Agro-Tech Alone No Panacea for Food Insecurity

Providing technology to communities to ensure food security doesn't work if local traditions and social dynamics are not taken into account, concluded the participants in a forum here at the Fourth Assembly of the Global Environment Facility.

MEXICO: Optimism and Unease as Census Begins

The 100,000 pollsters who will begin knocking on doors throughout Mexico Sunday for the national census will likely face a population hesitant to provide personal information. They may also run into the drug violence that plagues some areas of the country.

Universal Education an Empty Promise for Liberia’s Girls

In a small office tucked behind the stairwell in Liberia’s Ministry of Education, the once-proud staff of the Girls’ Education Unit appear defeated.

BRAZIL: Bridge to Drive Urban Growth in Heart of Amazon

The 74 pillars that will hold up the bridge over the Negro river to join this major city in Brazil's Amazon jungle to nearby urban districts have mostly been laid, without environmental protests or major debates on the impact of a fast-growing metropolitan area in the heart of the Amazon rainforest.

NICARAGUA: Nature as a Sword of Damocles

More than 1.8 million Nicaraguans are at high risk due to the various natural disasters that strike this Central American country, according to Civil Defence authorities.

CLIMATE CHANGE: Latin America, EU Set Sights on Cancun Summit

Governments from the European Union and from Latin America and the Caribbean are confident that at year's end the international climate conference will produce a concrete legal mandate to truly protect the environment.

Making Latin America’s Cities Women-Friendly

"Violence against women is not only domestic, it also happens in the streets. Not having the right to feel safe in a city square or at a bus stop without someone bothering us, that's also violence."

Child Mortality Rates Falling Faster than Expected

With only five years left to meet the Millennium Development Goals' 2015 deadline for reducing child mortality, progress toward that goal may be coming faster than was previously thought.

How to Spend Environmental Funds

The world's multilateral credit institutions have often faced the criticism that they cause more problems than they prevent. As the challenges increase, such as those posed by climate change, the debate is shifting to environmental financing.

BRAZIL: Report Challenges Rio Slum Evictions

The debate surrounding the evacuation decree for eight "favelas" or slums in this Brazilian city, ordered by the Rio municipal government citing the danger of landslides, has taken a new course with the release of a study that undermines the official argument.

Agrobiodiversity Key to Adaptation

Mechanisation, increased use of fertilisers, and the planting of hybrid seeds have underpinned huge increases in the world's agricultural output over the past 40 years.

COLOMBIA: Initiative for Water as a Human Right Sinking in Congress

Colombian civil society organisations gathered more than two million signatures to ask Congress to hold a referendum on a constitutional amendment that would make access to water a fundamental human right. But Congress gutted the draft referendum bill this week by eliminating the clause on water as a human right.

Can Amaranth Fix Mexico’s Dual Dietary Disasters?

Supporters of amaranth have been trying for decades to bring this millennia-old grain back from oblivion. Known for its high nutritional content, it is now being promoted as a way to help modern-day Mexico confront two of its dietary ills: malnutrition and obesity.

AFRICA: Better Data Key to Supporting Women Farmers

An accomplished farmer who won the coveted Woman Farmer of the Year Award in 2008, Thabile Dlamini-Gooday wants to uplift the standard of other women in agriculture. She believes that if women farmers were to work together they could fight hunger and significantly reduce poverty among themselves.

MALI: Muslim Conservatives Blocking New Family Law

A new family law has raised tension in Mali. This controversial law, intended to give greater freedoms and rights to women, has been sent back to the National Assembly for a second reading after protests from Muslim radicals.

ENERGY: The Sun Lights Up the Night in Haiti

There are shortages of lots of things in Haiti: clean water, arable land, trees, living-wage jobs, housing, schools, fuel, reliable sources of electricity and Internet access. But one thing Haiti has in abundance is sunny days.

NAMIBIA: Will Farm Project Mean the River Runs Dry?

A proposed irrigation scheme promises greater food security for Namibia, but should the 10,000 hectare Katondo Farm Project be completed, it could threaten the health of the Okavango River.

San Fight Land Grab in Namibian Park

Pensioner Makena Makanga slowly savours a piece of manketti fruit unaware that the tree it came from will soon be chopped down and mulched along with the rest of her forest to make way for a massive agribusiness project.

Angola’s Small-Scale Farmers Welcome Investment, Urge Careful Targeting

Think small to overcome big problems - that was the message to African governments being urged to do more to increase food security and reduce hunger and malnutrition on the continent.

CHILE: Gender Equity Progress Blocked by Hard-Core “Machismo”

More than 60 percent of Chileans surveyed by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) are opposed to full equality between women and men, according to a new national report released by the agency on Friday.

PERU: Glass of Milk Half Empty

The "Glass of Milk" Programme, created in 1985 in Peru to provide a nutritional supplement for the most vulnerable population, specifically children up to six years old and pregnant and nursing women, is undermined by poor oversight, according to an audit by the Comptroller General's Office.