Day 25 – Polis, Latsi, Akamas Peninsula

After a morning of email, Skype, blogging and research we lunch at the Hotel Natura, where we arrange to meet owner later.

We hire a dinghy and sail off Latsi for an hour, and then spend the remainder of the afternoon driving around the Akamas Peninsula. Most of the roads are dirt tracks and we are glad of the four-wheel drive. It is one of the island’s last remaining wildernesses, partly because of its controversial use by the British Army as a firing range, even though it lies outside the Sovereign Base Area agreements of 1960.

We return to Hotel Natura to meet the owner, Dr Christos Georgiades. Since inheriting the family farm on Cyprus’ northwest coast he has resisted the advances of island’s established property magnates and developed a “holistic” hotel, the first phase of which is well-established.

Much of the focus is on water and food. A large part of the plot is still farmed, in a way that is sensitive to the local climate, particularly rainfall. As well as more conventional measures, such as irrigating early in the morning and late in the evening, Dr Georgiades draws upon his experience as a microbiologist to develop more innovative techniques, including plant breeding. One example is reducing the water needed to grow watermelons by crossing them with pumpkins, which have a more efficient root structure.

He makes the rather bold claim that “not a drop of water is wasted”. The hotel has four sources of water:

1. Potable mains water for drinking, cooking and ablutions;
2. Irrigation mains water for agriculture, supplied from a local dam;
3. A borehole for lawn irrigation; and
4. Grey water recycling for WC flushing.

Day 23 – Lemesos, Galata, Polis

We are late arriving in Lemesos but are grateful to clear immigration and customs quickly. Ignoring the keen taxi drivers we find the bus stop and seven minutes later we are on our way as the only passengers on the No. 30 bus. We realise it’s heading along the sprawling waterfront rather to the bus station as we had hoped, disembark and walk for 10-15 minutes back towards the centre, where we have breakfast.

 

 

At 1100 we have a meeting with Dr Michael Ierides, Secretary General of the Cyprus Marine Environment Protection Agency (CYMEPA) and another enthusiastic environmentalist. Originally a shipping industry NGO (a function it retains) CYMEPA’s remit has spread to broader environmental education and since 1994 it has been Cyprus’ national member organisation of the Foundation for Environmental Education (FEE).

Recently elected to the FEE Executive Board, Dr Ierides has responsibility for mentoring JREDS, Jordan’s representative organisation, which we visited. In fact he had been in Aqaba just before us, where he oversaw the Mövenpick hotel achieving the first Green Key accreditation in the country. In Cyprus there are four hotels certified to date, soon to be five, with a target of ten for next year.

CYMEPA is also implementing the Eco-Schools programme, which started at primary level, expanded to senior, and now covers 300 schools. Water is a favourite opening topic, as the water cycle is easy for the children to understand. Typically automated taps and cistern bricks (which reduce the flush capacity) are installed as part of the project.

I am intrigued to know whether CYMEPA operates across the ‘Green Line’ and Dr Ierides tells us that he would and does work with any NGO that supports unification but not with the “so-called government” of North Cyprus.

We talk about Cyprus’ water “shortage”. Dr Ierides’ view is that the main issue is unsustainable agriculture, which accounts for 70 % of consumption (domestic use 20 %, tourism 10 %). Water-hungry cash crops such as pistachio nuts, bananas and tomatoes are grown but frequently ‘dumped’ as Cypriots struggle to compete on the international market:

• Other producers benefit from more favourable climates;
• Since joining the EU in 2004 Cyprus has been subject to the Common Agricultural Policy; and
• Water for agricultural use is not subsidised to the same level as previously. (Even so it costs just 7 pence per tonne and some farmers apparently bottle it and sell it at up to 50 pence per litre.)

In the 1960s, in an attempt to increase water availability, every river and stream on the island was dammed, which is one explanation for the reduction in marine life around the coastal. Even so last summer, after poor winter rains, fresh water had to be imported by tanker from Greece.

This has not been necessary this year as the winter rains were ‘better, and mains water availability has risen from three to four days per week. (A hosepipe ban remains in place though.) Water pressure is low so most houses have two tanks, one at low level filled by the mains from which water is pumped to a rooftop tank that serves the fittings and appliances by gravity. Stored water is not considered potable so most people drink bottled water.

