
VOICE ONE:
Bureau of Engraving and Printing in Washington, D.C.
Guided tours of the Bureau of Engraving and Printing in Washington D.C. are a popular activity for visitors. These tours are a good way to learn new and interesting facts about the history of money and its complex production methods. It is also very exciting to stand in a room with millions of dollars flying through machines.
TOUR GUIDE: “All right, Ladies and Gentlemen, once again welcome to the Bureau of Engraving and Printing. And this is where the color of money begins. The money making process begins when a yearly order sent by the Federal Reserve Board. That order will then be divided in half. Half will be done here in Washington, D.C. and the other half will be done in Fort Worth, Texas”.
VOICE TWO:
Next, the Bureau orders special paper from the Crane company in the state of Massachusetts. The paper is actually cloth since it is made up of seventy-five percent cotton and twenty-five percent linen. This paper is made so that it can last a long time. And, it is made with details that make it hard to copy. For example, bills contain security threads. These narrow strips of plastic inside the paper run along the width of the bill. This special paper is also made with very small blue and red fibers. Both of these designs make it very hard for counterfeiters to copy. Counterfeiters are criminals who create false money.
VOICE ONE:
The first stage of production is called intaglio printing. This is done on high-speed presses using printing plates onto which images have been cut. Each plate receives a layer of ink, which gathers in the cut areas of the plate. Then, each sheet of paper goes into the press to receive the printing plate. The machine forces about twenty tons of pressure onto the printing plate and paper. One side of a dollar bill is printed in green ink, while the other is printed in black. Each side must dry for about forty-eight hours.
VOICE TWO:
The printing plate used in this process is created from hand-cut engravings called master-dies. Highly skilled artists called engravers draw images into soft steel to make the dies. There are separate dies for the different images on the bill, such as the portrait of the president, the lettering, and other designs.
VOICE ONE:
Inspecting printed sheets of money
After each master-die is copied, they are fitted together to make a printing plate that has thirty-two copies of the bill being printed. A master-die can last for many years. For example, the master-die with the picture of President Abraham Lincoln was made in the eighteen sixties. It was used again this year to redesign the five-dollar bill.
Next, the large printed sheets are carefully examined to make sure there are no mistakes on any of the bills. This process used to be done by people. Now, computers do the work.
TOUR GUIDE: “OCIS is an acronym for Off-line Currency Inspection System and this is where the money from the last phase will be inspected.
Now that blue box will take a picture to size of the sheets of the money and compare its cut, color and shape with the master image sent by the Federal Reserve Board. It will take that picture and break it down into over one million pixels. Every single last one has to be absolutely correct.”
VOICE TWO:
In this part of production, the thirty-two bill sheets are cut into sheets of sixteen. In the next step, the bills are printed with a series of identifying numbers and seals.
TOUR GUIDE: “And this is where the money from the last phase will be put to its final state. If you look to the left of the room ladies and gentlemen, there is a tall machine with green ink at the top of it. That is the machine that will print your serial numbers, Federal Reserve seal and Treasury seal onto the money.”
VOICE ONE:
The serial numbers on the money tell the order that the bills were printed. Other numbers and letters printed on the bill tell when the note was printed, what space on the printing plate the bill occupied and which Reserve bank will issue the bill.
VOICE TWO:
“Bricks” of five dollar bills
Once the money is printed, guillotine cutters separate the sheets into two notes, then into individual notes. The notes are sorted into “bricks”, each of which contains forty one-hundred-note packages. The bricks then go to one of twelve Federal Reserve Districts, which then give the money to local banks. Ninety-five percent of the money printed each year is used to replace money that is in circulation, or that has already been removed from circulation. The Federal Reserve decides when to release this new money into use.
(MUSIC)
VOICE ONE:
You may know that America’s first president, George Washington, is pictured on the one-dollar bill. But do you know whose face is on the two, five, ten, twenty, fifty and one hundred-dollar bills? They are, in order, President Thomas Jefferson, President Abraham Lincoln, Secretary of the Treasury Alexander Hamilton, President Andrew Jackson, President Ulysses Grant and statesman Benjamin Franklin.
VOICE TWO:
During the tour, visitors can learn many interesting facts about money. For example, the average life span of a one-dollar bill is twenty-one months. But a ten-dollar bill lasts only about eighteen months. The one hundred-dollar bill lasts the longest, eighty-nine months.
