The BeachBoys: An Ocean Folks Series

The first I heard of the BeachBoys, as they are known, was in Sean Christies’ book, “Life Under Nelson Mandela Boulevard: Life Among The Stowaways”. Christie had identified and befriended a small but significant sub-culture, originating in Dar-Es-Salam, Tanzania. 

Like much of the global south, urban migration has altered Tanzania’s landscape. People flooding into towns and cities looking for work and opportunities, have to make do with sprawling informal settlements. With few services, rivers of shit and roaming gangs of footpads, these can be precarious places to establish a life. The lucky succeed and move out. The rest can only dream of escape. 

 The BeachBoys built a sub-culture around heroic narratives of stowing away onboard vessels lining Dar-Es-Salam’s harbour. So called due to their habit of watching the huge freighters glide past from the beaches, their goal was to hitch a ride to the riches of Europe where ones fortune was ripe for the plucking. But the destination was secondary to the passage and what it represented…a chance, an opportunity, a way out. 

Years of absence were common amongst the BeachBoys. World tours with far flung destinations, Rio, Cape Town, Rotterdam. No matter how miserable the squalor or pernicious the danger, they would not return to Dar-es-Salam empty handed. The only homecoming conceivable was a mariner’s return, tales of exotic destinations, adversaries overcome, opportunities seized and pockets full of cash. 

Every step of the way there was adversity. Captains would often times trick discovered stowaways ashore in Cape Town, where security was more pliable than the fortress ports of the West. Or that self same, port security would hound them night after night, preventing them catching another ride. 

In the meantime they melted into Cape Town’s exploding tent city, that colonises the forlorn urban expanse of the Foreshore. Graffiti extolling BeachBoy hardship and ventures, was one of the few indications that they were here. And the BeachBoys live hard. Plastic sheeted huts are their only protection from Cape Town’s howling Souther Easterly wind and freezing winter rains. The acrid smell of burning plastic hangs in low clouds. “Europe” They told me “Please help me get to Europe”. 

But aside for the sunny weather, the  squalid conditions are the same as the “The Jungle”, Europe’s mega immigrant shanty town located in Calais. Like a starling’s murmuration, the Jungle ripples, ducks and reforms to rhythm of the Gendarmes batons, stretching throughout the frozen wastelands of the port. Neither permanent or ethereal. 

The ills of substance abuse cuts a wide swath. Common amongst the residences is the mumbled incoherence of a tik high, or the manic neediness of the down- men desperate for a moments respite from the reality of their failure to escape. 

As a mariner I have not been blind to these migrants congregating at the fringes of ports worldwide. Their status is often informal, they glide between the legal and shadow worlds, running tasks and errands for crews. SIM cards, forex, cigarettes and booze are their bread and butter. Over the years these communities have both increased in population, and been driven further from the burgeoning port fence lines, where as many as three, razor wire topped lines delineate those whom are welcome and those that are not. The post 9/11 security landscape a stark divergence from the free-for-all of old.

My interaction with stowaways has been largely theoretical - security drills to search and find stowaways onboard, conducted in hot spots, in an era where governments increasingly penalise ship’s Masters and ship-owners for carrying undocumented people. The dispensed wisdom at these drills is to treat any found, with caution. They are likely to be desperate to evade capture and imprisonment. Stowaway determination continually outflanks the security designed to defeat them, often with appalling results. 

After signing on a vessel I knew well, the Chief Mate said they had issues on the previous mission. A noxious odour emanating from the starboard chain locker had revealed itself to be a decomposing corpse sitting atop a pile of chain. During a previous port call, a young man swam out as the vessel swung at anchor. Climbing up the anchor chain he took refuge in the chain locker. Classified as an enclosed space, access to these areas are closely regulated by health and safety regulation. Active ventilation, breathing apparatus and gas samples are the minimum requirements prior to entry. 

As metal rusts, the oxidisation process uses up the ambient oxygen. In unventilated spaces this process gradually lowers oxygen levels, until the atmosphere can no longer support life. A silent, painless death was the fate for this poor soul.

