Rural 21: Latest News

Foot-and-mouth disease is spreading further in North Africa and the Middle East

Tue, 15 May 2012 16:40:00 +0200

Following cases of foot-and-mouth disease (FMD) in Egypt and Libya in February and March 2012, at the beginning of May cases are now being reported in the Gaza Strip. The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) has pointed out that international efforts are essential in order to stop the virus from spreading further in the Middle East and North Africa.

Following outbreaks of the SAT2 strain of the virus in Egypt and Libya (refer to an earlier report on Rural 21), fears that the virus would spread to neighbouring areas were confirmed on 19 April when sick animals were detected in Rafah, a town in the Gaza Strip bordering Egypt. The SAT2 variant is new to the region, meaning that animals do not have any acquired resistance to it.

With vaccines against the SAT2 virus still in short supply, the priority at the moment is to limit animal movements to prevent its further spread. Heightened surveillance of animal populations to quickly detect and respond to new outbreaks is also critical.

Movements of animals from the Nile Delta eastward through the Sinai Peninsula and north into the Gaza Strip have been deemed the highest risk for the spread of the SAT2 FMD virus strain into the wider Middle East region, where livestock are a major component of household food security.

Another SAT2 virus strain was recently reported in cattle in Bahrain, but only at a quarantine centre. This emphasises the importance of thorough inspection and prevention systems when dealing with imported plants, animals or other biological material.
Following official reports of the FMD SAT2 outbreaks in Egypt, Israel quickly implemented targeted vaccination along its southern borders to create a buffer zone of protection for animal herds most at risk.

Measures to control FMD

Gaza Strip will be receiving an initial lot of 20 000 vaccine doses to protect its valuable cattle. An additional 40 000 doses will be made available as soon as possible for sheep and goats.

Meanwhile, FAO and the FAO-based European Commission for the Control of Foot-and-Mouth Disease (EuFMD) are negotiating with producers and vaccine banks to find sources for vaccines in the event of further spread of foot-and-mouth disease and a worsening of the current situation.

FAO/OIE (World Organization for Animal Health) Crisis Management Centre for Animal Health (CMC-AH) teams are said to have collected additional samples from affected animals in Libya so that the virus can be better characterised and the most suitable vaccine found or produced, thereby ensuring the maximum efficacy of eventual vaccination campaigns. The team will also lend Libyan veterinary services support in strengthening their efforts to control FMD outbreaks.

FAO has also been involved in a number of additional responses, as well:

Development of a regional response plan in consultation with countries at risk of eastward spread of SAT2 from Egypt and westward spread from Libya.
Facilitating a series of meetings among veterinary officials from the Middle East, North Africa, and southern Europe to promote coordinated action and effective implementation of the response plan.
Working through the FAO/OIE Crisis Management Centre for Animal Health (CMC-AH) and the EuFMD Commission to provide technical support to Egypt in managing its SAT2 epidemic.
Training veterinarians from the region in taking virus samples and diagnostic methods to identify the SAT2 strain of FMD. A supply of ELISA (Enzyme Linked Immunosorbent Assay) diagnostic kits, which are easy to use, were also supplied to veterinarians working in high risk areas of Egypt and countries to its east, including Israel, Jordan and the Palestinian territories, including the West Bank.

Author: (FAO/ile)

Toolkit: How to support small enterprises in the forestry sector

Fri, 11 May 2012 13:43:00 +0200

A facilitator's toolkit: Supporting small forest enterprises, was published by the International Institute for Environment and Development (IIED) in April 2012. It was produced with support from the World Bank-hosted Programme on Forests (PROFOR) – with additional support from the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), the FAO-hosted National Forest Programme Facility (NFP-Facility), the United Kingdom Government's Department for International Development (DFID), the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation (SDC) and the Danish International Development Assistance (DANIDA).

The guidance is for international donors, non-governmental organisations and national government agencies and extension workers who work to support small and medium forest enterprises.
These groups will be able to use the toolkit to diagnose and solve challenges in the sector – such as:

How to connect small enterprises to markets, to each other and to policy processes.
How to create and secure funding for alliances of supportive institutions.
How to support enterprises to develop products, improve the efficiency of value chains, prepare credible business and financial investment plans and ensure sustainability.
Small forest businesses are critical to the future of forest and forest peoples. They provide more than half of all jobs in the forestry sector worldwide and account for 80-90 per cent of companies in the sector, according to the authors.

The toolkit includes 16 modules of step-by-step guidance, followed by practical tips based on personal experiences of the authors. It includes 60 case studies that describe various trial attempts to use the tools during a two-year testing period in 12 countries.

In China, it was used to apply an Ethiopian ‘health check’ methodology to strengthen newly formed forest sector cooperatives.
In Burkina Faso, it was used to improve market information flows throughout the value chain for forest products such as Shea butter, honey, nuts and fruit.
In Nepal, it was used for product development. Community forest users groups were linked to community owned enterprises producing charcoal briquettes. Companies were approached to design stoves that fitted the briquettes and the link was then made with the Himalayan Naturals retailer with 50+ outlets in Kathmandu to sell them. The business is a huge success.

The toolkit was developed in response to the priorities of members of Forest Connect – an informal alliance of individuals and institutions in more than 50 countries that are committed to ending the isolation of small forest enterprises, the authors said. Download the toolkit

Author: (IIED/ile)

Mekong2Rio - International Conference on Transboundary River Basin Management

Fri, 11 May 2012 11:54:00 +0200

The Mekong River Commission (MRC) organised an international conference from 1st to 3rd – May in Phuket/Thailand. About 300 participants from 14 river basin organisations from different continents as well as government officials, policy makers, development agencies, non-governmental organisations, the private sector and other stakeholders from the region and beyond presented and discussed solutions in the governance and use of shared international water resources. Moreover, they discussed new approaches and up-to-date technologies to solve current challenges and to develop alternative options in order to minimise negative social and environmental consequences in river basins.