One popular question that visitors ask is about the two-dollar bill. This bill is not printed very often. This is because many Americans believe two-dollar bills are lucky, so they keep them. Two-dollar bills do not have to be printed often because they do not become damaged quickly like other bills. People can send their damaged or torn bills to the Bureau of Engraving and Printing. The Bureau will replace damaged bills with new bills. However, it is illegal to purposely damage United States currency in any way. Anyone found guilty of damaging American money can be fined or jailed.
(MUSIC)
VOICE ONE:
The Bureau of Engraving and Printing first began printing money in eighteen sixty-one. It operated in a room of the Treasury building. Two men and four women worked together there to place seals on money that was printed in other places by private companies. Today, The Bureau of Engraving and Printing has over two thousand employees in its two printing centers in Washington and Fort Worth.
VOICE TWO:
The Treasury Department continually works to change the design of bills to make it difficult for counterfeiters to copy. One method it uses is called microprinting. For example, what looks like a very thin line around the edge of a portrait may actually be the words “The United States of America” printed in very small letters. Also, many bills now have color-shifting ink that looks like metallic paint. In the last five years, the ten, twenty and fifty-dollar bills have been redesigned. All the bills are mostly green. But other colors are added when they are redesigned.
VOICE ONE:
The picture of Abraham Lincoln on the new five dollar bill
The newest design in American currency is the five-dollar bill, which was released earlier this year. This new bill has a second watermark. A watermark is an image that can be seen from both sides of the bill when it is held up to light. The new five-dollar bill also has a security thread that is on the right side of President Lincoln’s picture. On older designs, this thread was on the left side.
The new bill also has an area that is printed in purple ink. The number five is printed very large to help people who do not see well. The next note that will be redesigned is the one hundred-dollar bill. This is the highest value bill now used in the United States.
VOICE TWO:
American money might soon be legally forced to change its appearance in more extensive ways. In May, a federal appeals court ruled that the design of American money discriminates against blind people. Most other countries make bills in different sizes depending on the value of each note. But American dollars are all the same size. The American Council for the Blind brought the case to court.
The judges decided that the Treasury Department has failed to show that it would be too costly to make American dollars so that blind people could tell their value by touch. The Treasury Department says it would cost over a hundred and seventy million dollars to order new printing presses and as much as fifty million dollars to make new printing plates. Other experts estimate that it would cost over three billion dollars to redesign food and drink machines to accept bills of different sizes.
VOICE ONE:
It might be a long time before this case is settled in court. Until then, the printing presses at the Bureau of Engraving and Printing will continue to produce the green dollars that are recognizable to people around the world.
(MUSIC)
VOICE TWO:
Our program was written and produced by Dana Demange. I’m Barbara Klein.
VOICE ONE:
And I’m Bob Doughty. Our programs are online with transcripts and MP3 files at voaspecialenglish.com. Join us again next week for THIS IS AMERICA in VOA Special English.
A U.S. nonprofit group works to bring a $200 computer, and social empowerment, to villages in Laos and other countries. Transcript of radio broadcast: 27 September 2008
This is the VOA Special English Development Report.
A nonprofit group in San Francisco, California, is trying to take bicycle-powered computers to rural villages around the world. The computer was developed with villagers in Laos.
The group is the Jhai Foundation. Jhai, j-h-a-i, is a word in the Lao language that means “hearts and minds working together.”
Lee Thorn shows schoolgirls how to use a pedal-powered computer near Vientiane, Laos
Lee Thorn is the chairman. He says there are tens of thousands of dead computers in rural villages. He says villages often receive computers that they do not know how to use or how to keep working.
So Lee Thorn worked with another Lee — Lee Felsenstein, an early developer of personal computers. The result is the Jhai PC. The small computer costs about two hundred dollars. It does not use much electricity. The battery that powers it is recharged when a person pedals a bicycle.
Memory-storage devices called flash drives are connected to the computer to hold information. The Jhai PC has a steel cover designed to resist water and weather. The foundation says the computer is built to work for ten years.
In addition to Laos, the group is in contact with villages in Vietnam, India, Ghana and other countries.
The foundation offers to help villagers learn to make the computers themselves with local materials. The group looks for a business person in each village who will create a ten-year business plan. The plan must include hiring people in the village. It also must include maintaining the computers and paying for electricity and a connection to the Internet.
The Jhai Foundation provides business and computer training. It also provides classes for teachers on ways to use computers in school. The group has received awards from the United Nations.
