Development & Aid

Rock Glaciers Supply Water to Highlands Communities in Argentina

By Daniel Gutman
In Argentina's Puna region, at 4,000 metres above sea level, the color green is rare in the arid landscape, which is dominated by different shades of brown and yellow. In this inhospitable environment, daily life has improved thanks to a system of piping water downhill from rock glaciers to local communities.

World Youth Call to Governments to Ban All Hin Drances to LGBTQI Communities

By Mantoe Phakathi
Governments across the world must ban all state-implemented harmful practices against the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, Queer and Intersex (LGBTQI) community delegates at the ICPD25 tells IPS.

ICPD25: Lessons From the East

By Joyce Chimbi
The Japan Parliamentary Federation for Population represented by Mr Teruhiko Mashiko and its secretariat, the Asian Population and Development Association (APDA) has made a clear and concrete commitment to endorse the ICPD25 agenda. Mashiko tells IPS that Japan, as should every country driven by the well-being of its population, should create the best possible conditions to achieve the ICPD25 agenda.

Women with Disabilities Speak out Against Exclusion at ICPD25

By Joyce Chimbi
One in five women globally lives with a disability even as they have same needs and interests as women without disabilities, their access to sexual and reproductive health services and rights remains severely limited.

A New Deal for Sustainable Development

By Jomo Kwame Sundaram and Anis Chowdhury
Almost nine decades ago, newly elected US President Franklin Roosevelt introduced the New Deal in 1933 in response to the Great Depression. The New Deal consisted of a number of mutually supportive initiatives, of which the most prominent were: a public works programme financed by budget deficits; a new social contract to improve living standards for all working families, including creation of the US social security system; and financial regulation to protect citizens’ assets and channel financial resources into productive investments.

How can Taps, Toilets & Good Hygiene Help Ensure Sustainable & Resilient Agricultural Supply Chains?

By Ruth Romer
Water underpins the global economy and agriculture is by far the world’s largest water consumer, accounting for 70% of freshwater withdrawals. Global water demands are projected to increase by 55% by 2050 and climate change will present further pressures on water accessibility.

Cairo Dream Requires $264 Billion to Deliver Women’s Call for Justice and Bold Leadership

By Joyce Chimbi
For each of the 830 women dying each day from pregnancy complications and childbirth, an estimated 20 others suffer serious injuries, infections or disabilities. This is the reality that millions of women face, and informs the Nairobi Summit’s three critical commitments which are to bring preventable maternal deaths, gender-based violence and harmful practices, as well as unmet need for family planning, to zero. To achieve this objective money is needed.

Nairobi Summit to Redouble Efforts to Urgently Deal with Reproductive Rights for Women and Girls

By Mantoe Phakathi
More than 6 000 delegates in the population development sector are gathering in the Kenyan capital of Nairobi this week to renew the promise made to girls and women 25 years ago in Cairo.

When is Universal Health Coverage Good for Attaining Universal Sexual and Reproductive Health and Rights?

By Julitta Onabanjo
This is a special year for all rights-based health advocates, as we celebrate 25 years of the International Conference on Population and Development (ICPD).

Investment to Make Africa a World leader in Renewables

By Nalisha Adams
Africa, where close to half of its 1.2 billion people have access to electricity, is set to become a world leader in renewable energy. As global business and development leaders met in Johannesburg, South Africa, to attend the Africa Investment Forum (AIF), held Nov. 11 to 13, one of the key focuses of the deals being discussed was around sustainable, renewable energy.

Call to Action as Thousands Breathe New Life to the Cairo Promise at ICPD 25 Summit in Nairobi This Week

By Joyce Chimbi
Every day 830 women die while giving life. At least 33,000 girls are forced into child marriage with 11,000 girls undergoing female genital mutilation. These are some of the cruel realities young women face every day. However, there is renewed hope that delegates expected to attend the International Conference on Population and Development (ICPD) in Nairobi this week will re-energise and breathe new life to the Cairo Promise.

UN Peacekeeping Should Not Violate Charter or Principles of Sovereignty of Member States

By Ambassador Kshenuka Senewiratne
Given the political, economic and social exigencies of contemporary peacekeeping, it is important that the Department of Political and Peacebuilding Affairs (DPPA) remains engaged in the process.

Mo Money Mo Solutions – the African Development Bank’s Ready to Double Investment Across the Continent

By Issa Sikiti da Silva
Buses carrying cross-border traders and goods from Cotonou in Benin to Bamako in Mali have recently been using the Lomé route — travelling through the capital of Togo and then getting onto the Ouagadougou corridor on their way to the Malian capital.

Zimbabwe’s Inflation Makes it Hard to Keep Track of Cost of Living

By Jeffrey Moyo
Stung by the country’s spiralling inflation, Zimbabwe’s government workers took to the streets this week for the first ever police-sectioned march demanding improved wages.

Nearly Half of Nepali Children Still Malnourished

By Sonia Awale
For the first two decades after 1990, Nepal took great strides in reducing malnutrition. But progress has stalled.

The Nairobi Summit Is about the Future of Humanity and Human Prosperity

By Siddharth Chatterjee
As we count down the remaining days to the opening of the Nairobi Summit or the International Conference for Population and Development(ICPD), I am confounded by how much humanity has managed to simultaneously empower more women than at any other time in history, while at the same time failing to see that ‘women’s issues’ are actually ‘everyone’s issues’.

UN Agency for Palestinians in Crisis as Chief Quits

By James Reinl
The United Nations agency for Palestinian refugees was in “crisis mode” on Wednesday after director Pierre Krahenbuhl resigned amid a misconduct probe over whether he fast-tracked his girlfriend into a top aid job, analysts said.

Four Ways the African Development Bank Can Support a More Secure Africa

By Ifeanyi Nsofor
Free movement of people and goods across Africa increases the risk of transmission of infectious diseases. The continent must realise that it is no longer a question of if disease outbreaks will occur, but instead, of when, and how fast.

Urgent Need to Replace Competition with Cooperation in the Aral Sea Basin

By Stefanos Xenarios, Iskandar Abdullaev and Vladimir Smakhtin
The water resources in Central Asia’s Aral Sea Basin support the lives and livelihoods of about 70 million people — a population greater than Thailand, France, or South Africa.

Italy’s Olive-Oil Industry Sees Simmering Threats from Climate Change and Nasty Bacteria

By Eric Reguly
On a warm Saturday morning in late October, the silver-green leaves of the 200 productive olive trees on a rolling country property in Umbria, in central Italy, sparkled in the brilliant sun. Fausto Venturi, a local farmer who devotes autumn weekends to making olive oil, could not have been happier.

Burkina Faso: Climate Change Triggers Rural Exodus

By Issa Sikiti da Silva
Ibrahim Harouna and his neighbours sit under a tree at his uncle’s house, playing chess and chatting amid the simmering heat of Ouagadougou, the capital of Burkina Faso.
Next Page »