The conference looked into current trends of water uses to meet food, energy and water needs and pointed out the importance of the nexus approach from a transboundary water management perspective. Concrete recommendations to implement the nexus are contained in the message supported by the water, environment and energy ministries of the four MRC Member Countries, Thailand, Cambodia, Laos and Vietnam, to be sent to the UN Conference on Sustainable Development 2012 (Rio+20), which is to be held in June 2012 in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.

The key messages from the Conference in an abbreviated from were:

Water, food and energy are key strategic resources for countries. This may on the one hand create barriers to cooperation, but on the other hand a nexus approach can contribute to regional stability if countries can agree to cooperate. Solutions to food, water and energy security issues are being found by the three sectors working together.
Water management needs to respect the basin and aquifer as the basic unit, from the smallest catchment to the major transboundary basins. Transboundary river basin and aquifer management entities should be empowered to play their role in influencing national decisions.
The predominant paradigm in many countries on economic development needs to change towards a more balanced nexus approach which recognises the importance of investment in and protection of natural capital and the need to maintain ecosystems functions and livelihoods.
Operationalising the nexus in a transboundary setting calls for sharing of data and information between countries, not only on water, but also on food and energy production.
Nexus thinking needs to be based on scientific evidence of the gains to be made, and hence an added focus on research and development, along with the dissemination of results through a stronger transboundary science-policy dialogue.
A multi-purpose approach for dams may increasingly be used to provide solutions to food security issues by increased irrigation, and at the same time provide water supply, energy, flood protection, jobs and economic development. However, sustainability challenges still remain, as do the challenges to implement benefit sharing.
Infrastructure development for large-scale energy and food production in transboundary basins needs to address the dependency of the rural poor on water-related food production such as rice and fish through thorough analysis and stakeholder dialogue.
In anticipating the influence of climate change, there needs to be policy coherence between regional basin-wide analysis and national adaptation strategies.

Of utmost importance for any action is to consider the transboundary dimension of the nexus. Decisions at national level depend entirely on the awareness by decision-makers in the concerned sectors, and the political will to engage in dialogue across sectors and across boundaries.

For more information: Mekoong2Rio Conference

The GIZ cooperation programme with the MRC was actively involved in the preparation and management of the conference. In a GIZ information booth, opportunities for networking and sharing of experiences on transboundary water management were provided.

Author: Philipp Magiera, GIZ, Eschborn/Germany

Organic Agriculture beneficial for Africa

Fri, 11 May 2012 10:49:00 +0200

More than 300 participants to the 2nd African Organic Conference in Lusaka called on the European Union (EU) and other actors of the global trade partners to take all possible steps to facilitate the participation of Africa in global organic markets. This includes a request to recognise as equivalent the East African Organic Products Standard (EAOPS), which was developed through a consultative regional public-private partnership and adopted as the official East African Community organic standard in 2007.

In what they called the Lusaka Declaration on Mainstreaming Organic Agriculture into the African Development Agenda they urged African Governments to include organic agriculture in their policies and programmes, in consultation with the organic/ecological agriculture stakeholders in the respective countries. The conference “Mainstreaming organic agriculture into the African development agenda” ran from 2 to 4 May 2012 and had participants from 40 countries.

Expanding Africa's shift towards organic farming will not only be good for the continent's nutritional needs, but also beneficial to the environment, farmers incomes, and by extension for African markets and employment, noted the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) Deputy Secretary-General Petko Draganov in his opening address.
“Organic agriculture can offer an impressive array of food security, economic, environmental, and health benefits for developing countries, especially in Africa.” The UNCTAD-UNEP "Best Practices for Organic Policy" could provide useful guidance.

The UNCTAD strongly supports the growing use of organic farming practices on the continent – Africa already has more certified organic farms than any other continent. It is this form of agriculture that comprehensively illustrates the central topic of UNCTAD’s just concluded quadrennial conference in Doha, Qatar: “Development-centred globalization: Towards inclusive and sustainable growth and development.”

Organic agriculture, the highway to food security in Africa

Emphasised at the conference also, sustainable agriculture in regards to food security and a transition towards a ‘green’ economy. The conference had among its objectives the development of an African Organic Action Plan intended to spur expansion of the organic farming sector, streamline certification and “organic equivalency” systems that allow more vigorous trade in organic goods, and add to the continent's markets for organic produce. While stressing on the need to encourage farmers to practice organic agriculture, the speakers were all in agreement on the much needed institutional and governmental support of the same.
''Farmers ought to be encouraged and supported in order to practise organic agriculture'', said the Zambia's Minister of Agriculture and Livestock Emmanuel Chenda. He was of the opinion that organic agriculture not only sustains the fertility of soils, ecosystems and promotes health, but also has a major role to play in the fight against hunger in Africa.

Moreover, Africa has more than one million hectares of arable land currently being used for organic farming, and 530,000 certified organic farmers. Ethiopia and Uganda each have more than 100,000 certified farms while Tanzania has about 85,000.
“Organic farming helps promote the independence of farmers to grow a variety of farm produce and reduce dependency on costly inputs ”, stated Zambia's First Republican President Kenneth Kaunda, patron of Organic Producers and Processers Association of Zambia (OPPAZ).

Placing great value on the African traditional way of farming and communal spirit of togetherness, commonly known as Ubuntu, OPPAZ chief executive officer Munshimbwe Chitalu said organic agriculture was in harmony with nature and had its genesis in Africa.
Likewise, touching on the current food crisis in Africa, the head of Agriculture and Food Security from African Union Commission Dr. Yemi Akinbamijo, said, “Africa is food deficient, which is why organic farming provides another way of improving food security on the continent.”
According to Manjo Smith of International Federation of Organic Agriculture Movements (IFOAM), one of the accomplishments of the conference was the establishment of the Southern African regional network. Adding that research was underway on soil fertilisation which would benefit farmers.