An episode that accentuate the risks the BeachBoys take, happened years prior to this. I was partaking in a Trans Atlantic yacht race. One beautiful morning Mid Atlantic one of race fleet members came across the young man tied to a barrel, bobbing in the clear azure sea. He had jumped aboard a Greek flagged vessel in Cape Verde. Although he had stayed concealed for a number of days, he eventually ran out of food and water and surrendered to the crew. A first they treated him well, but some days in, the Captain behaviour changed and he ordered the crew to throw the man overboard. He was lucky, a couple more knots of wind, slight bigger swell, or a distracted watch and and the yacht would not have seen him. He would have perished in an unimaginably cruel way.

As our globalised order breaks down and reconfigures, nation states re-forge their identities and look inwards once more. Fuelled by the glossy magazine consumer porn of modern life, those of us that are lucky enough to have, are decreasingly likely to share. As those of us that “have not”, hungrily search for their slice….the collision of these realities can often be tragic.

Post-Pandemic Dreaming: 5 wishes for re-imagining our world

A decade on from our last economic crash we are in the grasp of another, which by all account will require huge government bailouts. This time around we need to learn from our mistakes, bailouts do not equate to business as usual. If taxpayer money is being spent these are the issues I would like to address.

1: Drawing the curtain on hydrocarbons

The simplest reason for this is that it is inevitable. Fossil fuels by their very nature are a finite resource. At current consumption levels we will have extracted all known reserves of crude oil and coal within 50 years.

Oil companies understand this, but want to maximise their profit on investment by eking out every last dollar from carbon extraction. Arguably they also want to stave off a slide into global irrelevance.

Bear in mind, the Seven Sisters have controlled one of the most geo-politically important industries for over a century. Whilst the ownership has gradually transitioned into state owned entities, the New Seven Sisters, the global political clout that comes with control of hydrocarbon reserves is undimmed.

From forming policy, rubbing shoulder with the great and good, plotting invasion and coups the industry faces an ignoble slide to insignificance.

More importantly however is the recognition, that oil is bad for our health and terminal for the health of our planet. Science estimates that burning our existing reserves would raise global temperature by 6–10 ºC, whilst the resulting air pollution would kill 4.6 million people per annum. The IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel On Climate Change) estimates that to retain a habitable planet we need to stay inside a warming envelope of 2 ºC .

“Transitioning to renewables would hurt our economy” is a familiar refrain, from the lobbyists and apologists for the industry. However a poorly published fact fatally undermines this argument: the level of global tax relief and taxpayer subsidies extended to the fossil fuel industry.

For the last three decades, fossil fuel industries have been receiving eye water ing subsidies worth between $7–15 Trillion, per annum. Put another way, that is between 5–10% of global GDP. These monies have been employed to cement their standing as the wealthiest and most influential industries ever known to humanity. Lobbying, fake news and a merciless defence of their privilege, via bodies such as the Heartland Institute have hampered the transition from fossil fuels.

Imagine however, our progress along the path to a carbon neutral economic transition if renewables had anywhere near the same level of policy or financial support.

When it comes to energy generation, renewables are already competing with fossil fuels on price, even without that support. Indeed, as the mix feeding into the global electricity grid changes to include more renewables, this will continue to drive up the per unit-cost of fossil fuels. This inefficiency will accelerate when the dearth of cheap loans to fund infrastructure filters through the system, as lending institutions become aware of the public relations catastrophe of being associated with the fossil fuel industry.

All in all, fossil fuels are on an irrevocable losing streak. There is no sense in courting global self-immolation by extending the life of an industry, already in terminal decline.

2: Provenance of Raw Materials and Minerals

A radical re-imagining of our economy is required to move towards carbon neutrality. A central tenet of this re-imagining will be technology and innovation, as new solution are used to meet existing requirements; think electric vehicles replacing combustion based models. This will place sourcing challenges on the raw elements used in this new tech, for instance the cobalt used in the manufacture of Li-On batteries that power those zero emission vehicles.

