NAMIBIA: No Option but to Adapt to a Changing Climate

Extreme weather conditions predicted because of climate change in Namibia are likely to have a tremendous effect on the 70 percent of the country’s people who live in rural areas and depend heavily on agriculture.

ZAMBIA: Outlook Dim for Women Candidates

Although there is a female presidential candidate contesting Zambia's Sept. 20 general elections, her prospects are not strong. And in fact, fewer women overall are likely to be elected into public office this year, analysts say.

SWAZILAND: Women and Children Bear Brunt of Lawyers’ Strike

The standoff between the Law Society of Swaziland and the Judicial Services Commission is negatively affecting women, and their children, who are seeking justice from abuse.

MALAWI: Remaining in the Dark

Malawi’s attempts to improve trade and investment in the country have taken a huge step backwards following a decision by the Millennium Challenge Corporation (MCC), a United States government foreign aid agency leading the fight against global poverty, to put on hold 350.7 million dollars meant to improve the country’s flawed energy sector.

Q&A: ‘Men Have Failed Zambia, Now Is the Time for a Woman’

In Zambia's highly patriarchal society Edith Nawakwi, 52, has broken a few records on the political scene over the last two decades. And she broke another one on Sunday by being the only female candidate to file for nomination to run for president in Zambia's upcoming elections.

SOUTH AFRICA: Failing Women as Maternal Mortality Quadruples

Only six sub-Saharan African countries have failed to reduce the number of women dying in childbirth over the last two decades. High-spending South Africa is among them, with maternal mortality rates more than quadrupling since 1990. Human Rights Watch researcher Agnes Odhiambo says this is largely due to a lack of accountability.

DR CONGO: Fresh Start for DR Congo’s Coffee Producers

Long years of civil war and instability set off a crippling decline in coffee production in the Democratic Republic of Congo: the country's output in 2010 was less than a tenth the harvest twenty years earlier. Now the DRC government has a strategy to bolster recovery of the sector.

SWAZILAND: Impossible for Children to Access Public Information

Many public officials in Swaziland do not think that access to information is a public right, but rather a privilege – which can be withdrawn at anytime.

ZIMBABWE: Women Seeking Justice Face Archaic Rules and Discrimination

The four armed robbers who gang raped her may be serving time for their crimes, but six years later justice has turned out to be a myth for Mildred Mapingure.

Water as Basic Human Right Has a Market Price, Says U.N. Chief

As the 193-member General Assembly commemorates the first anniversary of its landmark resolution pronouncing water and sanitation to be a basic human right, Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon triggered a political controversy last week when he implicitly declared that even human rights have a market price.

MALAWI: Water Drives Integrated Agriculture on Small Farm

When the original owners of a 3.5 hectare piece of land put it up for sale because it was too waterlogged to farm on, Diana Sitima and her husband, Wilson, jumped to buy it.

MALAWI: Concerns of Protesters Need to be Taken Seriously

Unless Malawi’s government does something to find solutions to its economic and governance problems, the country will see more nationwide protests like the ones last week where 18 people were killed and 275 arrested, analysts say.

ZIMBABWE: Bleak Future for Second-Hand Clothes Traders

It is becoming increasingly difficult for second-hand clothes traders like Susanne Jabavu to do business because of rising costs to import bales of clothing from neighbouring countries.

SWAZILAND: Irrigation Waters the Hopes of a New Village

A transboundary water project is reinforcing the fight against food insecurity and poverty along the Komati River which flows through South Africa, Swaziland and Mozambique.

Worrying Dysfunction in DR Congo Airports

Major operational shortcomings are behind the recent spate of crashes at airports around the Democratic Republic of Congo, raising questions about safety for aircraft and passengers in the central African country.

SWAZILAND: Economic Crisis Means Short Supply of ARVs

Swaziland’s economic crisis has affected its ability to provide healthcare as the country’s buffer stock of antiretrovirals (ARVs) has fallen below the prescribed three-month supply.

HEALTH-AFRICA: Improving Sanitation, Still a Long Way to Go

When Callixte Munyabikari, a potato farmer from Gakenke in northern Rwanda, was rushed to a regional hospital after he fell ill with diarrhoea, he thought it was just a bad case of food poisoning.

MALAWI: Fuel Shortages Ignite Violent Nationwide Protests

In light of the recent spate of protests in Malawi, government should rethink its policy to devalue the local currency, economists say.

SOUTH AFRICA: Mutually Beneficial Trade With India a Key Objective

South African companies are being urged to use the leverage of its government’s strong political relationship with India to develop new business and investment opportunities.

MALAWI: Women Get Dirty to Stop Water Scarcity

Ethel James cannot wait for the gravity-fed water scheme in her area to be fixed so that she and the other women in her village will no longer have to wake up before dawn everyday to queue for water.

ZIMBABWE: Mending the City’s Water Leaks

Thomas Njini is used to working with burst sewers and water pipes. It is a daily experience for him to respond to calls where he has to shovel human waste to clear blocked sewers. It is a job he continues to do with unenviable dedication in this city of two million people.