The three-day Lusaka meeting was organized by Organic Producers and Processors Association of Zambia (OPPAZ), UNCTAD, the African Union, the International Federation of Organic Agriculture Movements (IFOAM), the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) and Zambian Ministry of Agriculture and Livestock.

More information: 2nd African Organic Conference Author: Gethsemane Mwizabi, Journalist - Zambia

Land Matrix: Website provides extensive information on land deals worldwide

Thu, 10 May 2012 12:45:00 +0200

The report draws on data now made accessible in a new online interface called the Land Matrix. This website will provide unprecedented access to verified data on land deals, allowing people to explore and visualise trends from the global level down to individual deals. The aim of the Land Matrix is to promote transparency and accountability in decisions over land and investment through open data, accessible both via maps and visualisations and via download. The website is to encourage researchers, governments, companies to provide more data on land acquisitions.

Even citizens can get involved: the innovative interface is designed for the public to crowd-source new information, and also improve the database's quality and reliability. The website is intended to provide a facility for observing trends on land and investment on an ongoing basis.

The Land Matrix will periodically publish an analytical report, with this first one of the series focusing specifically on transnational agriculture deals in low and middle income countries of the Global South and Eastern Europe. The report contains information on investors, the drivers for these deals, and their impacts. The main investor countries are classified into three groups: emerging economies, Gulf States, and Europe and North America. Evidence of increasing south-south investment and intra-regionalism is another major finding.
Investments examined by the Land Matrix entail a transfer of rights to use, control or own land through sale, lease or concession that covers 200 hectares (ha) or more. Since the year 2000, 1008 deals have been documented, amounting to 76,329,194 ha of land. An analysis of international land investments for agriculture suggests that they are geographically concentrated: just 11 countries, many in East Africa and Southeast Asia, account for 70 percent of the total land area acquired in these deals. Close examination also reveals that almost half of land in question is already being used for crops, implying competition between investors and small-scale farmers. Members of the Land Matrix partnership:

CIRAD (Centre de Coopération Internationale en Recherche Agronomique pour le Développement)
CDE (Centre for Development and Environment)
GIGA (German Institute for Global and Area Studies)
GIZ (Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit)
ILC (International Land Coalition)

For more information: Website:

Download report: Transnational Land Deals for Agriculture in the Global South

Author: (GIGA/ile)

Land Matrix: Website provides extensive information on land deals worldwide

Thu, 10 May 2012 12:26:00 +0200

CIRAD (Centre de Coopération Internationale en Recherche Agronomique pour le Développement)
CDE (Centre for Development and Environment)
GIGA (German Institute for Global and Area Studies)
GIZ (Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit)
ILC (International Land Coalition)

For more information: Website

Download report: Transnational Land Deals for Agriculture in the Global South

Author: (GIGA/ile)

Groundwater in Africa and climate change adaptation

Tue, 08 May 2012 16:08:00 +0200

In 2010 DFID commissioned a consortium led by the British Geological Survey to study the vulnerability of groundwater to climate change in Africa. The aim of the study was to improve our understanding of the twin impacts of climate change and increasing demand on groundwater resources on the continent. The study was finished in 2011 and the reports are available online. The study has produced the first set of quantitative continent wide maps of groundwater availability for Africa by utilising existing maps and studies, and undertaking targeted field studies in Nigeria, Tanzania, Uganda and Ethiopia. A paper describing the maps was published in the journal Environmental Research Letters (volume 7, no 2, April 2012). These maps are the first of their kind for Africa and show the wide variation in groundwater resources across the continent. A key finding was that many countries usually considered water scare have large volumes of groundwater underlying them, but the poor accessibility of the groundwater means that countries still suffer from economic water scarcity. Groundwater development

The research indicates that for much of the populated parts of Africa it is possible to access groundwater using boreholes and handpumps for drinking water if accompanied by appropriate investigations using suitable expertise. The development of available groundwater will certainly help improve water security but the research emphasises the need for careful planning of groundwater development. However, building strategies that depend on the availability of widespread higher reliable yields from groundwater (for example for commercial irrigation) is likely to be problematic. More information:

Department for International Development (DFID)

(DFID/wi)

German development policy needs refocusing

Tue, 08 May 2012 12:01:00 +0200

The aid organisations terre des hommes and Welthungerhilfe have called on the German Federal Government to refocus its international co-operation. Presenting “The Reality of Aid 2012 – A critical analysis of the German Federal Government’s development policy” in Berlin in mid April, they criticised the government for its lack of coherence and its clinging to concepts that do not take changing global challenges into account.

Important areas are ignored

The report criticises an insufficient increase in government aid efforts, a reduction in the number of partner countries, the refocusing of German development policy on bilateral co-operation and too much emphasis on the (German) private sector. The recently decided transfer of major elements of emergency and transitional aid from the Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ) to the Foreign Office was a signal in the wrong direction. The result for the countries in need was that urgently required funds were now put on hold pending further budget decisions. There are many positive approaches, such as the announcement by the BMZ to subject all government projects to a scrutiny regarding human rights risks, says Wolfgang Jamann, Secretary General of Welthungerhilfe. However, Jamann maintains that there is a lack of coherence with other policy fields, so that the effectiveness of such a demand remains questionable. In the latest policy principle concept of the BMZ, he notes an absence of important topics such as primary education or the development of rural regions. Moreover, he adds that since the change of government, a trend has become apparent of counting KfW-Entwicklungsbank loans at market conditions as Official Development Assistance. Not only does this distort figures, Jamann says, but these means also benefit economically more powerful developing countries in particular.