It seems certain that increasing demand this will spark a new scramble for resources as lesser elements become strategically important. History has shown us that the scramble for resources has resulted in litany of morally questionable blowback, including wars, coups or the bank rolling of murderous dictators. Furthermore, the impact of extractive industries on countries without a robust legislative and governance frameworks is more often than not dire.

Think Angola, where oil receipts account for an income of $8.5 billion per quarter, yet the portion of the population now living on $1.9 per day has increased over the last decade from 30–47%.

The Luanda Leaks documented in lurid details what became of the oil wealth. Of how the former President’s daughter, Isabella Dos Santos, embezzled her way to a $3billion fortune. How much her father, former President Jose Eduardo Dos Santos, managed to embezzled during his 38 year reign will likely remain unknown, probably even to himself.

The same pattern, where the elite live in gilded wealth whilst the poor deal with the human rights and environmental consequence of the extraction, is depressingly repetitive. More so upon the realisation that it is our pattern of consumption that ultimately fuels this hideous travesty.

As consumers however, it is impossible to access the information that will allow for ethical and informed purchasing choices. Every time I fill my tank, I have no concept of whether I am funding the state sanctioned dismemberment of journalists (looking at you, Saudi Arabia) or topping up the Government Pension Fund of Norway.

I do however, have a better chance of understanding whether the profits made from supplying the tantalum found in my mobile phone, is being used to arm militias in East Kivu, DRC (Democratic Republic Of Congo), simply because the US government has fulfilled its obligation and legislated on this issue.

As of 2014, Section 1502 of the Hobbs-Frank act came into effect in the US, which requires all publicly traded companies to conduct due diligence on their supply chain from source to smelter, of defined conflict minerals (cassiterite, gold, wolframite, coltan, tin). The legal requirement is that companies are responsible for ensurer ensuring that raw products entering into their supply chain do not contribute to human rights abuses. The European Union is due to enact a similar law on the 1st Jan, 2021.

The major question is why stop at these limited conflict minerals. Surely if we have the capacity and methodology to police these supply chain we can police many others, including some of the most destructive which include, oil and gold.

Is it not time to ensure that our purchasing behaviour is not funding the misery of people, far removed? In an ever more interconnected world, if we fail to take responsibility for providing people with stable and safe homes, can we really be surprised when they appear on our doorstep seeking refuge?

3: Build for the entire life cycle

Mapping supply chains is a time consuming process, which the industry has been reluctant to engage in. The solution to this onerous task is simple, recycling.

The consumer products we purchase to plug into our lifestyle have a limited life span determined by material wear, fragility or simply built-in obsolescence.

That 48 months down the line these products end up in a land fill should not be a surprise, but the lack of planning for this final stage of a product’s lifecycle is.

Bear in mind many of these products contain materials that are either finite or that extoll a significant environmental cost during extraction. A typical smart phone, for instance, contains tantalum, gold, silver, platinum and palladium.

Gold has total reserves that are estimated to be 240’000 metric tonnes, or just over 5 Olympic swimming pools. That over 4 of these pools has already been extracted, demonstrates the wisdom of designing products for efficient disassembly and recycling.

In fact, I would go one step further and legislate that every manufacturer is responsible for their products for the full life cycle. Externalising the cost of disposing and treating waste, is no longer a viable socially responsible model.

This would have two benefits. Firstly, given the added complexity and cost of waste management, the onus would be on manufacturing quality rather than quantity. Products that served us for longer would be the goal, rather than the next best gimmick.

Secondly the purchasing model would change, transitioning from ownership to some form of “rental”, with the item returned when its useful life was over. This item would be recycled by the manufacturer and new unit provided.

This same model would be applicable to all manufacturing and would make inroads into adjusting some of our most wasteful habits.

Fast fashion, for instance, is defined by cheap, poor quality garments that employ detrimental environmental and labour practices. Research shows that they are generally worn less often prior to being discarded. As a consequence, their cost is misleading at check out, given that cost per usage might be higher than more expensive items.

