a 2 year old hudson o maddie says they've always depended on what they can grow and the area for their nutrition leads. as food security is a daily struggle, rather vargas, i hope all of our founding fathers created this dish to help them move round heights and valleys to work and farms as a child. i remember we use that as a dietary supplement. the people of, oh my dear, say proudly that customers are from across iraq, visit the town just to why it's a to haney. it's believe the 1st the haney. walter mill was built by kurdish rulers in the 16th century. what's not known is how long traditional mills will keep running without the introduction of some modern technology. but would abdougla had al jazeera in almighty a town noted in iraq. ah,

hello again. the headlines on al jazeera, the u. k. prime minister has warned its health service will be under considerable pressure in the coming weeks as ami crohn case, a surge, but war is johnson has ruled out additional measures. demons, however, he rebel say they've seized the united arab emirates ship. that was carrying weapons. the saudi led coalition says it was transporting medical supplies. large parts of malaysia have again been inundated by heavy rain on floods, forcing thousands more people to flee their homes. the rainfall has caused rivers in several states to rise to dangerously high levels. at least 50 people have died . the founder of collapse, blood testing start up. the runners has been found guilty of fraud and can spirits in the u. s. elizabeth homes falsely claimed her accompanies machines could test for dozens of diseases by using a drop of blood shot 100 has more from washington d. c. each of those 4 counts comes with her potentially 20 year prison sentence. but really, it's likely to be much less than that because those sentences would be served

concurrently. and she's likely to get a lesser sense because she hasn't been convicted of major crimes before. there's also $250000.00 fine in restitution for the victims in each of those 4 cases. now it's rare for a silicon valley executive to end up going to prison. so if the judge sentences her, she will be the most high profile female executive to be sent to prison since lifestyle guru martha stewart in 2004, she was convicted for lying to investors about a stock sale. another independent news outlet at hong kong has shut down. that is a news is the 3rd letter close in recent weeks. it's journalist said they were worried about their safety officer. police raided an online pro democracy media outlets last week. will have a check of the headlines at the top of the hour on al jazeera but up next it's counting. the cost

is celebration tradition night. i love al jazeera was gains way, insights into the diverse culture of somalia, ethical as 2 different couples in bucking on land life together to you wedding some money on empty zed. ah, with hello, i'm debbie and abigail. this is counting the cost on al jazeera, your look at the world of business and economics this week, the climate emergency, the price of going green, and why it doesn't need to cost the earth. so what is the world's waiting for? also this week,

new zealand and economic testbed for inflation in the ninety's. how's the world's central banks watching closely for its next experiment? this time it's targeting surging house prices. iraq has no gold deposits yet. it's become one of the country's top exports, billions exported to turkey. we find out why was the nation responsible for the biggest share of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere today? president biden has pledged more money and made new commitments to fight climate change. after his predecessor walked away from commitments to reduce harmful emissions that threatened to wreak havoc to global weather patterns, raising sea levels, and displacing people. washington is making climate change a priority. i didn't, once the number one, a number 3 big emitters, china and india to contribute more to the fight was a pandemic has proven where there is a will. there is a way and money is no object. in fact, the global cost of

a transition to renewable energy by 2050 would be $73.00 trillion dollars. that's according to stanford university. which research, i believe, could be recovered over a period of 7 years. and there's added benefits, the shift to a 0 carbon global economy would create $28600000.00 more full time jobs than if nations continue their current reliance on fossil fuels. will not the united states wants to make the transition to renewables over the next 9 years. it could, the cost would be $4.00 trillion dollars or a little more than the cost of $2.00 wars. and i've got a son. that number comes from energy consultants with mackenzie, but even they acknowledge that would not be feasible because a social and political issues. well, one of the biggest factors is what to do with businesses that emitting contribute to climate change. they would need time to transition. otherwise, the global financial system that includes banks, pensions and insurance,

