Poverty & SDGs

The Immense Cost 200 Million Migrant Workers Pay to Rescue their Families

By Baher Kamal
Straight to the point: while right and far-right politicians keep marketing their image with intensive campaigns of hatred, discrimination and stigmatisation against migrants, 200 million migrant workers worldwide will sacrifice over half a trillion dollars from their hard-earned money, to rescue 800 million members of their impoverished families. And that’s only this year 2019.

Rising Population Trends Threaten UN’s Development Goals in Asia & Africa

By Thalif Deen
The world’s developing nations, currently fighting an uphill battle in their attempts to implement the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), are facing another stark demographic reality: a rise in world population by 2.0 billion people in the next 30 years: from 7.7 billion to 9.7 billion in 2050.

The Importance of the Upcoming FAO Election

By Kip Tom
With each passing day, the world gets just a little smaller as the internet and cell phones bring our communities together, reveal our shared challenges, and lay bare our failures. As global citizens, we are all concerned about the growing number of hungry people around the world and the threats to food security. The simple fact is that more than 800 million people go hungry every day, and if that number shocks you, know that experts predict the number to grow significantly over the next ten years.

UN’s Development Goals Remain Largely Elusive

By Thalif Deen
The United Nations, in a new report to be released next month, has warned “there is no escaping the fact that the global landscape for the implementation of the 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) has generally deteriorated since 2015, hindering the efforts of governments and other partners”

‘What it Takes to Feed 7.5 Billion People’

By Desmond Brown
Events marking the 25th anniversary of the Convention to Combat Desertification (UNCCD) and the World Day to Combat Desertification opened here Monday, Jun. 17 with a call for urgent action to protect and restore degrading land.

The Implacable Desertification of Planet Earth

By Baher Kamal
Yet another under-reported human-made disaster: the relentless desertification of Planet Earth that may make uninhabitable some regions like the Middle East, endanger food security, aggravate climate crisis, and force more and more millions of people to flee.

World Day to Combat Desertification and Drought – “Let’s Grow the Future Together”

By IPS World Desk
One third of the planet's land surface is under the threat of desertification, impacting over 250 million people.

Asia-Pacific Region Falters on UN Development Goals

By Thalif Deen
UN Deputy Secretary-General Amina Mohammed told a Chatham House meeting in London last week that the UN’s Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), one of the legacies of the late Secretary-General Kofi Annan, “spawned tremendous progress” in the battle against poverty worldwide.

Dignity & Strength for Venezuelan Refugees & Migrants in Colombia

By Tomer Urwicz and Liliana Arias Salgado
Not long ago, 15-year-old Nelsmar attended a middle-class school in central Venezuela. That was before her family was uprooted by the economic and humanitarian crisis in her country, which has pushed nearly 3.9 million persons to migrate or flee, according to recent estimates of the Coordination Platform for Refugees and Migrants from Venezuela.

The Forgotten Migrants of Central America

By Caley Pigliucci
Rural and indigenous populations in countries like Guatemala and Honduras are increasingly on the move – either migrating internally or to neighbouring countries.

Championing Social Changes: A Tale of Two Women

By Karessa Ramos
This is the story of two women who are positively transforming social norms in their respective societies, as part of the global movement towards gender equality.

A Journey from a Small-Scale Farm to International Stage

By Chinasa Asonye
As a wife and mother in Nigeria who wanted to support my family and my community, I began my own farm in 2006. When I began, I never could have dreamed that just cultivating the earth would someday lead to my meeting government leaders, and traveling to meet other women from around the world doing their part to make a difference in their own communities.

Mothers in the US Are Dying: What Are We Doing to Save Them?

By Juan Pablo Segura
The maternal mortality rate in the United States is the highest of any developed country – and the rate is rising. The US is currently the most dangerous place to give birth in the developed world.

Afghan Schools Left Unprotected by Government & International Community

By Charlotte Munns
Attacks on Afghan schools tripled between 2017 and 2018, according to a UNICEF report released last week: from 68 attacks to 192 in 2018. This figure seems unlikely to decrease as the Afghan government prepares to use schools once again for political activity in the upcoming election.

We Must do More to Speed up Ending Fossil Fuel Subsidies

By Niklas Hagelberg
Fossil fuels—oil, gas, coal and their derivatives—pollute the atmosphere and emit the greenhouse gases that are ramping up global heating to dangerous levels. But did you know that governments around the world are subsidizing this pollution?

Transforming Society, Financialization Destroys Social Solidarity

By Michael Lim Mah Hui and Jomo Kwame Sundaram
Finance has not stopped at dominating the real economy. The tentacles of finance have reached into significant, if not most parts of society. Gerald Davis characterises modern society, where finance is dominant, as a ‘portfolio society’, in which aspects of social life have been securitized and transformed into a kind of capital or investment to be managed.

We Can’t Halt Extinctions Unless We Protect Water

By Claudia Sadoff
Global biodiversity loss has reached critical levels. One million species of plants and animals are now estimated to be at risk of extinction. The window for action is closing, and the world needs to urgently take note.

Water Research & Education Needs to Flow Towards Developing World

By Colin Mayfield and Hamid Mehmood
Post-secondary education relevant to the global water crisis is concentrated in wealthy countries rather than the poorer, developing places where it is needed most.

Asia-Pacific Region Viewed as Engine of the World Economy

By Armida Salsiah Alisjahbana
Since this Commission first met in 1947, our countries have travelled a long journey. Our economies are expected to become larger than the rest of the world combined, measured by purchasing power parity. It is often said the Asia-Pacific region is the engine of the world economy.

The World Made Promises to Women and Girls, We Must Fulfil Them

By Monica Juma
In 1994 the International Conference and Population and Development (ICPD) was hosted in Cairo by the Government of Egypt. Twenty-five years later, Kenya is ready to convene the ICPD “Nairobi Summit” in November 2019.

Report Reveals Mounting Pressure on Zambia’s Environmental Resources

By Irene Lungu Chipili
There is a strong link between provision of basic social services and the use of natural resources in a country. Thus, with increased population comes additional pressure on natural resources. This is a key finding in the latest Zambia Environment Outlook (ZEO) Report 4, published by the Zambia Environmental Management Agency (ZEMA).
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