SOUTHERN AFRICA: Rainy Season Brings Mixed Blessings

This year's rainy season has brought some mixed blessings to farmers and aid agencies operating in Southern Africa, which experienced a spell of drought and famine last year.

WORLD ECONOMIC FORUM: G33 Pushes Trade Powers on Farm Issues

Developing countries led by Indonesia, India, and China issued a strong message to the World Economic Forum under way here that they will not allow attempts to dilute the agricultural negotiations in the Doha Round of trade talks by certain industrialised countries, especially the United States.

HEALTH-RUSSIA: Activists Lash Out at HIV Drug Replacement

Health NGOs and experts are accusing Russia's health and social development ministry of endangering the lives of tens of thousands of infected Russians by altering the list of anti-retroviral drugs the government plans to buy this year.

VENEZUELA: Fighting Police Brutality

Enraged residents of a slum on the west side of the Venezuelan capital set fire to a police station the same day that the government announced the biggest overhaul of the police force in 40 years. Just a coincidence, but also a sign of the reigning chaos.

WORLD SOCIAL FORUM: Activists Determined to Take On Globalisation’s Challenges

The mammoth World Social Forum (WSF) wound to a close in the Kenyan capital after five days of dialogue, art, poetry, dance, drama and protests led by participants from around the globe who believe "another world is possible" - the slogan of the global civil society movement.

NAMIBIA: Environment Plan Slow to Take Off

The Namibian government has adopted all the right policies to achieve the United Nations Millennium Development Goal Seven on sustainable environmental practices, but its good intentions have floundered at the implementation stage.

WORLD SOCIAL FORUM: Debt the Illegitimate Legacy of Africa’s Dictators

As the World Social Forum (WSF) draws to a close in the Kenyan capital Thursday, calls on international finance institutions to cancel debts owed to them by poor countries have grown ever louder.

WORLD SOCIAL FORUM: End to HIV/AIDS a Tall Order in Face of Violence

The issue of violence exacerbating the spread of HIV/AIDS, particularly in women, has remained a hot one at the World Social Forum (WSF), taking place here this week.

ECONOMY-EL SALVADOR: Peace Alone Not Enough

"Conditions for workers have deteriorated, their buying power has shrunk, and marginalisation has grown. The only thing that has prevented the collapse of the economy of El Salvador are the remittances" sent home by millions of Salvadorans living abroad.

DEVELOPMENT: Morocco on a Slow March to Literacy

Morocco's "march towards light" as its literacy programme is called is brightening up as official figures go, but with far too many shady areas still.

ECONOMY-MAURITIUS: Globalisation “Gobbles Up the Plankton”

‘‘How much do you open, at what pace, and what measures do you take as a government to help local enterprises to restructure?’’

WORLD SOCIAL FORUM: Latin American Groundswell In Motion

The struggle against social exclusion and the defence of the environment and natural resources such as water have made progress in Latin America - so much so that they have become an influential groundswell of opinion which is giving shape to a new way of life, say Bolivian activists.

DEVELOPMENT-TANZANIA: Sachs Says It Is Possible to Meet MDGs

World renowned economist and director of the United Nations (UN) Millennium Project, Jeffrey Sachs, is a harbinger of good news. During his visit to Nairobi, capital of Kenya, in mid-January he emphasised that it was still possible to meet the MDGs before 2015.

WORLD SOCIAL FORUM: Small Ways to Solve Big Problems

"We were told to come for this celebration because it is a celebration to end poverty," Edward Njeru, driver of a tuktuk (a three-wheel vehicle used as a taxi in urban areas), said about the World Social Forum (WSF) that opened here Saturday.

DEVELOPMENT: Saving Farmers’ Four-Legged Bank Accounts

Most of the world's poor depend on livestock to survive, but international poverty reduction efforts devote little attention to the health of these animals, experts say.

NIGER: “The Capital Does Not Only Belong to the Rich”

The new year is looking much like the old for certain residents of the "Pays-Bas" shantytown in Niger's capital, Niamey. Four months after seeing their homes demolished in the name of safety and security, they are still waiting for resettlement at an alternative, developed site promised by authorities.

HEALTH: More Children With HIV, But Also More Getting Treatment

The world's response to protect and support HIV-infected and AIDS-affected children remains "tragically insufficient", but that is beginning to change, according to a new report by the U.N. children's agency UNICEF.

DEVELOPMENT-INDIA: IT Hub Can Handle Gigabytes, Not Dog Bites

When a pack of stray dogs tore to pieces the eight-year-old daughter of a construction worker, it showed up the social inequalities and other paradoxes of this global information technology (IT) hub.

CHALLENGES 2006-2007: Pregnancy Is a Dangerous Pursuit in Zambia

"Being pregnant in Africa is like having an unknown disease," says Zambian mother Alice Tembo, referring to many of her compatriots' lack of basic knowledge about pregnancy and childbirth.

HEALTH-PAKISTAN: Obstetric Fistula – Grim Reminder of Unmet MDGs

''I wouldn't have thrown her out but would certainly have remarried,'' says Mohammad Qasim easily, sitting in a verandah at the Koohi Goth Maternity Centre in the suburbs of this southern port city.

POLITICS: U.N. Move to Downgrade Disarmament Triggers Protests

A proposal by Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon to downgrade the U.N.'s Department of Disarmament Affairs (DDA) - and possibly bring it under the umbrella of the Department of Political Affairs - has sparked a critical reaction from member states, peace activists and non-governmental organisations (NGOs).