Another culprit, says Dr Ierides, is the trend in domestic swimming pools and lawns, which he says has resulted in increased humidity in Nicosia (we find this incredible). Pools are typically initially filled from water delivered by a tanker, with subsequent evaporation losses made up from a private borehole.

Demand for potable water for domestic use is increasingly being managed, with dual-flush WCs and grants for greywater recycling and private boreholes available. The country’s major infrastructure project is a new desalination plant, to add to three existing facilities. It will run on oil, perhaps converting to gas in the future if Cyprus’ untapped fields are exploited as expected. One has to question the value of an ‘autonomous’ water supply if it creates/perpetuates food and oil dependency.

Solar water heating is almost universal in residential buildings; it would be “stupid not to” have it given the subsidies (the capital cost for a four-person household should not exceed 700 Euros) and the short payback period. It is also common in schools, offices and other building types. The adoption of photovoltaic (PV) cells is less common and no clear subsidy strategy has yet emerged.

It has been a useful introduction to water management in Cyprus and Dr Ierides has also kindly arranged for us to visit the Green Key certified Cyprus Hilton in Lefkosia.We accept the generous offer of a lift to Avis’ “downtown” office, actually conveniently located 4 km from the centre. We want to see a lot of the island, particularly the mountainous interior, during our short stay, and public transport is rather limited, so we have decided to rent a 4WD.

We head north, past one of the dams, and up on to the Troödos Massif, heading for Galata where we have booked three nights’ accommodation through the Cyprus Agrotourism Company.

Except that when we phone the owner to say we have arrived she has no record of our booking. Thinking something is lost in translation we meet her in person but alas the studio is not available until the following night. However she is not about to pass up the chance of some unexpected revenue and takes us to see her friends who run a hotel and will put us up for the night.

We meet this friendly couple, are offered some homemade lemonade, and a long conversation in Greek ensues. We query what is happening and are told to wait. The husband disappears and returns with the phone book and they start discussing whom to phone.

Conscious of time (it’s now about 1600 on a Friday afternoon) we try to make our excuses but our prospective host is still reluctant to let a windfall escape her grasp and suggests we stay at her sister’s house for the first night. We agree to have a look. There’s no-one at home and she takes around the back of the house, where she fruitlessly roots around under stones and plant pots looking for the spare key. Her sister is on holiday and probably has no idea what’s going on.

It’s now 1700, two hours after we arrived and we’ve seen enough. It’s a pity because we want to support the agrotourism company, but our experience has been more aggro-tourism.

We decide to head for the northwest coast, as it is supposed to be less blighted by bad development and it allows us to traverse the interior, which we had intended to do. We consult the Lonely Planet guide, exchange phone calls with a hotel in Polis, where I agree to take a room, and am then lectured on the rudeness of not showing up.

  

It takes two hours to wend our way through the Cedar Valley and Pafos Forest, down on to the coastal plain. We arrive at the hotel but the proprietor has no idea who we are. Thinking it’s an embarrassing error on my part I return to the car, check the guide book and my phone, but the hotel and phone number appear to match, leaving me somewhat confused. So I return to the hotel and show the hotelier the guide book, whereupon he remembers that the number has changed and its new owner, another hotel, is allegedly taking advantage. This clearly isn’t the first time this has happened.

We phone the other hotel, get directions, and upon arriving discover that it is being renovated and isn’t as nice as the other hotel. So we tell the chap there what’s happened and that we’re going back to first place. He is initially reasonable and understanding, but then starts insulting the other hotelier who in the interim had called him, apparently accusing him of poaching his customers. We make our excuses and depart.

The first hotel still has space and the proprietor shows me the “studio”, which seems quite nice and fairly good value, before embarking on a brief character assassination of his rival. We unpack and agree we made the right decision. And though it’s not branded “green” or “eco” you have to pay extra to have the air conditioning enabled.

Day 21 – Haifa

I have been trying to organise a visit to Intel’s new Development Design Center in Haifa which is due to become the company’s first LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) certified building, incorporating, amongst other things, grey water recycling for irrigation. Unfortunately it does not possible but I am invited to visit once construction is completed.

Instead we take the Carmelite, the only underground railway in Israel, to the top of Mount Carmel, find a cafe, and blog, email and research our way through the morning.