The group also works with villagers on other ways to improve their lives. Fifty-one villages in Laos are in a coffee farmers cooperative. The foundation is helping the farmers sell their coffee in the United States.
Lee Thorn started the foundation ten years ago after visiting Laos to begin a process of reconciliation. He calls it the opposite of war. He was in the United States Navy during the Vietnam war. On an aircraft carrier he loaded planes with bombs to drop on neighboring Laos. Later he and Lee Felsenstein were active in the antiwar movement.
And that’s the VOA Special English Development Report, written by Karen Leggett.
Many financial companies have moved to other New York streets. But Wall Street still holds its place in the language as the capital of American finance.
Now Wall Street is being reshaped by the crisis over mortgage-related securities. The markets are unable to place a value on them. So banks and other investors are unable to find a buyer except possibly the government.
The aim is to unblock the flow of credit markets now, then sell the securities later, when the housing market improves.
But the new shape of Wall Street will be missing a piece. The credit crisis has ended the age of big investment banks. This week the last two, Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley, became bank holding companies.
As commercial banks, they can take deposits from the public and borrow from the Federal Reserve at any time. This will help them raise capital. But they will also face closer government supervision.
Henry Paulson headed Goldman Sachs before he became treasury secretary in two thousand six.
Morgan Stanley also agreed this week to sell up to twenty percent of itself to Japan’s largest bank, Mitsubishi UFJ. And investor Warren Buffett agreed to buy at least five billion dollars in Goldman stock.
Six months ago, there were five big, independent investment banks. Then, in March, J.P. Morgan Chase bought Bear Stearns in a rescue sale. And this month Merrill Lynch agreed to be sold to Bank of America.
The government provided loans to aid the sale of Bear Stearns. But officials decided to let Lehman Brothers, a one hundred fifty-eight year old investment bank, fail. Last week the British bank Barclay’s purchased much of Lehman in bankruptcy court.
Investment banks raise money for companies through offerings of stocks and bonds. They also sell and trade securities and provide other services.
The banks could borrow huge amounts against relatively little capital. And they created ever more complex securities.
The Glass-Steagall Act of nineteen thirty-three barred commercial banks from owning investment banks. Morgan Stanley split from J.P. Morgan as a result of Glass-Steagall.
Congress passed the law to reduce risk to deposits following the stock market crash of nineteen twenty-nine. But Congress ended Glass-Steagall in nineteen ninety-nine. Now, commercial and investment banks are together again, much as they were before nineteen thirty-three.
And that’s the VOA Special English Economics Report, written by Mario Ritter. I’m Steve Ember.
In part two of our series on American higher education, advice about where to get information on colleges and universities. Transcript of radio broadcast:17 September 2008
This is the VOA Special English Education Report.
This week in our Foreign Student Series, we discuss the first steps for students interested in higher education in the United States.
One place to go for advice and information about American colleges and universities is an EducationUSA center. More than four hundred of these educational advising centers are located around the world.
The advisers at EducationUSA centers do not charge any money for their services. They help students find schools and get information about financial aid, admissions tests and visa requirements.
The centers are supported by the State Department. You can find the nearest one on the State Department’s Web site for international students. The address is educationusa.state.gov. Again, it’s educationusa.state.gov.
Another place to get information is at an educational fair. Representatives of American colleges and universities present information and answer questions from students and their parents.
The Institute of International Education has been organizing United States Higher Education Fairs in Asia since nineteen eighty-two. Last year, more than fourteen thousand students attended these fairs in China, India, Indonesia, Japan, Thailand and Vietnam.
The next higher education fairs in Asia are in October. For example, more than seventy colleges and universities will have representatives in Hong Kong on October eleventh.
Other organizations hold similar events in other parts of the world. Information about educational fairs in your country can be found at the same Web site, educationusa.state.gov.
One important piece of advice — give yourself plenty of time to plan your studies in the United States. Educational advisers say you should begin planning at least two years before you want to start classes.
If you have a question for our series on American higher education, send it to special@voanews.com. Or use the Contact Us link at voaspecialenglish.com. Make sure to tell us who and where you are. We might answer your question on our program in the weeks ahead.
And that’s the VOA Special English Education Report, written by Nancy Steinbach. Transcripts and MP3s of our Foreign Student Series, and a link to the EducationUSA Web site, are at voaspecialenglish.com. I’m Steve Ember.
Now, the VOA Special English program, WORDS AND THEIR STORIES.