could be sitting on losses of 20 trillion dollars. but there is a mechanism that penalizes big polluters by making them buy credit to offset their emissions. it's called carbon trading. so you may have heard of deals like this where ill on must tesla cells, carbon credits generating revenue of $1580000000.00 in 2020. and this year volkswagen and china bought credits from the maker of electric cars. and then their oral companies like b p that are keen to dump acids to reduce their carbon footprint. it's sold at alaska. oil feels to a little known privately held company called hill corps for $4600000000.00. the problem is the world doesn't see a drop in emissions. they still exist, but a publicly traded company with shareholders and activists has now offloaded verifiable emissions to a company that has little incentive to declare them. so this is what we're going to do will pick up on carbon trading right after this report from christmas salumi in

new york. that's where our authorities are promising to have 70 percent of their electricity come from renewable sources by 2030. it's one of the most ambitious clean energy plans in the country. in the heart of new york said the legendary big alice, once the world's largest electric generating unit, its owner rise, light and power. now wants to make it the cleanest with plans to build the largest battery facility in the country right here in 2 years, a storage facility for renewable energy. what are the challenges that you face to meet this deadline in terms of the c o, clint plumber acknowledges it won't be easy. our challenge is new york show, jen. it's also the countries challenge and world challenges. how do we transition from a economy? a city that's run primarily on fossil fuels for as long as that electricity, one that's focusing on now running on clean energy infrastructure, the large electromagnet. they're taking their dirtiest carbon spewing oil and gas,

fire generators, offline to make way for the batteries. they'll also need transmission lines to tie into wind and solar farms outside the city. but currently renewables make up just 2 percent of down state energy. new york is attempting to win itself off of fossil fuels. at the same time, it's taking another major source of carbon, free electricity, offline the indian point, nuclear power plant in 2019. this facility alone was responsible for 13 percent of the state's power. while environmentalists long push for it's closure, some are now arguing nuclear power is currently the only carbon free technology able to replace fossil fuels. they point out the state is building more natural gas facilities to make up the difference. if you look at the examples of germany and vermont and california, there are small studies that have shown that when you get rid of nuclear in general air pollution and carbon emissions actually increase. still others say to switch to

renewables has to start happening for new york power to be carbon free by 2040 right now. barrier technology when solar technology, this tremendous effort underway to make those technologies less expensive, more reliable, and were possible smaller. all agree the need to keep the lights on and eliminate fossil fuels. i mean, there must be change on the horizon. christian salumi al jazeera new york. so that's just one story of the energy transition. and as we said earlier, many companies are using carbon credits to a their transition to renewables. but are they fit for purpose? well, my next guest is nikolai bartlett's is the global director of climate change environment monitoring advisory, c. d. p. thanks for speaking to us and counting the cost. your latest research find about half of the world's biggest 500 companies are indeed factoring carbon

accounting in their business plans. but let's just look at the top half empty for a moment's at this stage in our climate emergency. it's not really good enough is it's no indeed. i mean, we have seen an 80 percent jump in the last 5 years of companies internalizing carbon costs. and those driving different investment fissions, but we need to see a much higher proportion of them doing so as you've just articulated carbon the pricing ultimately places and monetary value on, on carbon itself. and whether it's in to regulation or what the companies do it themselves. the a, mr. trigger, a change in investment decisions. and of course, there's a direct link between companies doing this and the regulation in the market. we've also seen that it does drive change when it's huge, so it goes hand in hand with some of the, the emission reduction activities that companies of doing. so we see a direct correlation. those companies that use the price and those companies that are setting science based targets, investing in renewable energy, etc,

directly correlated at the same time i have, it's interesting to see, you know, this year we've seen a big spike in, for example, the european emission trading scheme in terms of prices, the median company a cook, the price, the median price can we see companies are reporting to us that they use internally is about 28 dollars. now this is below where the e t, yes spike to this year. so it seems to me that not only more companies need to do it, but the, the prices that they use need to increase, right? so let me ask you this, the cost of renewables are falling. and now is the time to push ahead and leave straggling companies behind anything else other than that will just look like socializing their failures, will it? absolutely, absolutely. and of course it's not just about the noodles, and it's not just about common pricing regulation per se. there are a myriad of regulation signals that are coming down the market faust in many

