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HULs top management while addressing a post-earnings media briefing indicated that inflation will remain a worry for the FMCG industry in the March quarter too, and any relief can be expected only in the second half of the calendar year.

January 20, 2022 / 08:47 PM IST

Inflation, a constant worry for FMCG companies since the onset of the pandemic, will continue unabated for the next two quarters and will moderate only in the second half of the calendar year 2022, indicated Hindustan Unilevers (HUL) top management during a virtual media briefing on January 20.

We are seeing unprecedented inflation; something we have not seen for at least last 30 years. And this is not demand-led but supply-led because of disruptions across the world. I believe, that hopefully in the second half of the year, we should see some moderation in inflation, said Sanjiv Mehta, chairman and managing director, HUL addressing a post-earnings media briefing.

The companys chief financial officer Ritesh Tiwari too chimed in and said the company expects a further rise in inflation in the March quarter.

In the near term, the operating environment looks challenging, and we expect to see sequentially more inflation in the March quarter as compared to the December quarter, he added.

FMCG companies are grappling with the rise in prices of several key commodities such as palm oil, and crude-linked derivatives for several quarters now. Despite taking price hikes of several rounds, the companies have been unable to pass on the increased costs to consumers given the quantum of inflation and fearing an impact on demand. This in turn has dented their margins.

HUL has also taken several rounds of price hikes. The company increased the prices of its soaps and detergents by 3-20 percent earlier this month, after taking a 1-33 percent increase across the product portfolio in November.

According to HULs management, the companys raw material costs are up by 30 percent as compared to FY20, most of which is on account of commodities such as palm oil and crude-linked derivatives. Palm oil is a key raw material for soaps, while crude-linked derivatives areessential for detergents and packaging material.

About two-thirds of our business is exposed to these commodities, said Tiwari.

HUL houses soap brands such as Lux, Dove, Rexona, Lifebuoy, Liril, Pears and detergent brands such as Surf Exceland Rin.

Rural slowdown a drag

A tepid rural demand has further complicated matters for FMCG companies. While rural demand remained resilient with the onset of the pandemic and even during the second wave, the second quarter of FY22 witnessed a downturn.

CMD Mehta flagged off the rural slowdown while reporting second-quarter results in October. Rural demand in the past few quarters has been resilient thanks to government initiatives such as higher spending on the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (MGNREGS), food subsidies, direct cash transfers to farmers, and a decent harvest, Mehta had said then.

Now, as mobility improves and urban markets see a pickup, rural centres, though they are still growing, their growth rates have moderated, he added.

The demand scenario in rural areas, indicated HULs management, further weakened in the quarter gone by.

Though the headline value growth is still there in rural India, the volumes growth has turned negative, said Mehta, while addressing the media briefing.

While the company is unable to introduce price hikes in rural India, given the unsupportive demand scenario, it has reduced the grammage of its low-unit products (LUPs), resulting in a drop in its sales volume.

Almost 30 percent of our business comes from packs that operate at magic price points of Rs 1, Rs 5, and 10. In these packs instead of increasing pricing, we reduce grammage; as a result, the same number of units sold leads to volume decline and this has an impact on our volumes, said Tiwary.

HUL reported volume growth of 2 percent in the third quarter-ended December as compared to 4 percent growth registered in the second quarter.

CMD Mehta called for government interventions such as increasing the outlay under MGNREGS for the recovery of the rural economy and demand regeneration.

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Inflation to moderate in the second half of 2022: HULs Sanjiv Mehta - Moneycontrol

The international community is closely monitoring the Taliban, after the group re-seized power in Afghanistan in August 2021.

There is legitimate reason for concern. The Taliban are again ruling through fear and draconian rules.

The Talibans last regime, in the mid-1990s, was marked by human rights violations, including massacres, mass detentions and rape. The regime collapsed on Nov. 14, 2001, shortly after the U.S. launched its global war on terrorism.

Even after the Taliban officially fell from power, their subsequent two decades of insurgency produced various gross human rights violations, an encompassing term under international human rights law.