After lunch we take in the spectacular views north towards Akko and visit the verdant Baha’i Gardens, which were began in 1987 and transformed the northern slope of Mount Carmel. It is allocated 180 million litres of water per annum for irrigation but through the application of sophisticated irrigation technology actually uses about 130 million litres, some of which is recycled greywater.

The Baha’i faith is one of the youngest religions in the world, originating in Shiraz, Iran in the mid 19th century. It has 5-6 million followers worldwide, each of whom must perform a pilgrimage here at least once during their life.

 

Later we make our way through the central Haifa, down to the HaShmona Merkaz station and take a train to Haifa Hof HaKarmel, where we spend a relaxing evening.

 

Day 19 – Jerusalem, Bethlehem, Bustan Qaraaqa

We take the No. 21 bus to Bethlehem, a largely Christian town on the West Bank. It is noticeable that the buses serving the West Bank are old minibuses with no air conditioning, in contrast to the modern buses on the Israeli side.

The bus heads south through Jerusalem’s suburbs and before too long we are driving alongside the infamous, imposing ‘security wall’ and, to our surprise and relief, pass through the checkpoint in to Bethlehem with minimal fuss. The bus terminates in an apparently random location but soon we are in a taxi heading for Bustan Qaraaqa (the Tortoise Garden), a community permaculture project based in the West Bank town of Beit Sahour (Shepherds’ Fields), just to the east of Bethlehem.

We are met by Alice who invites us in and offers us drinks, where we discuss her experiences of life, and in particular, water management, on the West Bank. She says that over the last 50 years, in the name of progress, there has been a trend away from “primitive”, traditional approaches to water management, which has left individual Palestinians dependent on modern infrastructure that they have little control over.

The water supply is regularly cut off for up to a month in Bethlehem and up to three months elsewhere on the West Bank, even in the winter when more rain falls. Water pressure is also frequently inadequate to reach rooftop storage tanks.

There are 200,000 Palestinians not connected to mains water at all. And though 60 % have a foul drainage connection only 10 % of sewage is actually treated, the remainder being dumped in wadis where it contaminates watercourses.

As with most issues in Israel and the Palestinian Territories, there is clearly a significant political dimension to water management, which I do not feel adequately informed to comment upon. The bullet points below simply outline some of Alice’s observations on water and waste infrastructure on the West Bank.

• Fragmented control impedes infrastructure development. The cities and towns are classified ‘A’ (Palestinian civil and military control) but are typically surrounded by countryside designated ‘C’ (Israeli civil and military control, covering circa 60 % of the West Bank by area), so it is impossible for the Palestinian Authority to initiate major infrastructure projects without Israeli consent.
• Israel benefits from the status quo: it is a water stressed country and the West Bank aquifer is a major supply source. Average domestic water consumption in Israel is around 2.5 times that in the Palestinian Territories (50 litres per person per day).
• Israelis do not experience the same interruption of supply, evidenced by the lack of water storage tanks on their houses, which has only just become mandatory under local building codes.
• Most Palestinian farmers wishing to increase their water storage capacity require Israeli consent, which is typically not forthcoming. Many proceed at risk and some have been issued demolition orders, which may or may not be implemented.

In response Bustan Qaraaqa advocates a grass roots approach:

“where governments and development agencies are failing, perhaps individuals and communities can succeed if only they recognise their own power to deal with the problems that are facing them.”

With water delivered by tankers being 4-6 times more expensive than the mains supply, maximising water storage capacity is an ongoing priority. Apparently stagnation is, in reality, not a problem. Water is transferred to clear plastic bottles, left on the roof for a day to be UV sterilised by the sunlight, and then decanted to clay jugs, where it quickly cools off before being consumed.

A new 90 m³ cistern has been added at the head of the wadi, which will help to support a major new tree planting programme next year. Olives, figs, carib, apricots and other fruit is already grown (for subsistence rather than commercially). There are more than half a dozen storage vessels for domestic use, and more are planned.

Consumption is also kept to a minimum at ~ 12.5 litres per person per day for drinking, cooking and ablutions. An old composting toilet has been restored, and water is recycled twice for dishwashing (rinse, wash, soak).

Consequently there is not much greywater but what there is is collected, recycled and used for growing mint, which as well as being tasty makes excellent mulch.