countries, almost all countries right now, whether it be targets, whether it be standards, whether it, whether it be incentives, whether it be investment path patton's changing. these are changing the way in which we need to invest in the future and the assets we make in the future. we've seen a continuous increase in carbon pricing itself regulation over the last many years . we're about 60 full jurisdictions have a carbon priced right now, whether at a state or provincial level or at a national level. and of course, china announced that it will be launching and emissions rating system in 2021. but we need this quicker and we needed foster. and in terms of, of, of, of carbon pricing itself. it is incredibly helpful. full sectors such as cement and steel, where renewables and cain energy will not be the only solution to, to the technology challenges they have. you also have this announcement by the

e u that it plans to have a buddha tax adjustment, which means that the cost of carbon will be included in the cost of those products if they brought in from outside of the european union. and i think this is also really interesting and something that companies need to watch out for local were mentioning b p earlier on and b, p has sold at alaska oil business. the new buyer is a private company. so this is good for b p. but those emissions still exist, who's actually monitoring the private buyer? well, this is a really interesting question. and of course we may see more of this is the trend in the future. we see that with a significant number of fossil fuel assets right now, going into private hands, private equity. i think what we're seeing is we obviously need regulation and we need monitoring. now we have increased scrutiny on those companies who are listed and we need to now stop shine. the spotlight on the companies that are not listed and regulation is vital, of course. but all of the monitoring that needs to happen by and g o is by civil society by,

by the media. and particularly by the investment community themselves. we work with over 9600 investors that have about 110 trillion in assets. and over the last 20 years we've been working with them to get companies to measure and manage these type of emissions rates as low many banks. apologies. i mean, look at banks for a moment. so while they talk about net 0 targets, that hasn't really stop them from continuing to finance, coal oil as well as gas ventures. absolutely. we have a, another piece of analysis coming out in about a weeks time, which really looks at what banks have disclosing to us. and while you see a significant number of banks saying they're aligning their own internal practices . and if they investment and lending decisions with the parents agreement with a below 2 degree world, this is not yet translated into a shift in their portfolios. we need to see that we need to see it quickly. i think not enough focus has been put on the banking community in the space. so we have the

momentum. now we have the scrutiny and i think civil society and other aptis. that's where they need to be. focus the financing of these things, needs to stop and banks play a major role in that. ok, nikolai bartlett, thank you so much for speaking to us from london. thank you very much. now before we leave this topic, one more report for you and it's important on so many levels because china is the world's biggest emitter of greenhouse gases, president she, japan has pledged to fight climate change, but the government continues to build new co plants. one of the leading sources of carbon emissions. katrina, you reports of judging and chang province. plumes of toxic smoke leaking from power plants and factories is a common sight and shanty. the northwestern province has for decades powered china's economic growth primarily by burning coal. it's contributed to the nation, becoming the world's top to lucia, responsible for roughly one 3rd of global carbon emissions. the cold industry

employs most of the people who live here. oh, pollution living. it's been polluting for decades. if they shut down all the factories or what are we going to do? everyone worked for the factories. last year this region produced about 1100000000 tons of coal, toners reliance on burning coal as its main source of entity is its biggest obstacle to lowering carbon emissions. the government is struggling to find ways to curb it's years of coal without affecting jobs or harming economic growth. pollution caused by burning fossil fuels regularly shrouds the capital in heavy smoke. beijing, his pledge to peak carbon emissions by 2030 and eliminate them altogether by 2060. but it's yet to detail how exactly it plans to achieve this is not only about commitment is all about though, where we actually do rise in the next 5 years. we're expected china can implement more concrete policies and to, to give us