All told, there is only one winner in our current consumer goods manufacturing model: the manufacturer. The environment, labour rights and our wallets all come out second best. It is time to level that playing field.

4: Tax havens

As was widely reported during the 2008 global crash the most telling is the difference between words and action. Life-long free market evangelists were suddenly extolling the virtues of government market interference in the form of bailouts. Yet naturally these bailouts were aimed at those that created the crisis rather than those who bore the impact through unemployment or home repossession.

A decade on, whilst those same bailed out institutions are back operating as usual, the cost on the remainder of society remains palpable. Wages have stagnated, cost of living increased and public services were slashed, as we struggle to reduce the huge budget deficits brought on by the bailouts.

“Socialism for the rich and capitalism for the poor” is how Michael Harrington first succinctly expressed this phenomenon in 1962. Yet, this doesn’t even begin to express the level to which taxpayers have been taken for a ride.

Not only was risk taking as a phenomenon seen to increase as a consequence of the bailouts, but many of the bailed out institutions had the temerity to use tax havens as a vehicle for reducing their tax burdens. There can be no more eloquent message of the contempt than banks short changing the very stakeholders that are, to this day, still paying for their bailouts.

In 2020 this needs to be clearcut: the path to the public purse is not one way. As bailed out institutions amply demonstrated post 2008, the concept of civic responsibility was unable to filter into the moral vacuum of the boardroom. That being the case, governments need to clearly legislate against and regulate the employment of tax havens to reduced tax obligations.

Failure to meet with these measures simply means businesses will not be eligible for bailouts.

Going further, the end goal would be to regulate against banking privacy laws. Switzerland was pressured to share account information with tax authorities in 2018 and whilst the EU has attempted to bring pressure by withholding development aid from additional blacklisted tax havens, this is clearly insufficient.

Current estimates of global losses are around $500 billion per year due to aggressive tax avoidance. Furthermore, the rate by which multinationals are seeking tax avoidance strategies is increasing. A world where tax burdens are shifted from business to citizens is unsustainable and actively contributes to decreasing global stability, by driving up inequality.

Unilateral action needs to be taken. How this is tackled, whether by outlawing transactions with entities registered in defined tax havens or by re-writing tax regulation to suit a globalised world, this reform is long past due.

5: Deal with big tech

The behavioural modification empires of Google, Facebook, Amazon et al have been colonising our public and private space, by stealth for over a decade. By creating a new industry, these giants have taken advantage of the fact that no and/or ineffective legislation exists to police their behaviour.

For instance, the maximum fine set by the UK’s 1998 Data Protection Act was £500’000. This was duly levied against Facebook, when it was found guilty of failing to safeguard user data in connection with the Cambridge Analytica scandal.

Given that this sum represents 5 minutes of Facebook’s revenue stream, the company would have earned significantly more during the time it took to draft the correspondence informing them of the judgement.

The misuse of personal data is just part of the story, however. The impact of these “digital gangsters” on democratic processes is still very poorly understood.

One facet, that has been well demonstrated, is the corporate ethics that rule this new industry. For instance, Facebook’s decision to use an anti-Semitic smear against George Soros to distract attention from the Cambridge Analytica scandal is case in point.

Herein lies the nub of the problem: questionable ethics coupled with a lack of transparency and accountability, a toxic cocktail do make (for tax avoidance see above). When we allow this to exist alongside an environment of ineffective or outdated legislations, the problems are simply exacerbated.

The solution, however, is pretty obvious as shown by Australia’s creation of a purpose-built regulatory body with a responsibility for policing and investigating these behemoths. In addition, that body should be tasked with formulating new legislation that will limit the most egregious aspect of these companies.

Just as we chose how advertisers could behave on traditional media, we need to move with the times and ensure digital behavioural manipulation occurs within well-defined and palatable boundaries. Failure to do so threatens not only our mental wellbeing but the foundations of democracy.