Our expression today is “getting down to brass tacks.” It means to get serious about something, to get to the bottom of the situation. For example, a man may say, ” I want to work for you. But how much will you pay me? He is getting down to brass tacks. Or a woman may ask, “You say you love me. Will you marry me?” She, too, is getting down to brass tacks.
How did this expression get started? There are several ideas.
At one time most women made their own clothes, buying the cloth in small stores. The material was kept in large rolls. And the storekeeper cut off as much as a woman wanted. Brass tacks along his work table helped him measure the exact amount.
Sometimes a busy storekeeper might try to guess how much material to cut off. But this would not be correct. He could get an exact measure only by laying the material down along the brass tacks.
One word expert, however, has another theory. He believes the expression came from seamen who cleaned the bottoms of boats. Strong heavy devices called bolts held the ship’s bottom together. These bolts were made of copper. The seaman had to clean the ship down to the copper bolts. American speech soon changed the words copper bolts into brass tacks.
Another idea is that the expression began when furniture was made by hand. Brass tacks were used around the bottom part of the chair. The brass tacks, showed that the chair was built to be strong. When something went wrong with the chair, someone quickly examined the bottom to discover the trouble. In other words, someone got down to the brass tacks.
No one is sure where the expression first was used, but everyone is sure what it means today.
It is used by people who dislike empty words. They seek quick, direct answers. They want to get to the bottom of a situation. There are others, however, who have no such desire. They feel there is some risk in trying to get down to brass tacks.
This happened in the case of a critic who made the mistake of reading a play written by a close friend. The critic disliked the play a lot. He felt his friend should not be writing plays. But he said nothing. This silence troubled the writer. He demanded that his friend the critic say something about the play. The writer finally heard the critic’s opinion. And this getting down to brass tacks ended a long friendship.
(MUSIC)
This VOA Special English program, WORDS AND THEIR STORIES, was written by Mike Pitts. I’m Warren Scheer.
Now, the Special English program, Words and Their Stories.
(MUSIC)
Hang is a simple word. But there are many meanings for hang. Especially when it is used with other words. Two often-heard expressions are to hang tight and to hang loose.
When a friend says to hang tight, he is advising you to wait a little longer, not to give up. He might say, for example, “Hang tight. Keep studying. You can still pass the course.”
But if that same friend tells you to hang loose, he is telling you to take it easy, not to get excited. He could say, “Hang loose. You probably passed the English test.”
Hang around is an expression with several meanings. Usually, it means to spend your time doing nothing. You may need time to just hang around if you have been working too hard. Hang around also can mean spending time with friends. You hang around with your friends, for example, because you share a common interest in sports.
Hanging out is similar to hanging around. You may hang out with the same group of friends and always do things together.
A similar-sounding expression, however, has a very different meaning. The expression is let it all hang out. Well, when you let it all hang out, you are being completely open and honest. You do not keep your opinions hidden, even if they may cause you trouble.
Sometimes, a person may suffer from a hang-up. Well, a hang-up is an emotional difficulty that causes a problem for a person. You may know someone, for example, whose hang-up is shyness. They have a problem talking with people they do not know well.
A hangover can be a very painful condition. A hangover is the headache, upset stomach and other disorders that result from drinking too much alcohol.
Another common expression is to get the hang of something. It means to understand how a device works or how to do a job. An office worker might say that she cannot get the hang of using a computer. But after a few days, she may tell you that she finally got the hang of it.
One of the early heroes of the American republic, Benjamin Franklin, gave a warning to the other signers of the Declaration of Independence. The warning contained two different meanings of the word hang.
“We must all hang together,” Franklin said, “or surely, we shall all hang separately.”
The other signers took Fanklin’s advice. They hung together, remained united. As a result, the American colonies won their independence. And none of the signers of the declaration was hanged as a revolutionary by the king of England.
(MUSIC)
This VOA Special English program, Words and Their Stories, was written by Marilyn Christiano. Maurice Joyce was the narrator. I’m Shirley Griffith.
The disease has been reduced below 10,000 cases in five countries. Transcript of radio broadcast: 20 September 2008
This is the VOA Special English Development Report.
Guinea worm disease usually does not kill, but it is extremely painful. It prevents people from caring for their farms, their homes and sometimes even themselves.
In nineteen eighty-six, an estimated three and one-half million people in Africa and Asia suffered from Guinea worm disease. There were cases in more than twenty countries.