It a fascinating insight to life on the West Bank. Alice also gives us contact details for Marad al Kahuffash, who is running another local permaculture project in Mada village, adopting a slightly more technological approach. One to follow up once we are back, as time is short.

We pay a fairly brief visit to Bethlehem before returning to Jerusalem.

  

The security check on the way back in to Jerusalem is more rigorous, with all passengers disembarking for an identity card/passport check.

In the evening we manage to sample some beer from the Taybeh Brewery, the only microbrewery in the Arab world, which I am sure would make another interesting case study in water management.

Day 17 – Aqaba, Eilat, Jerusalem

Today is the day we intended to visit Wadi Rum, a spectacular desert and mountain landscape two hours’ drive inland from Aqaba. (In particular we had hoped to see USAID sponsored project recycling greywater for agricultural use, which apparently, after initial scepticism has been embraced by the locals.)

However access is strictly controlled, effectively limited to organised tours approved by visitor centre, which also regulates prices (67 JD (£ 57.35) per person for a half-day tour).  Since we cannot glean any information on public transport (there is rumoured to be one minibus per day from Aqaba) we would need to take a taxi, at 40 JD (£ 34.25), making the overall cost 87 JD (£ 74.45) per person for half a day.

This is symptomatic of our experience of Jordan, which is becoming increasingly tarnished by the tiresomely persistent hawkers, high prices and the extremely limited public transport. The standard greeting “Welcome to Jordan” is starting to ring hollow.

So we decide to leave Jordan a day earlier than planned. After taking a taxi from the hostel to the border we pass through the Jordanian procedures within 15 minutes and walk through the no man’s land to Israeli border control.

The first part is a security check, which involves emptying our backpacks and various x-rays. The second part is immigration. The flow of people across the border is a trickle, less than a dozen people an hour we reckon, and everyone but us and two amiable French guys is waved through. We sit for an hour and a half in a fly-infested (though air-conditioned) tent. Needless to say the common ground between us and our new Gallic friends is that we have all been to Syria, which makes this tedious “security check” routine treatment. The third part of the charade is a surprisingly rapid and disinterested customs check. We are then free to go the toilet and be ripped off at the bureau de change.

We share a taxi in to Eilat with the French chaps, buy tickets for the bus to Jerusalem at 1630 (the first of the day because it’s Shabbat) and wander in to Eilat in the searing heat. It has a very touristy and American vibe but on the upside we enjoy the best coffee for some time. (I quite enjoy the Turkish variety, especially with cardamom, but the ubiquitous Nescafe and desperate instant cappuccino have left me yearning for a Monmouth double espresso.)

We wait for the coach at the advertised bay, join the scrum to put our luggage in the hold and jostle to board, only to discover that our coach will be departing from another bay. (Our Hebrew is on a par with our Arabic.) We are just in time and soon we are heading north. There is little evidence of water scarcity here, with various plantations and polytunnels on our right for mile after mile. And at the service station we stop at the outside seating area is being evaporatively cooled.

Once we reach the shores of the Dead Sea agriculture gives way to salt mining and other industry. We are a little surprised that the bus route takes us through the West Bank. Darkness falls and we see the lights of Jericho, the lowest town in the world at 260 m below sea level, to our right as we head west on Route 1 towards Jerusalem.

Day 14 – Amman, Dead Sea

This morning we have two meetings with NGOs. The first is with Safa Al-Jayoussi of the Jordan Environment Society (JES), which runs various projects including two recently completed relating to water management: Awareness Project in Water (APW) and Water Efficiency and Public Information for Action (WEPIA).

APW is a five-year programme, part-funded by USAID and intended to raise public awareness of water management. “It is designed to implement sustainable “information, education, and communication” campaigns and activities throughout Jordan with the specific targets of decision makers, businesses, public and private organizations, community leaders, women, university students and children.”

WEPIA’s various sponsors include the Ministry of Religious Affairs. Part of the project is the promotion of an aerating device that can be easily retrofitted to taps and other appliances by a layperson. These were initially free, then subsidised, and are still available at 2-3 JD each (£ 1.70-2.55).

Funding is being sought for various other projects. Unlike in the UK where climate change dominates, water management is considered the top priority here.

Water is only supplied to each property in Jordan for one day per week, when the washing and cleaning is done, and the storage tank replenished. Typically a 4,000 litre tank is expected to supply a family for the remainder of the week, though some houses have surreptitiously installed a second tank. (Al-Taibah, a village in Al-Karak, has been cut-off from mains water for three months due to contamination of its water supply.)