The Welthungerhilfe Secretary General attested the Fourth High-Level Forum on Aid Effectiveness important successes. For example, for the first time, the Final Document was now also being supported by the “new donors”, such as China, India and Brazil – albeit only on a voluntary basis. However, Jamann criticised that the document lacked concrete goals and schedules. Germany ought to urge catching up on this by June 2012 at the latest.

Sustainable development goals are necessary

Danuta Sacher, Executive Director of terre des hommes, stressed the changing global context. The gulf between rich and poor was widening in many countries. Also, the majority of the poor, now more than 70 percent, were living in middle-income countries such as India, China, Brazil or Indonesia. Forecasts indicate that by 2030, 57 percent of the gross national product will be generated by non-OECD countries. Coupled with an alarming scarcity of natural resources and the impact of global climate changes, this shift in economic and political power relations world-wide is posing new challenges for the world community, Sacher maintains, and suggests that in order to address these challenges, German development co-operation requires a new concept with the following cornerstones:

Germany’s development policy ought to be based on the economic, social and cultural human rights and the government commitments that they entail. In addition, the Federal Government ought to apply the so-called Rio commitments as a yardstick for its activities, i.e. the principle of common but different responsibilities on the part of states (according to their contribution to global environmental stress and their economic capacity), the polluter principle (in covering the costs of environmental and economic damage) and the preventive principle (which obliges governments to prevent doing severe harm to humans and the environment in their political action).
A coherence strategy has to be developed that has a binding nature for all government departments. In future, all policy areas ought to be subjected to an “MOT” examining their impact on human rights and development.
In their present form, the Millennium Development Goals do not sufficiently reflect the global challenges. They ought to be replaced by sustainable development goals. In order to strengthen the international architecture to implement sustainable development, the status of the UN Commission on Sustainable Development (CSD) established in Rio de Janeiro in 1992 ought to be enhanced to the level of a UN Council on Sustainable Development along the lines of the UN Council on Human Rights.

The report “The Reality of Aid 2012” is conceived as a shadow report accompanying the official statistics of the Development Assistance Committee/DAC of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD). It examines the quantity and quality of German and international development co-operation.

More information Download Report Author: Silvia Richter, editor, Rural 21

From technocratic to participatory planning? Water supply and sanitation services development in post-Soviet Moldova

Tue, 08 May 2012 11:07:00 +0200

The Republic of Moldova is in the middle of a profound socioeconomic restructuring process that has a particular effect on rural areas. After the breakdown of the Soviet system, state revenues were cut dramatically, which reduced the ability of the government to provide adequate and effective public services such as water supply and sanitation (WatSan). Today, the country is considered to be the poorest European economy. As part of an attempt to close the gap in meeting public demands, responsibility for efficient public services provision was handed over to local government units. However, the decentralisation reform to strengthen sub-national development capacities is still underway. In parallel, a regional development policy has been adopted to overcome disparities and the uneven distribution of economic activities across regions. Since 2009, regional development institutions have been developing integrated strategies and bringing together a multitude of actors across different levels and sectors.

A changing planning paradigm

There is an unambiguous correlation between the quality of services and the degree of public participation during local development planning. Due to the legacy of centralised planning, there is not much experience with inclusionary planning in post-Soviet countries. Low levels of political efficacy have led to political disengagement of the civil society. The transfer of planning tasks to lower levels of government remains a huge challenge. Nevertheless, the planning paradigm in the Republic of Moldova has substantially changed from top-down and technocratic to participatory today. Although planning is a bureaucratic activity in need of technical expertise, there are various reasons to promote meaningful engagement of citizens in the planning process. It is recognised as contributing to Good Governance, enhancing the transparency of decision-making, and providing planners with crucial information on local realities. The question is whether citizens in post-Soviet Moldova actually want to be involved in decision-making. Or does the image of planning have a negative connotation stemming from the era of Soviet central planning?

Participatory district development planning

This article results from experiences made during the pilot implementation of a participatory approach for integrated district development planning in the Republic of Moldova. WatSan sector planning documents in the Republic lack both a coherent, transparent prioritisation of infrastructure investments and realistic, measurable targets. To assist the district administrations with their mid-term strategic planning for WatSan infrastructure development, GIZ (Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit) commissioned the SLE (Seminar für Ländliche Entwicklung) to carry out a field assignment from August to October 2011. As part of SLE postgraduate studies, an interdisciplinary team of junior advisors designed a participatory approach for integrated planning and supported its implementation in two pilot districts, Cahul and Riscani. It should be noted that some final results of this pilot process are still pending. The aim of the whole endeavour is to guarantee a more efficient and needs-responsive resource allocation at district, regional and national level for the implementation of water and sanitation development activities. Using Stakeholder Dialogues as a tool, relevant stakeholders were brought together to set priorities for WatSan investments in the two pilot districts, and to align district planning with regional and national strategies. This kind of vertical interaction within integrated planning is a dimension of multi-level governance, which goes hand in hand with decentralisation.

Status quo of participation in decision-making

The institutions regulating and facilitating public participation in issues pertaining to the governance of the physical and socio-economic environment are only poorly developed in the Republic of Moldova. This is why participation in public decision-making has so far only been executed sporadically on the level of communes and towns, initiated by international development organisations. Resource allocation and decision-making characterised by informal processes is a result of low public involvement and a poor level of transparency in development planning. Hence the approach tested by the SLE team was a venture into uncharted territory. The essence of the approach is the unification of national strategies with local priorities at the interface between national and commune level: a development plan for the district. In the future it shall integrate all public service domains (horizontal integration), although, for the time being, it is focusing on the most pressing ones. The approach for participatory development planning at district level has been designed by the team to serve all domains of public service provision. In this case, it incorporated the identification of national WatSan policy goals and was proposed to national decision-makers to complement these goals with locally adapted district priorities. These district priorities were seen as making the difference between increased attention for disadvantaged areas, or the concentration on extending and upgrading existing service provision in already better-off zones.