When the Taliban regained control over Afghanistan last year, some outside observers speculated that an evolved version of the group might materialize. These spectators assumed that the Taliban recognized it cannot govern merely with fear and bans.

Many Afghan people still expressed widespread fear and skepticism about the Talibans return.

The Taliban have now been in power for almost five months. A clearer image of the human rights and personal freedoms situation in Afghanistan is emerging.

As political science professors specializing in conflict and violence, we find that the Talibans changes are limited to international public relations campaigns on social media and other outlets.

While promoting a moderate face to the world, with promises of living peacefully and respecting womens rights, the regime has continued to systematically violate human rights and strengthen its autocratic grip.

Theories about what experts called Taliban 2.0 continued after the group assumed control over Afghanistan.

Representatives from countries such as Turkey and Qatar encouraged the international community to engage with the Taliban.

While international donors have frozen about $5 billion in foreign aid to Afghanistan since the Taliban takeover, some Western countries, including the U.S., have announced increases in aid to address the countrys humanitarian crisis.

The Taliban have undertaken a systematic media crackdown to achieve their contradictory goals of presenting a softer face to the international community while violating Afghans rights.

The group is forcing media to follow two of the Talibans dogmatic and moral regulatory bodies guidelines.

The Taliban also announced the 11 journalism rules, which include forbidding journalists from publishing or broadcasting stories that are contrary to Islam or insult national figures.

About 40% of the countrys media sources have shut down, 6,400 journalists lost their jobs, including 84% of female journalists. Violence against media and journalists has again become widespread.

Many other journalists have left the country.

The media crackdown has a practical reason: limiting the flow of information about the regimes continued rights violations.

United Nations human rights experts say they have received credible reports of the Taliban killing civilians, as well as hundreds of former Afghanistan security personnel across the country.

The Taliban have shown gruesome hangings of dead bodies and stoning of people to death.

Meanwhile, the humanitarian situation has deteriorated under the Taliban. Approximately 23 million Afghans are facing hunger, including 3.2 million children who are suffering from severe malnutrition.

The Taliban leadership denies any responsibility for alleviating the looming humanitarian crisis.

In November 2021, Taliban Prime Minister Mullah Hasan rejected the regimes responsibility for food insecurity in Afghanistan and asked people to cry to God to alleviate famine and drought.

Anas Haqqani, a senior member of the Taliban negotiation team in Doha, also downplayed the seriousness of the looming hunger crisis by rhetorically asking a BBC reporter if she had ever witnessed someone dying of hunger.

The Talibans conduct toward girls and women also reveals a return to previous ways.

The Taliban has banned women from traveling more than 72 kilometers from home without a male relative.

In early December, the Taliban released a decree saying a woman is a noble and free human being and should not be forced into a marriage. The international community largely welcomed the announcement.

However, a closer look at the decree reveals that the Taliban formalizes the regimes right to determine whether a woman actually consents to a union.

The Taliban have systematically reinstated old restrictions on girls education and female employment.

While most primary girls schools are closed across the country, secondary and tertiary education remains completely banned for girls.

In 2017, U.N. Childrens Fund figures showed that 3.7 million Afghan children were out of school, 60% of them girls. This percentage is now likely much greater with the Talibans ban on girls education.

This differs from the Talibans recent public messaging on girls and womens right to education and work.

[The Conversations Politics + Society editors pick need-to-know stories. Sign up for Politics Weekly.]

To the domestic audience, the regimes messages are vague. Leaders condition reopening girls education, for example, to unclear economic and moral conditions. Deputy Prime Minister Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar said recently that once economic challenges are resolved, we will provide education for all those who want to pursue their studies.

The Taliban have also banned most female government workers from returning to their jobs, resulting in a workforce restriction that would result in economic losses totaling $1 billion.

The only indication of a new Taliban is a much more sophisticated and strategic public relations approach for masking ongoing human rights violations.

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Taliban 2.0 aren't so different from the first regime, after all - The Conversation AU

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The shares are trading at $1.23. For more information, please visit the company's website, http://www.ReliqHealth.com or email IR@ReliqHealth.com. Investor Relations in the United States is handled by Ben Shamsian of Lytham Partners, who can be reached at 649-829-9701 or by email at shamsian@LythamPartners.com.