Overall 70 % of water is used for agriculture, even though it represents a small proportion of Jordan’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP), well behind tourism and exporting potash. At Al Kherbeh al Samrah a French funded and operated waste water treatment plant incorporates centralised recycling of grey water for agricultural use.

The major infrastructure project under consideration is a canal connecting the Dead and Red Seas, which will replenish the receding Dead Sea with sea water and in doing so reduce the salinity, allowing less energy-intensive desalination closer to areas of high population density, such as Amman. The project is sponsored by the World Bank and also involves Egypt, Israel and the Palestinian Territories.

We are also interested to learn that a Jordan Green Building Council is being established. The huge mixed-use scheme at Abdali, currently under construction, is expected to be the ‘greenest’ development in Jordan, meeting the new voluntary, good practice standards being established.

The second meeting is with Dr Fadi Sharaiha, Executive Director of The Royal Marine Conservation Society of Jordan (JREDS).

One of JREDS main roles is as Jordan’s national member organisation of the Foundation for Environmental Education (FEE), “a non-governmental and non-profit organisation aiming to promote sustainable development through environmental education (formal school education, training of staff and general awareness raising).”

As the national member JREDS is responsible for implementing FEE’s five environmental education programmes in Jordan. These are: Blue Flag; Eco-Schools; Young Reporters for the Environment; Learning about Forests; and Green Key.

It is also running a public awareness campaign funded by HSBC, with activities including promoting “eco-diving” with Red Sea diving centres, running the Clean Up the World campaign in Jordan and organising an EcoClub in every school in Aqaba.

Like JES, JREDS has been consulted on the terms of reference for the Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) of the proposed Dead Sea Red Sea channel. Dr Sharaiha explains that the energy source for the desalination plant has not yet been determined but could be a nuclear reactor at Aqaba (which would require 100 billion litres of water per annum for heat rejection). An alternative source is Jordan’s shale oil reserves, which could be exploited commercially in the future. We agree that Concentrated Solar Power (CSP) would probably be preferable.

Solar water heating is subsidised and has a 2-3 year simple payback but is not widely adopted in residential buildings; big corporations such as the hotel operators are more likely to recognise the value. In rural areas hot water is generally not used, except for cooking.

Jordan is the fourth most water stressed country in the world. Dr Sharaiha tells us that domestic use averages 15 litres per person per day, though it varies widely, being perhaps ten times higher in urban areas than rural. (Consequently in rural areas grey and black water recycling not viable because volumes are so low.) We find this a little hard to believe, particularly since in urban areas ‘Western’ flush toilets are apparently widespread, and dual-flush WCs are only just being introduced.

Despite the scarcity water is not expensive. Dr Sharaiha’s colleague tells us that the water bill is 7 JD (£ 6.00) per quarter for her two person household and 40 JD (£ 34.25) for her parents’ five person household. Dr Sharaiha, who is a strong advocate of practising what he preaches, spends 8 JD (£ 6.85) per quarter for “four people and a pet”. Apparently this is partly attributable to his following the 1970s Californian mantra, “if it’s yellow, let it mellow”, which seems to cause a little friction with his wife!

(Dr Sharaiha also demands high standards of his employees, refusing to travel in one colleague’s 2.7 litre engine car, and reprimanding his staff for not going to a widely advertised, HSBC sponsored promotion where collect water saving devices were being given away.)

Later in the afternoon we visited the Dead Sea itself, the lowest elevation on the earth’s surface on dry land, at Amman Beach, and briefly floated in its incredibly saline water.

In the evening we visited the westernised Sweifieh district of Amman, depressingly complete with four Coca-Cola branded Hummers.

Day 11 – Damascus

This morning I met Anne Marie Galmstrup, project architect for Henning Larsen Architects (HLA), designers of the new Massar Children’s Discovery Centre in Damascus. Anne Marie was very helpful, talked me through the project and gave me a number of leads to follow up, including contacts at Buro Happold, the civil, structural and M&E engineer for the project, and at Gesellschaft für Technische Zusammenarbeit (GTZ), the federally owned “international cooperation enterprise for sustainable development…[supporting]the German Government in achieving its development policy objectives”.

