Adaptation Gaps Mean African Farmers Fork Out More Money for Reduced Harvests

In Cameroon's Northwest Region, Judith Muma walks 9km from her home to her 300-square-metre farm. The vegetables she grows here are flourishing thanks to the money she has borrowed from her njangi (thrift group) and a local credit union to finance a small artisanal irrigation scheme.

No Victors or Vanquished in Brutal Gaza Conflict

As the dust - and the gunpowder - settles after the month-long devastating conflict in Gaza, there were apparently no victors or vanquished.

Gender Equality Gains Traction with Pacific Island Leaders

A pledge by political leaders two years ago to accelerate efforts toward closing the gender gap in the Pacific Islands has been boosted with the announcement that three women will take the helm of the regional intergovernmental organisation, the Pacific Islands Forum Secretariat, headquartered in Suva, Fiji.

What’s More Important, the War on AIDS or Just War?

They say there is a war on and its target is the deadly human immunodeficiency virus (HIV).   

Putting the Littlest Disaster Victims on the Caribbean’s Climate Agenda

Children are often the forgotten ones when policy-makers map out strategies to deal with climate change, even as they are least capable of fending for themselves in times of trouble.

Youth Suicides Sound Alarm Across the Pacific

Suicide rates in the Pacific Islands are some of the highest in the world and have reached up to 30 per 100,000 in countries such as Samoa, Guam and Micronesia, double the global average, with youth rates even higher.

How Mozambique Is Coping With AIDS

Mozambique struggles to contain the HIV epidemic with one in ten among its 24 million people infected. Helping them is not easy when only 60 percent of people have access to health services.

Zimbabwe’s ‘Casualisation of Labour’ Leads to a New Form of Exploitation

Ethel Maziriri, 27, holds an Honours Degree in Social Work from the University of Zimbabwe, but instead of working in her chosen profession, she works as a cashier in one of the country’s leading clothing retail company. And it’s not by choice.

Swamped by Rising Seas, Small Islands Seek a Lifeline

The world's 52 small island developing states (SIDS), some in danger of being wiped off the face of the earth because of sea-level rise triggered by climate change, will be the focus of an international conference in the South Pacific island nation of Samoa next month.

Aleppo Struggles to Provide for Basic Needs as Regime Closes In

The single, heavily damaged supply road remaining into the rebel-held, eastern area of the city is acutely exposed to enemy fire.

Nepal’s Poor Live in the Shadow of Natural Disasters

Barely 100 km north of Nepal’s capital, Kathmandu, the settlement of Jure, which forms part of the village of Mankha, has become a tragic example of how the country’s poorest rural communities are the first and worst victims of natural disasters.

Women Warriors Take Environmental Protection into Their Own Hands

Aleta Baun, an Indonesian environmental activist known in her community as Mama Aleta, has a penchant for wearing a colourful scarf on her head, but not for cosmetic reasons.

Going Back to the Farm in Cuba

Scattered houses amidst small fields of vegetables and other crops line the road to the La China farm on the outskirts of the Cuban capital. This is where Hortensia Martínez works – a mechanical engineer who has been called crazy by many for deciding to become a small farmer.

Tech Entrepreneur Encourages Rwanda’s Young Women to Venture into ICT

Akaliza Keza Gara is only 27, but she’s achieved much for women in Rwanda’s technology sector in just a short space of time.

Atom Bomb Anniversary Spotlights Persistent Nuclear Threat

It has been 69 years, but the memory is fresh in the minds of 190,000 survivors and their descendants. It has been 69 years but a formal apology has yet to be issued. It has been 69 years – and the likelihood of it happening all over again is still a frightening reality.

OPINION: For Nigerian Girls, Education Is the Key That Opens Doors to Progress

I grew up in Nigeria, in a culture where bearing a son validates a woman and her family, and a male innately holds the superior position in society over a female. At 11 years of age, I escorted my mother to deliver her fifth baby girl, my youngest sister, and watched our mom die in the hands of an unfit doctor.

Child Malnutrition Doesn’t Take Vacation in Spain

It’s two in the afternoon, and María stirs tomato sauce into a huge pot of pasta. School is out for the summer in Spain, but the lunchroom in this public school in the southern city of Málaga is still open, serving meals to more than 100 children from poor families.

Asia Looks to Innovation to Achieve Sustainability

Innovation in the fields of renewable energy, food production, water conservation, education and health will be crucial for the developing economies of Asia to meet the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).

Cuba’s Balsero Crisis Still an Open Wound, 20 Years On

Tears, silence and evasive responses are the reactions from Cubans when they are asked about the “balseros” or rafters crisis; two decades after an exodus without parallel in Latin America, it remains a taboo subject in this Caribbean island nation.

Bringing “Smart” Building Technology to Jamaica’s Shantytowns

Buildings are among the largest consumers of earth’s natural resources. According to the Sustainable Buildings and Climate Initiative, they use about 40 percent of global energy and 25 percent of global water, while emitting about a third of greenhouse gas emissions.

Ethics of ‘Mercy Killing’ Up for Debate in India

If a terminally ill patient, with scant hope of recovery, pleads for his death to be facilitated, should the doctors comply? Or, if the family of a patient who has been declared brain-dead requests that her life-support system be withdrawn, should their will be respected?