On March 4 2023, the 193 members of the United Nations reached a major milestone. They agreed on a treaty to manage and protect the high seas– the marine areas that lie outside the 200 mile Exclusive Economic Zones (EEZ) of coastal states. The high seas are an essential part of the global ecosystem. They cover 50 percent of the Earth’s surface, produce half the oxygen we breathe, provide a home to 95 percent of the planet’s biosphere, are a critical sink for carbon dioxide, and help regulate the Earth’s temperature.
As we reach the midpoint of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, it is an opportune moment to reflect on the Asia-Pacific region’s progress and accelerate efforts to achieve our goals.
Georgian civil society can breathe a sigh of relief. A proposed repressive law that would have severely worsened the space for activism has been shelved – for now. But the need for vigilance remains.
The impacts of the climate crisis are acutely felt in the Pacific region. In recent years, the region has been hit by devastating climate events, which cause widespread destruction and significant loss of lives and livelihoods across countries.
Women health workers are more than two thirds of the health workforce and represent 90% of the world’s frontline health workers, yet hold less than a quarter of senior leadership roles - a situation which is unfair and a significant risk for global health security.
Last October, Ales Bialiatski was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize. He was one of three winners,
alongside two human rights organisations: Memorial, in Russia, and the Center for Civil Liberties in Ukraine. The Nobel Committee recognised the three’s ‘outstanding effort to document war crimes, human rights abuses and the abuse of power’.
In contrast to its strategic role as an essential resource to help achieve community development and poverty alleviation globally, groundwater has remained a poorly understood and managed resource.
On 29 and 30 March, the US government, in partnership with Costa Rica, Netherlands, South Korea and Zambia, will co-host the second virtual
Summit for Democracy. Several elected leaders and state representatives will come together to highlight achievements in advancing democratic principles.
Burkina Faso’s interim President Captain Ibrahim Traoré spoke late last year of the conflicts that are now blighting his country and much of his region. He described the situation in Burkina Faso as predictable given the endemic weaknesses in governance that he believes have led to the economic abandonment of many young people, particularly outside of urban areas.
BP, the oil company that previously brought us “Beyond Petroleum” and more recently robust corporate climate goals, has announced a return in emphasis to its traditional business of producing oil. Drawn by the inescapable appeal of oil’s latest high profits, has BP rebranded itself as “Back to Petroleum?”
As countries recently gathered in Geneva for the
fourth round of negotiations on the WHO proposed pandemic treaty or accord, close examination of
the current text by civil society experts has revealed significant gaps.
Two destructive Category 4 tropical cyclones, Judy and Kevin, and an earthquake of 6.5 magnitude impacted over 80 per cent of the Vanuatu population from 1 to 3 March 2023. To address this emergency situation, the UN, along with Pacific member States have deployed personnel on the ground to coordinate humanitarian assistance and prepare post-disaster damage assessment.
This month, government and civil society organization representatives gathered in New York for the United Nations’ 67th session of the Commission on the Status of Women (CSW) to discuss technology as a tool to facilitate access to education for women and girls.
This year marks the halfway point— eight years in and eight years out— of the UN Sustainable Development Goals to end poverty and reduce inequalities.
The global food security crisis reveals an increase in the undernourishment prevalence, reaching higher than in 2015, when countries first agreed to eradicate hunger by 2030 as one of the SDG targets. In the Caribbean, between 2014 and 2021, hunger increased by 2.3 percentage points, affecting 16.4 percent of its population by 2021. Moreover, the Caribbean is a net importer of almost all the main food groups such as cereals, dairy products, fruits and vegetables (except the Dominican Republic), meat and vegetable oils.
In September 2020, the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action for women’s rights celebrated its 25th anniversary. It was, however, a bittersweet commemoration, mixing joy for the progress in gender equality achieved since 1995, and the stark realization about the multidimensional gaps awaiting tackling and the new divides brought by the social consequences of COVID-19.
The internet has a pivotal role to play in empowering women and girls across Africa, but preexisting forms of gender discrimination and marginalization are underpinning a widening digital gender divide.
Since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, the tremendous power of technology and innovation has become clear to the world.
However, it has also increased exclusion, discrimination, and inequalities -- especially for women and girls.
On International Women’s Day, let us remind ourselves of the power of education. We have all benefited from an education that less than a century ago was not a given for a girl and which still remains a distant utopia for millions of young girls.
Recent crises have pushed the gender inequality gap even wider and new technology has brought new threats to women’s autonomy and safety. This year’s International Women's Day celebrated under the
theme “DigitALL: Innovation and technology for gender equality” is an opportunity to strengthen efforts to uplift and empower women and girls’ digital participation to ultimately improve their lives.