About InvestmentPitch Media

Investmentpitch Media leverages the power of video, which together with its extensive distribution, positions a company's story ahead of the 1,000's of companies seeking awareness and funding from the financial community. The company specializes in producing short videos based on significant news releases, research reports and other content of interest to investors.

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InvestmentPitch Media Video Discusses Reliq Health, a Rapidly Growing Global Telemedicine Company, and its Partnership with Cognizant to Expand Care...

The following essay is reprinted with permission from The Conversation, an online publication covering the latest research.

At the end of 2020, it seemed hard to imagine a worse year for misinformation on social media, given the intensity of the presidential election and the trauma of the COVID-19 pandemic. But 2021 proved up to the task, starting with the Jan. 6 insurrection and continuing with copious amounts of falsehoods and distortions about COVID-19 vaccines.

To get a sense of what 2022 could hold, we asked three researchers about the evolution of misinformation on social media.

Anjana Susarla, Professor of Information Systems, Michigan State University

While misinformation has always existed in media think of theGreat Moon Hoax of 1835that claimed life was discovered on the moon the advent of social media has significantly increased the scope, spread and reach of misinformation. Social media platforms have morphed intopublic information utilitiesthat control how most people view the world, which makes misinformation they facilitate a fundamental problem for society.

There are two primary challenges in addressing misinformation. The first is the dearth of regulatory mechanisms that address it.Mandating transparency and giving users greater access to and control over their datamight go a long way in addressing the challenges of misinformation. But theres also a need for independent audits, including tools that assess social media algorithms. These can establish how the social media platformschoices in curating news feeds and presenting contentaffect how people see information.

The second challenge is that racial and gender biases in algorithms used by social media platforms exacerbate the misinformation problem. While social media companies have introduced mechanisms tohighlight authoritative sources of information, solutions such as labeling posts as misinformation dont solve racial and gender biases in accessing information. Highlighting relevant sources of, for example, health information may only help users withgreater health literacyand not people with low health literacy, who tend to be disproportionately minorities.

Another problem is the need to look systematically at where users are finding misinformation. TikTok, for example,has largely escaped government scrutiny. Whats more,misinformation targeting minorities, particularly Spanish-language content, may be far worse than misinformation targeting majority communities.

I believe the lack of independent audits, lack of transparency in fact checking and the racial and gender biases underlying algorithms used by social media platforms suggest that the need for regulatory action in 2022 is urgent and immediate.

Dam Hee Kim, Assistant Professor of Communication, University of Arizona

Fake news is hardly a new phenomenon, yet its costs have reached another level in recent years. Misinformation concerning COVID-19 has cost countless lives all over the world. False and misleading information about electionscan shake the foundation of democracy, for instance, by making citizenslose confidence in the political system. Research I conducted with S Mo Jones-Jang and Kate Kenski on misinformation during elections,some publishedand some in progress, has turned up three key findings.

The first is that the use of social media, originally designed to connect people, can facilitate social disconnection. Social media has becomerife with misinformation. This leads citizens who consume news on social media to become cynical not only toward established institutions such as politicians and the media, but also toward fellow voters.

Second, politicians, the media and voters have become scapegoats for the harms of fake news. Few of them actually produce misinformation. Most misinformation is produced byforeign entitiesandpolitical fringe groupswho create fake news for financial or ideological purposes. Yet citizens who consume misinformation on social media tend to blame politicians, the media and other voters.

The third finding is that people who care about being properly informed arenot immune to misinformation. People who prefer to process, structure and understand information in a coherent and meaningful way become more politically cynical after being exposed to perceived fake news than people who are less politically sophisticated. These critical thinkers become frustrated by having to process so much false and misleading information. This is troubling because democracy depends on the participation of engaged and thoughtful citizens.

Looking ahead to 2022, its important to address this cynicism. There has been much talk aboutmedia literacy interventions, primarily to help the less politically sophisticated. In addition, its important to find ways to explain the status of fake news on social media, specifically who produces fake news, why some entities and groups produce it, and which Americans fall for it. This could help keep people from growing more politically cynical.