a more clear roadmap. how are they gonna achieve these 2? are carbon targets increasing the use of renewable energy sources is crucial. china is already the world's largest producer of wind and solar power. it's also the biggest market for electric vehicles. the government has tightened regulations to pressure con makers into transitioning away from gas. but many say that's not enough. u. s. climate envoy john kerry was in shanghai trying to convince authorities to do more. the eager to 3 in agree bigler. 44 big country with 1400000000 people to the these goals are not easily delivered. some countries are asking china to do more on climate change. i'm afraid this is not very realistic. researchers say china must close down more than 500 coal fired power plants in the next decade to meet its climate pledges. but it continues to approve new ones at a faster rate than anywhere else in the world. the sion she government is planning to close down some older factories here and build what it says. oh, greener,

more efficient whole facilities. some parts of china, at least it seems. the road to clean energy will be long and slower. katrina, you al jazeera, says she, province, china the now think new zealand. what comes to mind the all blacks rugby team? it's mallory culture and it's picturesque landscape. and yes, it's exceptional handling of the pandemic. but it's also been known as a leader in the field of economics. back in 1989 new zealand central bank was the 1st to commit to a specific target for consumer price inflation venue. the biggest threat to the world economy. at the time, there was great opposition to the idea, but inflation fell from 8 to 2 percent over 2 years. and inflation targets were adopted by most central banks to tame runaway prices. so wouldn't surprise you that the prime minister to send to our dirt has tossed the central bank to limit the

rise of house prices. an important issue globally, when you consider, despite the pandemic house prices have stored in new zealand, the average house price increased by 24.3 percent to $826000.00 new zealand dollars and march 2021 a record high for the country. now this is such an important issue globally on so many levels. so let's get some analysis from oakland. we're joined by bernie smith, who's the chief executive officer of the monte celia housing trash. thanks so much for speaking to us on counting the cost, the prime minister to send the order and was a little elected on the promise of housing affordable housing. how's that going? it's not been going very well for the government at all. and frank, the 4 years and 10 so far prices rapidly increased to the extent that it's actually creating homelessness

and costing the government a $1000000.00 a day, just an emergency and transitional housing. so how did i get to the point where there's a chronic housing shortage with president government would suggest that it was the previous, a national government, but they know, as well as we know on the ground that it's been a decades in the making a by governments on the right and the left have that a real desire to have a market driven economy because it means a healthy economy. they haven't been building the houses the level that they did in the fifties and sixties. and you know, the population has gone from 2000000 to 5000000 and we were just in the situation. now that seems impossible to turn around,

but i'm sure we will at some time. so is it possible to come point one reason or several reasons behind the house price raises? it's, is it speculation the central banks printing money building regulations high immigration? what is that, or is it a combination of all of those? it's a combination of one of those speculators, for instance, if i got a $1000000.00 in the bank that day, i'm going to gain about point 5 percent interest, which is very little retain. i could buy a house for a $1000000.00, and i flick it in a couple of years some in some cases by can flip it on months. and mike, hundreds of thousands of april a that taking advantage of the lack of supply of housing. and

of course, of a government assisting low income families with income related rained. so the speculation has continued. they the central bank as much as the government does desired to un, hender it in the same, so from stopping or slowing down the housing market as safer bank a spice to be totally independent and it's mind drivers to ensure that the economy stays healthy. so really the government has no swipe on what it does. it can give advice, but a cons. instruct what happened to the government. $2000000000.00 planned to build more housing key. we build a rebuild, became the laughing stock of, of fun, usina. and i really because we billed,

was trumpeted as part of their election came buying to, to build $100000.00 houses per year. and so that i've had 10 years. so $10000.00 a year, the steve, they wrote about $300.00 and of those $300.00 there were barely able to sell a half of ice. they're building them in the wrong locations. the price benchmarks were in correct. so that taken that target away totally. and now instead of having inspirational policy says they go the key rebuild, that they've got what they call foundational a policy. so in other words, we're not going to say any targets or in this for the long haul. and i'm the now i

