Like previous years, 2022 has been challenging for all countries across the world. Pandemic and the Russia-Ukraine war have created challenges and some countries faced a drop in GDP growth. However, data determines that many countries have GDP growth despite all the tough challenges the world has been experiencing in 2022. Most recently, the IMF has declared a forecast for countries with the highest GDP growth in 2022.

India is one of the fastest countries with growing economies in the world as they had 8.2 percent growth in April, but the latest forecast from the IMF points out a drop of India’s economic growth to 6.8 percent. However, India remains to be in the top 10 fastest growing economies. On the other hand, Guyana has the fastest-growing economy in the forecast with 57.8 percent growth in 2022 so far with the fact that it just became an oil producer about two years ago and it was one of the poorest countries in Latin America per capita before. Oil production is about to make Guyana one of the richest in Latin America and in the world as well. Also, their goal is to reach 800,000 oil barrel production per day by 2025.

Iraq and Egypt are doing very well according to the IMF forecast since Iraq places second in the list of highest GDP growth, which is 9.3 percent. Egypt is in the bottom of the top 10 with only 6.6 percent growth. Also, Saudi Arabia has 7.6 percent growth.

The war in Ukraine and sanctions on Russia play a big role in the economies of countries and it is well predicted that we will see many other changes in such forecasts.

Since the dawn of the cinematic experience in the early 20th century by French and American individuals and organizations, cinema has stood the test of time in order to provide the world with a clear and significant medium that would encompass a range of stories, styles, and genres.

In the midst of such a creative way to narrate stories, there exists minimalism. Not only does minimalism stand in the fields of philosophy, but it also has had a considerable impact in cinema, particularly, arthouse films that focus more on a specific audience than the commercial success of cinematic work.

Minimalist cinema is the process of applying minimalism in artistic work. Usually demanding fewer and fewer materials either on set or in the film itself. It can be a film in which near or total artistic freedom is given based on decisions that would enable the crew to experiment.

The Youth Art Cinema Club is an arthouse-based club that was founded in 2022 by a group of independent artists stemming from concept art and independent filmmakers and young film critics in Duhok. First initiated by Walid Siti, a painter and printmaker by profession, the group soon developed into a modestly growing community with a weekly audience. It screens arthouse classics from history for free to an audience that is welcome to participate and interact. Not only were they able to witness the impact of minimalist films such as Tokyo Story but they also had an opportunity to discuss, analyze and educate themselves and others about films, their directors, and a style or a topic that is significant in a film.

The role the film club has can range between emphasizing the development of artistic expression using cinematic techniques that demand little to no technical usage in an effort to introduce a broader and class-conscious community into cinema.

The key to a fair and free society lies in the empowerment of women and girls. Unfortunately, women continue to encounter exclusion and inequality on a regular basis, particularly in terms of agency and socioeconomic standing.Gender equality has a major impact on lowering global conflict and poverty. However, international community often hesitates to act on or completely ignores the so-called women's issues like gender-based violence.

Education is the best way to improve the status of young women and girls: every year a girl stays in school, especially at the secondary level, makes her less likely to get HIV, get married young, or die as an infant or mother.Furthermore, the cost of not educating girls is estimated to be trillions of dollars. UNICEF estimates that the prohibition on secondary education for female students by the Taliban has cost the Afghan economy over $500 million. All levels of society, including governments, corporations, international institutions, and charitable groups, are responsible for reversing this tendency.

Policymakers should give more thought to the welfare of young women and girls, particularly in the context of maintaining peace and security. The international community should take concrete measures to back its verbal support for gender equality, such as increasing funding for campaigning and holding human rights abusers accountable. The growth of inadequate actors and democratic backsliding around the world makes immediate action imperative. A direct challenge against autocracy, poverty, and terrorism can be seen in the movement to empower young women and girls. For effective foreign policy, it is crucial that decision-makers prioritize the empowerment of women and girls worldwide.

By: Baniz Wasman

OPEC+ members – including Saudi Arabia and Russia – have decided to reduce oil production by 2 million barrels for November. The group has indicated that the decision has been made due to expectations of the global economic recession, and to balance prices as they have decreased recently. Despite that, it is expected for oil prices to climb after the decision.

It is necessary to highlight that the reduction in the oil production has been the biggest since the pandemic. UAE Energy Minister Suhail al-Mazroui stated “The decision is not political but technical.”

An analysis on BBC’s Middle East business correspondent demonstrates that the OPEC+ choice is important for both oil markets and geopolitics and President Joe Biden’s request to the Saudi Arabia Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman to transport more barrels in order to drop prices is a big waste. Also, It could be a reason to disrupt the West from implementing restrictions on Russian oil revenues.

Oil prices have been unstable since the start of the Russia-Ukraine war. A barrel of Brent Crude oil was at $84 in late september and it was trading at $130 in the spring. Countries all over the world – including Iraq and the Kurdistan Region– have been facing ups and downs in oil markets and it is still possible to face another rise in oil prices.

The functioning of Social Metaverse company is highly, or we can say merely,  dependent on collecting data. A procedure which consumes a large amount of electricity and a large amount of water. This matter has alerted the concerned authorities and activists in Europe. In addition, Europe has witnessed its hottest summer and this has been a further trigger on the water resources.

As a preceding solution, the EU commission has issued a draft on the data center’s environmental impacts. The commission plans  to create energy labels for the data collection centers to have a monitoring tool for their energy usage. The urge to have a better control over data collection center’s energy consumption is due to the risks brought by drought and climate changes on the EU weather.

The highlighting event in this regard goes back to last summer when the Facebook owning company wanted to build a data center in Zeewolde, a small town in the Netherlands. This attempt has been opposed immediately by Zeewolde local-environmental activists. They claimed that Facebook will purchase the green energy for less than its actual value, this was not their main concern, what was more vital for the activist was the scarcity of green energy that could appear in their town.

We live in a world that is in constant change of environment, from pandemics to war, it's in perpetual change. Mental health is the state of mental well-being that enables people to cope with stress, environmental change and contribute to their community, which is why it is crucial for survival.

Most of us felt bewildered at some point, mental health enables us to realize our abilities, learn and work well. It underpins our individual and collective competency to make decisions, build relationships and shape the world we live in. Mental health includes our emotional, psychological, and social well-being. It affects how we think, feel, and act. It is a basic human right. And it is important to personal, community, and socio-economic development.

Mental health is more than the absence of mental disorders. It exists on a complex continuum that can be experienced differently from one individual to another, with varying degrees of difficulty and distress. In 2019 an estimated study showed that one in eight people was living with a mental disorder globally. In 2020, the number of people living with anxiety and depressive disorders rose significantly because of the COVID-19 pandemic.  Initial estimates show a 26% and 28% increase respectively for anxiety and major depressive disorders in just one year.

Prevention interventions work by identifying the individual, social and structural determinants of mental health and intervening to reduce risks, build resilience and establish supportive environments for mental health. Interventions can be designed for individuals, specific groups, or whole populations.

Promoting child and adolescent mental health is crucial because a mentally healthy child is a mentally healthy adult and it affects most of their life. It can be achieved by policies and laws that promote and protect mental health, supporting caregivers to provide nurturing care. School-based social and emotional learning programs are among the most effective promotion strategies for countries at all income levels. In the end, if you ever feel any mental health difficulties never hesitate to seek help whether it's from professional care or someone close to you, remember it happens to everyone and you are not alone.