Rather than blaming each other for the harms of fake news produced by foreign entities and fringe groups, people need to find a way to restore confidence in each other. Blunting the effects of misinformation will help with the larger goal of overcoming societal divisions.

Ethan Zuckerman, Associate Professor of Public Policy, Communication, and Information, UMass Amherst

I expect the idea of misinformation will shift into an idea of propaganda in 2022, as suggested by sociologist and media scholar Francesca Tripodi in herforthcoming book, The Propagandists Playbook. Most misinformation is not the result of innocent misunderstanding. Its the product of specific campaigns to advance a political or ideological agenda.

Once you understand that Facebook and other platforms are the battlegrounds on which contemporary political campaigns are fought, you can let go of the idea that all you need are facts to correct peoples misapprehensions. Whats going on is a more complex mix of persuasion,tribal affiliationandsignaling, which plays out in venues from social media to search results.

As the 2022 elections heat up, I expect platforms like Facebook will reach a breaking point on misinformation because certain lies have become political speech central to party affiliation. How do social media platforms manage when false speech is also political speech?

This article was originally published on The Conversation. Read the original article.

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What Will 2022 Bring in the Way of Misinformation on Social Media? 3 Experts Weigh In - Scientific American

Editor's note: This story is part of Southwest Michigan Second Wave's On the Ground Calhoun County series.

Durk Dunham says when he was younger he couldnt wrap his head around the idea of retirement. He also never thought hed live to be 50. But he did live and he has retired -- almost.

Dunham retired Dec. 16 as director of Calhoun Countys Emergency Management Department after 14 years with the county.

He originally began working with the Countys Emergency Management department as a volunteer and since he is not quite ready to completely step away from the workaday world, he has agreed to once again serve in a volunteer capacity as one of three of the countys Deputy Emergency Management Directors. He also will work part-time with a major local company in their security area.He first volunteered while holding down his day job at Olivet College as Director of Admissions and Financial Aid and later as interim Vice President in the 1990s and serving as a firefighter with the city of Marshall.

The college was going through some major transitions at the time he was interim Vice President of Enrollment Management. He agreed to take the position with the understanding that once things had stabilized, he would go back to being Director of Admissions because he loved that job and the students he got to work with.Director of Calhoun Countys Emergency Management Department Durk Dunham retied in December.My intention was to go back to being director of admissions, Dunham says. During the course of replacing three vice presidents and a president in a three-year span I decided to leave. Lets just say I was opposed to what the new president stood for and who he was as a human being. I could either stay there and suck it up or leave with my morals and integrity intact and thats what I did with the severance package I took in 1993.His departure marked the end of a long history with Olivet College that began while he was a student there. He graduated with a Bachelors degree in Psychology and would go on to work at a psychiatric hospital in Lansing, the former General Motors plant in Kalamazoo, at radio stations in Battle Creek, and the college.Throughout these job changes, the one constant was his volunteer service with the County. That did not go unnoticed by former Calhoun County Sheriff Al Bynum. The two were friends as well as work colleagues. He asked Dunham to become the Director of Emergency Management. In making the job offer, Dunham says Bynum told him, Weve got some issues here and I want you to take care of them.It was a time when cell phones had not yet solidified their place as a necessity in peoples everyday lives and Dunham relied on police and fire radio and pagers to stay on top of potential emergency situations that would require emergency preparedness planning.He was the only paid member of the Emergency Management Department and was supported by three volunteers who are sworn Sheriffs deputies. Dunham says these volunteers play an absolutely crucial role alongside him. He says he would have liked to have had a part-time administrative assistant, but there was no funding for such a position.This is a tough job and there is a mountain of paperwork and federal, state, and local laws and regulations that go a mile deep, Dunham says. The requirements of this position are really formidable.Prior to 9-11, weather-related events were recognized by the Emergency Management department as among the highest risks in the County because they impacted every resident.Before 9-11, we chased weather. There were required components to this position, and things we had to do, but it wasnt anything that was taxing. After 9-11 hit everything changed, Dunham says. If I had to put it on a sliding scale and start with 9-11, thats when phone calls to our department gradually started to increase every year going forward. Because of more stipulations and regulations that have followed since 9-11, our workload has risen steadily. Its a completely different operation now. Its much, much more complex because society has become more complicated and more difficult.Director of Calhoun Countys Emergency Management Department Durk Dunham and the volunteers in his department have dealt with everything from bad weatther to the Enbridge oil spill to COVID-19.The complexities and complications became even more challenging with the arrival of COVID-19 and the ensuing shutdowns throughout the County in March, 2020. Dunham was among city and county leadership who are part of the Joint Information Center that was formed in response to the pandemic. The JIC began hosting weekly virtual meetings to disseminate information about the virus and its ensuing variants, the number of COVID-related infections and deaths, and how key stakeholders were supporting efforts to manage the pandemic and take care of the needs of all residents. Dunham put his radio voice to use as the host for some of the more recent Joint Information Center meetings.