Organising and designing participatory planning at the district level

Three issues surfaced while the team organised the Stakeholder Dialogues. First, the mode of selection for the stakeholder representatives, and corresponding repartition of the major groups: a) district administration, b) mayors of rural communes, and c) civil society representatives. This selection is supposed to be driven by bottom-up processes: delegation of representation for a specific task as opposed to self-appointment of traditional elites, or top-down selection by the next higher government level. A second, complex issue was that of stepwise, transparent and strategic decision-making in the field of WatSan services. While participatory planning is not complex in technical terms in principle, the concrete subject of water and sanitation service provision (in this pilot process) is. Technical options, respective investment and recurring cost need to be made transparent for the stakeholders to take well-informed decisions. The main input of the SLE team's support to the newly established regional development agencies was the facilitation of exchange between the stakeholders, starting with the formulation of objectives, and leading to weighted priorities. The regional development agencies are the ones responsible for the facilitation of broad-based participatory strategic planning. A third domain of challenges concerned logistics. On the one hand, it relates to the timely and comprehensive availability of accessible information on the current state of WatSan infrastructure, service provision, and potential costs. The other aspect concerns the gathering of people from a larger area, within a limited timeframe.

Despite the pioneer character of joint, strategic planning the responses and involvement of delegates were very positive, claiming that learning about the respective counterpart’s point of view was very valuable. This is true both for representatives of the national level as well as mayors of remote communes. However, balancing the need for efficacy (through delegation) against the will to give ‘everyone’ a say has been questioned by stakeholder representatives and non-participants alike. Most stakeholders were not familiar with special questions regarding WatSan service provision. In addition, delegates have little experience with decision-making. Due to the approach being applied for the first time, the issue of delegation had not been given as much attention as would have been desirable: members of the facilitation team and the district administration chose delegates. Hence, there was a mixed response among the representatives to the pilot run of a participatory planning process. While for the majority of representatives, being a delegate was part of their everyday lives as mayors, actors from civil society organisations were thrilled to be invited to join full-time politicians in their decision-making. The wider public, however, remained uninformed about the process due to insufficient communication and media involvement. In addition, since comprehensive data on the WatSan status quo had not been readily available at the time the Stakeholder Dialogue had been conducted, there have been signs of reluctance to carry on with the process. Some stakeholders have called for a ‘pragmatic’ delegation of the planning to experts.

Lessons learnt

Not least due to rising pressure by the people, and constant lobbying by international partners, there had been a paradigm shift from a centralised, top-down model of planning towards a participatory approach to strategic planning in post-Soviet Moldova. The approach suggested adds transparency to politically sensitive decisions on resource allocation for water and sanitation development activities. Implementing participatory district development planning, however, revealed that expectations of immediate project selection and funding remained high among some participants. Others took a rather passive role of presence during the stakeholder dialogue. In addition, until the last step, some participants were not clear about the expected outcomes. In this case, working in smaller, more focused groups was conducive to the clarification of questions. Our experience has shown that the key principle is to continuously inform stakeholders about the objective and status of the planning process. This holds true especially for stakeholders not acquainted with this form of joint decision-making, to avoid feelings of being disadvantaged in terms of the outcome. Yet, it remains to be seen how the results will look like in a couple of years.

Authors:
Elisabeth Bollrich & Jens Treffner
Participants of the 49th SLE Postgraduate Course

elisabethbollrich@gmail.com
jenstreffner@gmx.de

New Internet platform on European development policy

Mon, 07 May 2012 11:07:00 +0200

The internet platform Donor Tracker was launched at the end of April 2012 by the German consultancy SEEK Development.

Donor Tracker offers up-to-date and comparative information on the development policy priorities and financial commitments of eight major European donors: UK, Germany, France, EU, Spain, Netherlands, Norway and Sweden. The profiles for Norway and Sweden are not yet online, says SEEK Development, but will be available soon.
The website includes information on how individual donors focus on agriculture.

Donor Tracker information is in three formats:

Donor Profiles give a compact overview of each country’s political system, the relevant actors and institutions, underlying strategies and funding commitments. They also analyse the development policy focus in the sectors health and agriculture.
The Policy Tracker provides ongoing news on development policy debates, decisions and legislation. The news can be filtered per theme or country and an RSS news feed subscription is also possible.
Cross-Cutting Analyses allow readers to obtain a transversal insight into strategic development policy issues.

SEEK Development provides consultancy to international organisations, government institutions, non-government organisations, foundations and socially committed organisations. Focus is placed on global health and international development.

Author: (SEEK Development/ile)

Climate change, land grabbing and the never ending story of food insecurity

Fri, 04 May 2012 15:24:00 +0200

As part of its 50th anniversary celebration, Welthungerhilfe hosted a two-day conference in Bonn, Germany, on 24th – 25th April. The conference “Move! United for sustainable development” brought together experts, academics and like-minded partner organisations from around the globe to deliberate on the way forward to achieving the ultimate goal of a world without hunger. Discussions were centered on three main topics: climate change and the right to food; food waste, food losses and food security; large-scale land deals and small-scale farmers.

The decrease of agricultural productivity due to climate-induced risks, soil degradation, land grabbing and a lack of adequate farming techniques and equipment, the spread of new human, animal and crop diseases, and excessive demographic pressure were but a few of the negative factors quoted as posing a severe threat to livelihoods and food security.