Massar, part of the Syria Trust for Development, a non-governmental, non-profit organisation established in April 2007 by Her Excellency Mrs. Asma Al Assad the First Lady of Syria, is “creating a major national learning and development programme for young people in Syria from 5 to 21 years old…[using] non-formal learning techniques to inform, involve and inspire young people across all Syria.”

Its first regional Discovery Centre opened in Lattakia in 2007, and a second in Homs, focusing on music, is under construction. Massar’s Green Team “has been on a national touring program since July 2005 reaching 100,000 children in Syria on 01/06/2008”.

The site lies between two branches of the Barada River (which is more of a stream these days) on a “cultural strip” stretching west from the old city that also features the opera house, library and national museum. The scheme incorporates landscaped gardens, underground car parking and the new building, two-thirds of which will accommodate interactive science exhibitions with the remainder housing library, education and administration space.

HLA were one of five practices shortlisted for an international design competition; or, more correctly, a strategic design approach competition, as the design was developed in partnership with the client and later local consultants. An early activity was a fact-finding mission to Syria focusing on ‘buildability’, i.e. which materials, constructions and technologies could be sourced and delivered locally.

Water management is an issue that has come to the fore over the life of the project (four years to date). Initially the design team struggled to get information and engagement on the subject. However there has been increasing public awareness over the period and the building will incorporate low-flow fittings and appliances and grey water recycling. The latter uses sand filters as part of a “dry wetland” area of landscape, the filtered water being used for irrigation and, potentially, WC flushing. Black water recycling was also proposed but not accepted.

Solar water heating provides some renewable energy generation but overall the design philosophy advocates building ‘lean’ and avoiding ‘green bling’, which is less likely to be adequately maintained.

Anne Marie also showed me some other projects in Middle East (HLA generally being supported by Buro Happold), where water management was a recurring theme.

 

After the meeting I went to see whether the train from Damascus to Amman, Jordan is running, having been suspended during 2006, due to Syrian tank manoeuvres destroying the tracks according to one source. Alas, it is still not running and worse still the Hejaz station in central Damascus, in shades of London St Pancras, is being pushed further out to accommodate retail and hospitality development. (Khaddam, 5 km to the south, is now the main station for Damascus.)

After a pleasant amble back to the Old City and through the souqs…

 

…we found the salubrious headquarters of the Syrian Environment Association (SEA).

 

There did not appear to be anyone there so we went to the SEA’s Ecological and Biological Garden, immediately to the north of the citadel, where I was able to briefly meet Ms Etab Al-Takee, Head of the SEA (and also NPPP – Gender & Communication for the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA)). I was invited to a seminar on local markets that was about to start but decided that my Arabic wasn’t up to it (shamefully I have just about mastered reading Arabic numerals, and little else) and settled for a cold drink at the cafe instead.

  

Day 8 – Aleppo

We spend an hour or so ambling through the souk before going to see the citadel by day. The now largely vanished Quwayq River and underground wells provided an abundant and dependable water supply to the site, key to its longevity.

   

Back on the hotel terrace we meet Dr Yaser of the Faculty of Architecture at Aleppo University, which has links with the University of Dundee.

Domestic water consumption in Syria averages 35 litres per person, a third of that required by Code for Sustainable Homes Levels 3 and 4 (current good practice in the UK), which the Syrians find staggering. It is likely that usage is higher in urban areas than rural, and it will be very interesting to see whether demand will increase as the country continues to ‘develop’.

Although demand is not regulated there are initiatives to implement grey water recycling, marble factories being a good example of where it is being adopted, in contrast to slaughterhouses, where it is not deemed acceptable.

Apparently there are daily water cuts (typically up to 10 hours in Damascus and 3-5 hours in Aleppo) and though most buildings have water storage, it engenders a culture of self-restraint.

In terms of wider environmental issues we learn that the village of Al-Quatara, to the west of Aleppo, became “zero carbon” last year thanks to a joint Syrian Government and United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) investment programme in solar water heating and photovoltaic cells.

In Syria there is a feed-in tariff paying a premium for renewably generated electricity exported to the grid, but the rate is only guaranteed for this year, making it difficult to commit to medium-to long-term investments. Absence of clear market signals from government is a common complaint in the UK too.

Fact for the day: the words “tariff” and “sheriff” originate from Arabic.