RIGHTS: Women More Educated, Not More Equal

When it comes to female education rates, progress has been made around the world, and in many countries girls and young women have outnumbered and outperformed boys and men at all levels of schooling for decades. Nevertheless, these advances have yet to translate into greater equity in employment, politics and social relations.

Q&A: “We Can’t Continue to Pay Lip Service to Gender Equality”

During consultations of the 45-member U.N. Commission on the Status of Women (CSW) here, one of the lingering issues that is surfacing is the success - or failure - in the implementation of the 1995 Beijing Platform for Action on gender empowerment.

DEATH PENALTY: Post-Genocide Countries Ban Executions to ‘End Revenge’

More than 1,000 activists and experts attending this week's Fourth World Congress Against the Death Penalty in this Swiss city are building a network of cooperation to support local organisations campaigning for human rights in countries that retain capital punishment.

RIGHTS: Women Still Battling Gender Bigotry Worldwide

Nearly 62 years after the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which proclaimed "all human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights," a few of the world's discriminatory laws against women are being progressively repealed in Asia, Europe, Africa and Latin America.

HEALTH: Addressing Preterm Births Crucial to Anti-Poverty Goals

Reducing the annual 13 million preterm births and 3.2 million stillbirths should be a global public health priority, says a report released Monday which asserts that significant reductions in these numbers could be achieved by improving access to low-cost interventions in both low and high-income countries.

MALAWI: Catapults Against Cholera

By this time last year, Mkanda had recorded 14 cholera cases as rainy season descended on central Malawi. This year, there has not been a single report of cholera.

EAST AFRICA: Improving Local Access to Family Planning

A severe shortage of highly-trained medical personnel is one of the many challenges to providing health care at a local level across Africa. Task shifting - permitting less-specialised people to carry out certain functions - is one proposal to over come this, but it is meeting resistance.

AFRICA: “Women’s Decade”: Greater Attention to Implementation

Fears that the impact of the global economic meltdown would affect funding to various development areas have been rife. Already, several governments have cut their budgets for HIV and AIDS and bilateral and multilateral funding partners have done likewise.

Q&A: “We Have a Take-Make-Waste Economy”

To halt the planet's declining biodiversity and loss of critical natural resources, both the economy we live in and communication about science needs to be changed profoundly, says a prominent Dutch ecologist.

DEVELOPMENT: Grassroots Aid Groups Struggle to Stay Afloat

The Holy Child Integrated Agricultural Centre, an organic farm near Abeokuta in southwestern Nigeria, was looking forward to having running water. An industrial borehole had already been already installed, and a pump and piping to various buildings were in place.

Q&A: “It’s Not Easy to Fight Impunity”

Guatemalan President Álvaro Colom said he intends to extend the mandate of the International Commission against Impunity in Guatemala (CICIG), in this interview with IPS during a three-day visit to the United States.

DEVELOPMENT: World’s Longest Toilet Queue in the Making

The "world's longest toilet queue," scheduled for next month, may not be a celebrity-filled event worthy of a Hollywood spectacle - but it could still find a place in the Guinness Book of World Records.

SOUTHERN AFRICA: Women Traders Demand Support

Support for regional trade is one of the cornerstones of the Southern African Development Community (SADC). But the focus has been on large scale trade in goods and services, ignoring one important group trading throughout the region.

RIGHTS: U.N. to Focus on Global Epidemic of Gender Abuse

The statistics relating to the world's socially and economically-distressed women are staggering.

ENVIRONMENT-LATIN AMERICA: Glass Half Empty

The countries of Latin America have made progress in terms of access to clean water and sanitation, but have failed to curb greenhouse gas emissions and deforestation, says a new United Nations report.

EAST AFRICA: Women Want Visibility in Regional Union

As the East Africa Community (EAC) gradually moves towards a political confederation, women’s rights groups from the five member states are pushing for an East African Protocol on Gender and Development to bridge the gender gaps within the integration process.

DEVELOPMENT-ASIA: ‘Poverty Still Has a Woman’s Face’

Women and poverty still share an uncomfortable spot on the development matrix of countries across Asia-Pacific that are struggling to end deprivation, according to the newly launched third joint report of the United Nations and the Asian Development Bank (ADB) on the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs).

EUROPE: Fight Female Mutilation Harder Activists Urge EU

With hundreds of thousands of girls and women believed to be at risk of female genital mutilation (FGM) in Europe, rights groups have mounted a campaign to get EU leaders to stop what they see as a barbaric and dangerous procedure.

COTE D’IVOIRE: Policy Changes Revive Poultry Industry

Ivorian poultry producers are enjoying strong growth thanks to the imposition of a tax on imports of poultry products from the European Union and South America.

CENTRAL AMERICA: Women Eke Out a Living in Informal Economy

"I've been working in the streets since I was a girl. My parents didn't send me to school, so it's really hard for me to find a job," says Carol Orozco, 31, who forms part of the veritable army of vendors hawking their wares on the streets of Central America.

GUATEMALA: Anti-Mine Activists Encouraged by Canadian Ruling

Ecologists in Guatemala see a recent ruling by Canada's Supreme Court, which ordered Canadian mining companies to carry out rigorous environmental assessments, as a positive precedent that could help improve environmental controls over the mining industry in this Central American country.