Today, Guinea worm still exists. But in two thousand seven, fewer than ten thousand cases were reported in five countries.
International organizations made the difference. They worked to increase activism and donations to the Global Dracunculiasis Eradication Campaign. That is the technical name for Guinea worm disease. Local governments provided support for services.
The Carter Center in the United States led the efforts. The World Health Organization and UNICEF, the United Nations Children’s Fund, also played central parts. So did the United States Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
The C.D.C. says Guinea worm no longer strikes in Asia. Most remaining cases are in Sudan and Ghana. The other countries affected are Mali, Niger and Nigeria. All five are working to stop the disease.
The disease affects poor communities that do not have safe water to drink.
Guinea worms are parasites — organisms that live in other organisms. The parasites enter the body when a person drinks water containing water fleas infected with Guinea worm larvae, the young form of the worm. “Water fleas” are not insects but copepods, a crustacean like lobsters and crabs but extremely small.
Almost a year passes without signs of the disease. But during that time the worm develops inside the person’s body. Some reach lengths of one meter.
Then the worm makes its way toward the skin surface. A blister forms, usually on the legs or feet.
The person suffers greatly when the worm cuts through the skin and leaves the body. And it is not unusual for an infected person to have more than one Guinea worm.
The international campaign has worked to help communities improve their supplies of drinking water. For example, villagers have been taught ways to keep water clean and to take steps like running water through cloth to reduce the risk of infection.
There is no vaccine against Guinea worm and no totally effective treatment. But the disease can be managed to reduce pain and infection.
And that’s the VOA Special English Development Report, written by Jerilyn Watson.
And I’m Shirley Griffith with EXPLORATIONS in VOA Special English. Today we tell about entrepreneurs and the problems they face starting businesses around the world.
(MUSIC)
VOICE ONE:
“Entrepreneur” is a French word that means someone who does something. An entrepreneur is someone who attempts to organize resources in new and more valuable ways and accepts full responsibility for the result.
Entrepreneurs bring a new product, service or idea to market. For more than a century, entrepreneurs have changed the world. American Bill Gates is perhaps the world’s best-known entrepreneur. He did not invent personal computers. But his operating system made computers easy to use. It also brought the new technology to millions of people around the world.
VOICE TWO:
Wendell Cochran is a journalism professor at American University in Washington, D.C. He says the Internet is a very helpful tool for entrepreneurs. That is because it provides information to anyone, anywhere.
Craig Newmark is an example of another American entrepreneur. Thirteen years ago, Mister Newmark created an Internet message service for the investment company where he worked. Today, his web site, Craig’s List, has users in more than five hundred fifty hundred cities and fifty countries. They can buy and sell goods, find a job or a place to live.
VOICE ONE:
Modern technology has made it easier for entrepreneurs around the world to succeed. However, they still have problems getting money to start businesses and deal with government restrictions in many countries. In Venezuela, for example, monetary exchange controls and a leadership hostile to free markets make it difficult to do business. Santiago Alvarez is a businessman in Caracas. He says it is difficult to get all the permits necessary to start a business.
In India, Sunil Mittal overcame different problems to build a successful telecommunications company. He says the end of central economic planning by the country’s government helped his company succeed.
SUNIL MITTAL: “With thirty, thirty-five million dollars that I could access, we went on to built India’s second largest telecom company.”
Today, Bharti Airtel has thirty thousand employees. The Bharti Group has become India’s second largest corporation.
(MUSIC)
VOICE TWO:
Brent Goldfarb is a business professor at the University of Maryland. He says all kinds of people work to become entrepreneurs. However, he says most entrepreneurs do not get rich. Most earn less than if they were working for someone else. That was true for Pakistani entrepreneur Ashar Hafeez. He opened his first Tandoori restaurant in Islamabad in nineteen ninety-three. He has advice for other entrepreneurs: “You have to work very hard. And you cannot do it alone. You have to have a very good team with you.”
VOICE ONE:
In Iraqi Kurdistan, Suhela Kakil Raza is a mother of four. She began making women’s clothes about a year ago. But there were problems finding a place to open her store in her city, Irbil. She had to find an area in Irbil where men did not go. This would permit Sunni Muslim women to come out and buy her products. Now, Suhela Kakil Raza has four employees and she wants to expand. She says she dreams of having a factory. She would also like to operate a school to train her female workers.