Prior to COVID, Dunham says the top major emergencies for the county were the Enbridge oil spill in July 2010 and a severe storm over the 2011 Memorial Day weekend.The Enbridge oil spill was the largest inland oil spill in the history of the United States, Dunham says. Ninety percent of Emergency Managers across the nation would never go through a crisis of that magnitude.Officials with the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, the Michigan Department of Environmental Quality, Enbridge, and the Michigan State Police, worked alongside Dunham and other local leaders to manage the spill and the cleanup.There were textbooks and training materials written from the data gathered from that oil spill. People documented it very, very carefully, Dunham says. We had some of the worlds smartest scientists visiting this county after the oil spill happened and they used what they learned here to create a plan for the mitigation of future oil spills. We knew there was going to be an ending, and that it wouldnt go on forever, and that we were going to clean the river up.Fortuitously, Dunham says an emergency incident like the oil spill was included in the countys Hazard Mitigation Plan, which defines the 10 most likely risk-oriented disasters in Calhoun County.Though the oil spill and the destructive 2011 Memorial Weekend storm taxed the Emergency Management departments resources, Dunham says the pandemic has been the greatest challenge for him and his volunteer staff to manage.On of the more challenging events of Durk Dunham's career as director of Calhoun Countys Emergency Management Department was dealing the Enbridge oil spill of 2011.With the pandemic, we dont have an end in sight, he says. When the Delta variant emerged that was an eye-opener for anyone not involved in emergency management. Part of our challenge is to try to keep people in a positive frame of mind while trying to stay ahead of the virus and its variants. The pandemic has been a heavy lift.In addition to providing people with the most accurate and up-to-date information about COVID and its variants and addressing other emergencies impacting the county and its residents, Dunham has some standard messaging that he has consistently been sharing. He says a very huge part of his job is to communicate countywide about family emergency and disaster preparedness.A big part of my job responsibility is about keeping our residents, their kids, and their friends as safe as possible, he says. I ask questions like, Do you have a flashlight and a case of water in the basement? What I am putting out there has never been more important at this time in the history of our country. People need to prepare for natural disasters and any situation that would affect their safety or the safety of family and friends. Because of our internet, there are resources like FEMA.gov that are fingertips away to tell you how to prepare.He says his message to residents is, Each individual in this county has to take on the personal responsibility to mitigate risk for themselves, friends, loved ones, and pets. Its a responsibility I would love people to take on thats as important as brushing their teeth.He will continue to highlight the importance of having a plan in place for emergencies as he slides into the next phase of his life.That he will miss the people he works with on a daily basis, is a given. He calls them special human beings.But he knew it was time to step down when a sense of calm set in after he had made his decision.I remember through the years as an upper-level manager that I would start to see people retire and one of the things they used to say to me with this big, calm look on their faces was that You will know when its time and you will feel it inside. It was a very calming feeling that said to me its time. Im relaxed and ready and super-excited about what comes next.

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Emergency Management Director has seen Calhoun County through oil spill, bad weather, and COVID-19 - Concentrate