Development & Aid

Low-cost Technology can Have Life-changing Impacts for Rural Women

By Samira Sadeque
Access to technology which is relatively inexpensive to deploy can have a life-changing impact for rural women, social scientist Valentina Rotondi told IPS.

Why Food System Transformation Needs Water

By Dr. Mark Smith
The impact of Covid-19 on supply chains and food security has dealt a blow to the already faltering global development ambition of ending hunger.

NESFAS Partner Communities Celebrate World Food Day

By Damica M Mawlong
World Food Day, a day dedicated to tackle world hunger, is annually celebrated on October 16, 2020 globally. To commemorate this day, the North East Slow Food and Agrobiodiversity Society (NESFAS) along with its partner organisations — Society for Urban and Rural Empowerment (SURE) and North East Network (NEN), Nagaland — hosted several programmes across 27 communities in Meghalaya and Nagaland. It may be mentioned here that all government SOPs and measures were followed during the events.

Why a Zimbabwean Farming Project Failed: Lessons for Rural Innovation

Many countries in sub-Saharan Africa commit resources to promote agricultural innovations. This is based on the assumption that rural livelihoods are mainly agricultural and that the innovations will increase agricultural production and household income.

Q&A: Food Systems need to Mimic Nature

By Samira Sadeque
Despite the World Food Programme (WFP) being awarded the 2020 Nobel Peace Prize for its work in addressing global hunger, sustainable food systems expert Emile Frison believes a lot more needs to be done. This includes the rethinking of approaches to agricultural production, establishing deeper relationships between consumers and producers, and taking a wholistic approach towards socio-economic factors.

Food Citizenship: Innovative Partnerships for Healthy Food Systems

By Frank Mechielsen
Food is high on the political agenda. The need to make food systems more resilient to external shocks like climate change and Covid-19 is now well acknowledged among states and other actors. Green, healthy, and inclusive food systems should become the new normal. But to make this happen we need to reshape the entire food system, with citizens driving bottom-up innovations.

Amid COVID-19, What is the Health of Civic Freedoms?

By Marianna Belalba Barreto and Aarti Narsee
More than half a year after the World Health Organization declared the COVID-19 outbreak a pandemic, governments are continuing to waste precious time and energy restricting human rights rather than focusing on fighting the virus.

What Developing Countries Can Teach Us About How To Respond To a Pandemic

Nine months into the pandemic, Europe remains one of the regions worst affected by COVID-19. Ten of the 20 countries with the highest death count per million people are European. The other ten are in the Americas. This includes the US, which has the highest number of confirmed cases and deaths in the world.

Is the IMF Encouraging World Financial Leaders to Walk Blindly Towards More Austerity?

By Isabel Ortiz and Richard Jolly
This week the world’s Ministers of Finance and Central Bank Governors meet virtually at the 2020 Annual Meetings of the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank and decide on the fate of the world. This year’s gathering is particularly important, given that the world is confronting an unprecedented crisis. Governments are struggling to finance emergency care and urgent socioeconomic support to cope with the COVID19 pandemic.

High Tech, Low Labour?

By KJ Ong
In the glitzy Dolby Theater in Hollywood Heights, with stars dressed in hundred thousand-dollar garbs, Parasite—a film about inequality, class tension and the fault lines of capitalism—won big. I couldn’t help but recall South Korean director Bong Joon-ho’s earlier 2013 film, Snowpiercer.

Why We Need Trees to End to Poverty – Landmark Report

By Alison Kentish
With extreme poverty (living on $1.90 a day) projected to rise for the first time in over 20 years, a new study has concluded that global poverty eradication efforts could be futile in the absence of forests and trees.

Disregarding Rights of Persons with Disabilities

By Shudarson Subedi and Simone Galimberti
The lack of consistency and a patchy approach undermines the Government of Nepal’s credibility in fulfilling the rights of persons with disabilities. One step forward and several steps back.

Global Poverty Soars– As Incomes of World’s Billionaires Hit New Highs

By Thalif Deen
The phenomenal rise in extreme poverty -– for the first time in 20 years -- has been accompanied by an upsurge in the incomes of the world’s billionaires and the super-rich.

Working Animals’ Role in SDGs and Addressing Climate Change, Pandemic Crises

By Mike Baker and Roly Owers
As we prepare to celebrate the 75th anniversary of the  Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), it is time to recognise the role of working animals in livelihood systems, addressing climate change and in human health, which has been overlooked for too long. The Working Animal Alliance seeks to change this. 

Changing the Lives of Bangladesh’s Rural Girls by Giving them a Tertiary Education

By Farid Ahmed
Nila Kispotta, a 19-year-old rural girl from the Oraon ethnic community, has become a figure of exceptional achievement to the small, poverty-stricken village in Thakurgaon in northwest Bangladesh that she grew up in. Born into a family of daily wage earners, Kispotta dreamt of a different life. So when she enrolled in tertiary education to pursue a diploma in Nursing Science and Midwifery — she achieved something her family and community hadn’t even dreamed was possible.

Train Faith Leaders to Tackle Africa’s Mental Health Needs

By Chiwoza Bandawe
The world is actually in the throes of two pandemics. The first is COVID-19. The second is the wave of stress and anxiety, depression and substance use it has unleashed around the world. Most mental health disorders are treatable.

The Urban Poor are Fighting Back Against COVID-19

By Mbaye Mbeguere
For those who live in slums and informal settlements, the Covid-19 pandemic has brought to the forefront their greatest vulnerabilities. But they are fighting back; organising, and coming up with creative ways to protect their communities.

Improving People’s Lives with Digital Technology during COVID-19

By Samira Sadeque
Digital technology has been crucial in ensuring community and connection during the coronavirus pandemic and subsequent lockdowns. And its shown that collaboration between the private and public sector can ensure that digital technology continues to advance in a way that improves people’s lives under crises, experts said on Tuesday, Oct. 13. 

How the Pacific Islands are Balancing COVID-19 Survival Demands on Coastal Fisheries with Sustainable Management

By Catherine Wilson
Coastal fisheries in the Pacific Islands have become a food and livelihood lifeline to many people who have lost jobs, especially in urban centres and tourism, following COVID-19 lockdowns and border closures. Now governments and development organisations are trying to meet the crisis-driven survival needs of here and now, while also considering the long-term consequences on near shore marine resources and habitats.

Indigenous Peoples & Local Communities Offer Best Hope for Our Planetary Emergency

By Yoko Watanabe and Nina Kantcheva
Indigenous peoples and local communities offer the best hope for solutions to our planetary emergency. These solutions are grounded in traditional, time-tested practices and knowledge.

Q&A: Women in Mali Play Critical Role in Preventing and Resolving Conflicts

By Samira Sadeque

The coronavirus pandemic has affected the safety and sense of community for many women in Mali given the travel restrictions and lockdowns in place, Bassirou Gaye, an assistant researcher for a 2019 report on the role of Mali women in peacekeeping, told IPS this weekend.

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