VOICE TWO:
In South Africa, Mthuli Ncube is the director of the entrepreneurship institute at the University of the Vitwatersrand. He says the African continent does not have enough entrepreneurs who are prepared to take risks. However, the most successful black entrepreneur in South Africa, Richard Maponya, has been taking risks for a long time to build successful businesses. Now in his eighties, Mister Maponya recently opened a huge shopping center in Soweto, near the city of Johannesburg.
Donald Trump is one of America’s most successful property developers. He says entrepreneurs must think big and take action. He says they also must study new information, learn to negotiate and enjoy competition.
(MUSIC)
VOICE ONE:
Muhammad Yunus In many developing countries, small loans are known as micro-credit or micro-financing. They have helped entrepreneurs get the money they need to start a business. Special attention is now being given to female entrepreneurs. They have had to beat many cultural barriers to get financing.
In Bangladesh, the Grameen Bank lends small amounts of money, mainly to women. And almost all of these small business loans are repaid. Grameen was the first bank in the developing world to lend money to poor people who wanted to be entrepreneurs. Muhammad Yunus started the Grameen Bank. He and the bank won the Nobel Peace Prize in two thousand six.
VOICE TWO:
Grameen’s micro-financing has expanded the idea of entrepreneurship to many people. For them, entrepreneurship is about raising chickens and cows or making clothes to help feed their families. For example, Margaret Okoth sells food at a market in Nairobi, Kenya. She is using low-interest micro-loans from an organization in her village.
Margaret Okoth MARGARET OKOTH: “[The cooperative] has recently increased its limit so that you can borrow eighty thousand [shillings]. And if you take out that big a loan you’ll really see your business grow.”
Margaret Okoth’s area at the market was destroyed in violence after the Kenyan election. But loans permitted her to rebuild. The money also helped her balance her business with her other job, as a wife and mother of twelve children.
VOICE ONE:
Now, large lenders like the World Bank are supporting the ideas of the Grameen Bank in discussions with developing countries. Dahlia Khalifa is a business expert at the World Bank’s International Finance Corporation. She says getting the necessary financing is the biggest barrier for female entrepreneurs in African countries. But she says discrimination against women goes even further. In many places, women are not permitted to sign an agreement or to represent themselves in court.
(MUSIC)
VOICE TWO:
Many countries have policies that make it hard for entrepreneurs to start businesses. In Russia, for example, people often have to make secret payments to government officials to influence their decisions on business permits. Other entrepreneurs say they have to deal with government processes that are slow and difficult.
Alexei Protsky has a chemical company. He says he has to deal with unnecessary rules and reporting requirements. He says dealing with too much paperwork means a loss of time and reduction in productivity for his company.
VOICE ONE:
Every year, the World Bank rates countries on the ease of starting a business. The Bank examines the processes involved in getting permits, getting credit, paying taxes and enforcing agreements. World Bank specialist Dahlia Khalifa says some governments are reforming and changing their business laws. The World Bank said Egypt was the top reformer last year, followed by Croatia, Ghana, Macedonia and Georgia. The bank says Egypt reduced the amount of money needed to start a business. Egypt also eased rules that used to delay building permits.
(MUSIC)
VOICE TWO:
Schools and universities around the world are teaching entrepreneurship. For example, in China and India, thousands of people are attending graduate schools of business where entrepreneurship is taught.
Such programs in the developing world are influenced by those in the United States. At some American universities, business students are required to start a business before they complete their study program.
Elaine Allen teaches entrepreneurship at Babson College in Boston, Massachusetts. She says she meets with groups of college students before they learn about financial rules. The groups are given two thousand dollars and told to start a business.
At the end of the year, she says, almost all of them make a profit. Often the profits are as much as fifty or sixty thousand dollars. They donate this money to non-profit organizations. These students are on their way to becoming entrepreneurs of the future.
(MUSIC)
VOICE ONE:
This program was written by Barry Wood and adapted by Shelley Gollust. Our producer was Mario Ritter. I’m Steve Ember.
VOICE TWO:
And I’m Barbara Klein. You can download audio and read scripts on our Web site, voaspecialenglish.com. Join us again next week for EXPLORATIONS in VOA Special English.
Now Wall Street is being reshaped by the crisis over mortgage-related securities. The markets are unable to place a value on them. So banks and other investors are unable to find a buyer except possibly the government.
Morgan Stanley also agreed this week to sell up to twenty percent of itself to Japan’s largest bank, Mitsubishi UFJ. And investor Warren Buffett agreed to buy at least five billion dollars in Goldman stock.