Mulitfacetted threats to agricultural production

Alfred Sawadogo, president of SOS Sahel, noted that in Burkina Fasso, for example, extreme climatic conditions had left a trail of destruction across the country that the world must not ignore. Likewise, the culture of hunger that Burkina Faso had acquired was merely due to recurrent droughts which, during the past century, had commonly been characterised by the periodic invasions of desert locusts. He claimed that agricultural production was directly dependent on rainfall, which had become unreliable, ranging from floods in 2007– 2009 to droughts in 2011.

In India on the other hand, it is the lack of humanity and social ethics that present the greatest danger to food security, at least according to Manash Gosh, Dean ATC, Ramakrishna Mission Ashrama. He stated that whilst climate change was wreaking havoc the world over, it was the youth's lack of interest in farming and farmers not being respected by the communities, compounded by the scores of farmers immigrating to the cities from the rural areas, that seemed to be the beginning of the end of the once vibrant agricultural sector. “We are not just faced with the challenges brought about by climate change. Farmers are shown no honour or positive regard; not only are they disrespected as individuals but also the entire farming fraternity is simply taken for granted; both by the communities as well as by the government,” he stated. “Little wonder that most are eager to abandon the practice.”

Consequently, the likelihood of sustainable development in the wake of a sharp increase in population growth, and an ever increasing resource consumption crowned by the impact of climate change paints a rather gloomy picture. Welthungerhilfe is aware that the prospects of a world without hunger are grim, noted the organisation’s president Bärbel Dieckmann in her keynote address. She stressed that while the organisation had achieved a lot it could boast about over the past 50 years, the idea now was to facilitate an exchange of experiences and a discussion of initial approaches for solving tenacious issues such as food waste and land grabbing.

“We need the intensive networking of the many experts and active participants around the globe. Sustainable development has been one of Welthungerhilfe's most important principles for 50 years, and will become the greatest challenge in our future work,” she stated.

Close correlation between land grabbing and biofuels As a result of the world-wide food crisis plus the demand for biofuel, a disturbing trend arising on the global platform and one that is causing mayhem to the economies of developing nations in Africa and Latin America is land grabbing; and by extension the purchase of enormous tracts of agricultural lands by buyers in rich or emerging economies. In countries such as Bolivia, Sierra Leone, Cambodia, and Uganda, which were represented at the conference, the trend is said to have reached its peak.

Moreover, a recent study by FIAN, an organisation campaigning for the right to adequate food, on behalf of Platform EuropAfrica on the admixture ratio for biofuel (so-called E10) confirms that there is an enormous correlation between land grabbing and biofuels. The study notes that 66 percent of all large-scale land grabbing in Africa has the aim of producing biofuels. Thus by encouraging land concessions for economic purposes, FIAN states, developed nations are contributing to violations of the right to food and are countering the efforts they themselves are making to promote smallholders and fight hunger.

Similar sentiments were presented by the President and Founder of the Cambodian League for the Promotion and Defence of Human Rights (LICADHO), Dr. Pung Chhiv Kek. She maintained that the increased incidents of land conflicts in Cambodia were a direct repercussion of the issuance of Economic Land Concessions (ELCs), which now represent over 50 percent of all arable land in the country. In granting these highly lucrative long-term leases, often for just a few dollars per hectare per year, Cambodian authorities were routinely ignoring and violating Cambodia’s 2001 Land Law and other laws and regulations with protective provisions, some of which were drafted with the technical support of EU countries, the participants heard.

“Land grabbing carries a huge social and economic cost. And taking away homes or rice fields from families makes them poorer, reduces their ability to access education, health care, and other services, and makes them more vulnerable to exploitation such as human trafficking,” Dr. Pung Chhiv Kek concluded.

More information: Welthungerhilfe

Author: Olive Bexten, Rural 21

Promoting girls – between goals and realities

Fri, 04 May 2012 10:13:00 +0200

Each extra year at school raises a woman's potential income by 10 to 20 percent, says the World Bank. In spite of this, two thirds of the 760 illiterate adults world-wide are women. So aren't politicians in the North and the South doing enough to achieve equal participation of girls and women? And what makes special support for girls so difficult? In an attempt to examine these issues more closely, Deutsche Stiftung Weltbevölkerung, together with the company Bayer HealthCare Pharmaceuticals, organised a Parliamentary Evening in Berlin, Germany, on the 24th April 2012.

Still a lot to catch up on

Over the past few years, the promotion of girls has attained more significance in development co-operation and scored some success, says Wolfgang Kanera of Germany’s Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ):

In primary education, girls and boys are represented on a par in almost all countries nowadays.
In 45 developing countries, more girls than boys attend secondary education.
In 60 developing countries, more women have enrolled at universities than men.

Nevertheless, these positive developments should not overshadow the fact that many regions still have a long way to go before they have achieved equal opportunities: 40 million of the 67 million children of primary school going age who do not go to school are girls.Things are even worse in later school development. In Sub-Saharan Africa, for example, only three out of ten girls have the chance of receiving secondary education. Girls in rural areas are particularly disadvantaged, mainly because schools are frequently far off and getting to them can be risky. Scarcity of funds often means that the sons get to go to school while the daughters have to help with household chores and agriculture. Factors such as a lack of women teachers (for example in Afghanistan) or the absence of separate sanitary facilities for girls and boys are a deterrent to parents sending their girls to school. In addition, girls are often married before they reach the age of 18 years, and they then often (have to) give up school. In the developing countries, 14 million teenagers become pregnant each year. Complications during pregnancies are one of the chief causes of mortalities among young women between the ages of 15 and 19 years, and 70,000 deaths are recorded each year.