starting to get a little bit of traction on the, on the key we build development, but we're talking about one or 2000. we're not talking about tens of thousands at this point. right. and do you think that it would be possible for the central bank to control house prices, inflation there's, there's no doubt that they are central bank could control a fly. so chinese, but the difficulty is they need to manage the economy as a hall. and i don't see it as i understand it as the key responsibility. it's really the government's responsibility by ensuring that the government pozole the labors at possibly chain to ensure that that housing. and that is a roy to every individual in this country, in many countries across the world that everyone has an opportunity,

withers rainbow, or whether it's a purchase and the government's just not doing it because they're becoming more central. and i believe the, the more focused on being re elected in a couple of years than what they are in the st. so, being practiced on the needs of families that are falling into homelessness. and i focus their own bernice has said the chief executive officer of the month of cecilia housing trust. thank you so much for speaking to us from auckland. no worries at all. thank you. and finally, gold has become one of iraq's top exports, despite there being no gold deposits in the country. in 2020 iraq exported nearly a $1000000000.00 worth to turkey alone. so what's the secret osama bin job aid reports from baghdad. in an old bagdad workshop, the same melting pot has been used for decades. natural dilemma converts old gold

into 21 carrot bars. in the chemical process, each element is carefully measured and added according to the weight. he's been doing it for years, but business is not what it was before. the 2003 us invasion. now with the rising demand for newer and final designs, most of his orders go to turkey or gulf states for local goldsmiths. it's difficult to compete with more than machinery, cheap electricity, and labor. and it's minute. i'm nanny. we hope the government supports us with new machine. we want support for the workshops and we demand to stop exporting gold. gold is now among iraq, stop, 3 exports after oil. the trade with turkey alone has reached nearly a $1000000000.20 in 2019 doesn't produce gold, but imports it from other countries. and gold traders export it for processing into jewelry. so now lear and this read, the local gl industry has died,

not just go but all local industries and there's a lack of electricity. eric is not attractive for investment and not business friendly. 3 or traders in business then go to turkey and other countries because it is better quality and cheaper and high. so how much gold goes in and out of iraq? apparently, there is no clear data. we asked the ministry of trade, who directed us to the ministry of finance, who told us to ask the central bank, which in turn said that data must be kept by them in history of planning. why it can be often was told that in fact this issue of how much is imported is not our job. we only plan for the quality and legal import out of the organization for quality and standards monitors. goldsmith all over iraq. also, we have offices at border crossings and airports to guarantee quality and reduce smugly. deep rooted corruption and a weak economy makes it easier for black market operators to move things across

borders. diplomatic sources told out there are due to lack security crossings. and lawlessness is gold being smuggled from neighboring countries. and iraq economic uncertainty leads to increase local demand despite the current could no virus pandemic. this bar of gold costs about $55000.00 in today's market because of iraq security. many families are investing in precious metals, rather than keeping their money in dollars or the nurse from glittering religious sites to important social occasions erupting have had a century or relationship with gold. and as the precious commodity is now a major economic entity, they want the government to ensure it adds to the economy rather than taking away from it from the job without their back that. and that's or so for this week, but there's more for you online at al jazeera dot com slash ctc. that'll take you straight to our page, which has entire episodes for you to catch up on. i'm daddy navigator you've been

watching, counting the. com. thanks for joining us. the news on al jazeera is next ah, stepped beyond the comfort zone, where assumptions are challenged, traveled to the ends of the earth, and further experience the unimaginable of the people who live it is probably the most extreme situation i've been involved in. how quickly things contract award winning documentaries, but also a perception witness. on al jazeera, the listening post cuts through the noise, we're talking about competing assets. they seeing monday tools being used to perpetuate there's competing narrative separating spin from fuck all 3 versions of the story and then some element of the truth. but the full story remains and content hung packing the stories you're being told. it's not

a science story at all. it's a story about politics, the listening post your guide to the media on a jesse uta. ah, this is al jazeera. i'm darian abigail with a check on your world headlines. the u. k. prime minister has warned its health service will be under considerable pressure and coming. reese is army crankcase. a serge. what countries across europe are imposing new restrictions? boris johnson has ruled out additional measures where we challenge reports from london. pupils returned to english schools on tuesday after the crisp.