A question of empowerment

“Girls’ education has an impact on all dimensions of development,” said Kanera, describing the close link between education, sexual self-determination and reproductive health. He maintained that education for girls resulted in reduced infant and maternal mortality, better HIV/Aids prevention and lower birth rates. Not only will a girl in a developing country attending school for at least seven years get married four years later in comparison to one with poorer or no school education, but on average, she will also give birth to two less children, the child welfare organisation Unicef has established. The question however remains why implementing support for girls does not result in success hoped for despite an increase in financial resources. Karin Roth, Member of the German Federal Parliament, regards cultural barriers as a crucial factor. Often, in countries where social and political power traditionally lies in the hands of men, who are not interested in ceding part of it, this is only progressing at a snail’s pace, Roth maintains. In addition continuous dialogue, for example with church representatives on the causes of sexual violence towards women; it is above all women’s movements in rural areas that need support, in order to give women a voice, she says. And here too, one has to start at an early stage, Roth adds: “We have to enable girls to obtain qualifications and show them that they themselves are responsible for their own lives.”

“Empowering girls means empowering society”

If parents are to be persuaded to send their girls to school despite cultural barriers, financially support would make this step easier for them.Here Roth welcomed the proposal made by the International Labour Organization and the World Bank to introduce a sort of child benefit system for developing countries in which payment of benefits would be made conditional on the children’s school attendance. Kenya made primary education free of charge and mandatory ten years ago. Since 2007, secondary education has also been free of charge,Kenya’s Ambassador Kennedy Nyauncheo Osinde reported. Since then, the primary school attendance rate has risen to 100 percent, while it is at 47 percent at secondary schools. In order to prevent pregnancies at an early age, a curriculum has been developed that already includes sexual education at the primary school level. Teachers who are proven guilty of sexual misconduct are punished severely. Of course all these measures are met with considerable resistance – not only on the part of the Catholic Church, but in society in general; after all, a girl is a potential candidate for marriage and therefore a source of wealth for her parents. Osinde is nevertheless convinced that his country has chosen the right path: „Empowering girls means empowering society”.

More information on the DSW und Bayer HealthCare projects Author: Silvia Richter, Editor, Rural 21

How can the needs of the earth’s population in the future be satisfied?

Fri, 04 May 2012 09:10:00 +0200

Professor Martin Faulstich, Director of the German Advisory Council on the Environment (SRU), presented the findings and consequences of overusing our vital ecosystems. 80 participants and other SRU experts discussed the concepts on how to deal with the ecological challenges.

What options exist in order to ensure food for almost 9 billion people, to guarantee an acceptable prosperity for everyone and to conserve the world's fragile ecosystems?

One approach discussed was the triad of reducing consumption, raising efficiency and substitution.

The call to reduce our consumption of raw materials and energy is a sensitive issue: a controversial debate centred on whether it is enough for each individual to find his/her own path towards greater sufficiency by him/herself. Or does the call for more frugality just lead to an impasse? Only three to five per cent of the people in this world would voluntarily eat less meat, drive their cars less frequently and buy fewer mobile phones. This is why politics have to take an active role, demanded the opposing faction. A binding framework of action must be laid out by policy-makers. Moreover, politics must promote technological innovations and employ (price) instruments to reduce demand.

Efforts to raise efficiency have already been successful in recent years. Enormous improvements have been made in the efficiency of housing and electro motors. In terms of CO2 emissions, agriculture and goods transport are still standing at the pillory. Is this two sides of the same coin? The more feed we give to our cows that originates in far-off continents, and the higher the amount of foodstuffs that is destroyed enroute between the producer and the consumer, means that global trade and goods transport become all the more sophisticated, leading ultimately to higher CO2 emissions.

The boom of renewable energy resources is proof that substitution of fossil sources of energy is possible within a few years. With a quota of 20 per cent energy from renewable sources, Germany has just set out on this path, and has already taken on a leading role. Another example of successful substitution is recycling: Instead of repeatedly bringing new raw materials from far-off, often crisis-riven countries into consumer countries it suffices to close the life-cycle of production, use and re-use.

However, solutions to global problems can only be found at global levels. Twenty years after Rio, now is the time to re-stimulate the corresponding mechanisms of the world community, to strengthen the exchange of ideas and technologies and to minimise conflicting goals.

The conference participants agreed in the end: there are enough options available to achieve a decoupling between sustainable development of prosperity and resource consumption. Mid 2012 the German Advisory Council on the Environment (SRU) will publish a report dedicated to this topic. More information: German Advisory Council on the Environment (SRU)

Evangelische Akademie Tutzing

Contact

Author: (GIZ)

Amendments to Brazil’s forest law underway

Fri, 04 May 2012 07:02:00 +0200

The Brazilian lower house of parliament voted to reform the Brazilian Forest Law on 25 April 2012. Environmental protection organisations were appalled. The World Wide Fund For Nature (WWF) said it was almost a public invitation to carry out deforestation. The changed law relaxes the deforestation regulations for landowners and contains an amnesty for past illegal deforestation. Brazil’s President Dilma Rousseff has not yet passed the amended law. Environmentalists are hoping that she will veto it.

WWF considers that the amnesty will chiefly benefit large landowners. The small farmers and the Brazilian people are the losers. WWF fears that further large-scale deforestation will increase the danger of flooding and landslides, and the general public will bear the resulting costs. The relaxations to the law will impact far beyond Brazil’s frontiers. The foreseeable deforestation and the wavering of the need to implement reforestation are likely to bring a global climate burden of 20 billion tons of carbon dioxide. This is the finding reached by a report published by the Institute for Applied Economic Research (IPEA), which states that the amendment to the law could lead to a loss of up to 76.5 million hectares of forest.

The Brazilian Forest Law was considered to be one of the most progressive in the world. The law required that even privately owned forestland had to keep a certain percentage of land with forest cover – in the Amazonas, for example, this amounted to 80 per cent of the land owned.

Both in Brazil itself and all over the world, protests are being raised against the amendment to the law.

Author: (WWF/ile)

New Internet platform on European development policy.

Fri, 04 May 2012 06:35:00 +0200

The Internet platform Donor Tracker was launched at the end of April 2012 by the German consultancy SEEK Development.

Donor Tracker offers up-to-date and comparative information on the development policy priorities and financial commitments of eight major European donors: UK, Germany, France, EU, Spain, Netherlands, Norway and Sweden. The profiles for Norway and Sweden are not yet online, says SEEK Development, but will be available soon.
The website includes information on how individual donors focus on agriculture. Donor Tracker information is in three formats:

Donor Profiles give a compact overview of each country's political system, the relevant actors and institutions, underlying strategies and funding commitments. They also analyse the development policy focus in the sectors health and agriculture.
The Policy Tracker provides ongoing news on development policy debates, decisions and legislation. The news can be filtered per theme or country and an RSS news feed subscription is also possible.
Cross-Cutting Analyses allow readers to obtain a transversal insight into strategic development policy issues.

Employment of young people in rural areas

Wed, 02 May 2012 09:43:00 +0200

The study Promoting decent and productive employment of young people in rural areas: A review of strategies and programmes analysed the realities and challenges young rural women and men face in their working environment. Through the lens of the four pillars of the United Nation's Decent Work Agenda – creating jobs and enterprises, guaranteeing rights at work, extending social protection, and promoting social dialogue – the two agencies reviewed 23 programmes worldwide, including an in-depth review of five IFAD-supported projects in Egypt, Madagascar, Nepal, Nicaragua and Senegal. Specifically, the results of the study showed progress in Senegal and Madagascar for instance, where 100 per cent of the young people interviewed reported improvements in their employment situation, professional skills and income. In Nicaragua, 71 per cent of the young women and men noted that their employer showed greater awareness and respect for workers rights. However, the results also highlighted the need to focus more on working conditions and social protection, labour rights and the social dialogue between workers and employers, as only marginal progress was generally achieved in these areas. Most of the 1.2 billion young women and men aged between 15 and 24 live in rural areas of developing countries. The study made several recommendations about generating decent employment opportunities for them and making better use of their potential to contribute to rural growth and transformation:

explicitly target rural youth in development programmes
offer them training and other support, both as workers and as self-employed entrepreneurs
compensate for gender imbalances, and
use integrated approaches covering employment and enterprise development, working conditions, social protection and rights at work.

Download executive summary: Author: (IFAD/ILO/ile)

New annual series: Global Food Policy Report

Thu, 26 Apr 2012 14:34:00 +0200

For most of 2011, global food prices and food price volatility remained high. Droughts, floods, and earthquakes threatened food security for the poor, and increased hunger and malnutrition in the areas hit by these natural disasters. Yet 2011 saw significant gains in support of agriculture, food and nutrition security, and global poverty reduction. Agriculture moved to the forefront of the international development agenda, and investments in the sector rose.
Emerging economies like Brazil, China, and India, as well as the private sector and philanthropic organisations also increased their voice in the global food system through global platforms such as the G20 meeting and the World Economic Forum. Looming large for 2012 will be continued high and volatile food prices, increased oil prices, the threat of extreme weather events exacerbated by climate change such as drought in the Sahel, and financial crises in the US and Europe – all of which have and will continue to affect the food and nutrition security of the poor and hungry. However, there are concrete actions that will help improve food policy actions and decisions in 2012 and beyond, including:

Forging a broad intersectoral coalition to address issues related to agriculture, food, nutrition, and health via the G8 and G20 meetings;
Enhancing the key role of agriculture in economic, social, and environmental sustainability via Rio+20;
Ensuring that water, land, and energy are used efficiently in food production, and that poor people have access to them; and
Creating and strengthening institutions and capacities for country-led development
strategies.

The Report makes the case for keeping food policy issues high on the global agenda and can serve as a reference to policymakers and stakeholders as they undertake discussions on global development.

More information: IFPRI Download report Author: (IFPRI/ile)

Dispute over rain-forest clearance for palm-oil plantations in Cameroon

Thu, 26 Apr 2012 14:22:00 +0200

WWF assesses the area as worthy of conservation. A High Conservation Value (HCV) assessment ordered by Herakles for the scheduled plantation arrives at an opposite conclusion, says WWF. This HCV assessment rates almost the entire concession area as „degraded“ and only three per cent worthy of conservation (i.e. HCV areas). Using satellite images, WWF then identified that at least half of the concession area is largely intact forest, serving as a major ecological buffer zone and corridor for the surrounding protected areas, and as the livelihood basis for the local population. In order to obtain more secure information about the situation on site, WWF has submitted the Herakles environmental assessment to the HCV network experts for a peer review to be carried out and has also commissioned a comprehensive study by independent scientists. The process is still underway.

WWF reports that the local communities in the affected area did not receive any information nor was their approval obtained for the project. The WWF is in possession of 20 official letters of complaint from villages, parliamentarians and mayors of the region who oppose the development of the plantation. The livelihoods of the people in the region depend on the resources offered by these forests and the majority oppose the palm-oil concession. Some communities have filed legal charges against the company. Moreover, WWF criticises that the forest clearing is to be driven forward under guise of the Roundtable for Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO). WWF is itself an RSPO member and has lodged a formal complaint that can lead to the expulsion of the company. Clear-cutting in the area has already begun. In 2011, 8 hectares were cleared to make place for a palm-tree nursery. Part of this area is situated in the middle of the small zone that Herakles itself identified as HVC, meaning that it has been established exactly where clear-cutting is not allowed, reports the WWF.
The environmental organisation criticises that while the companies involved emphasise that the plantation is to be developed in a sustainable manner, simultaneously, they ignore the RSPO guidelines. WWF announced that together with the local communities and other organisations it will act to halt the establishment of a plantation in this species-rich forest and seek alternative, more environmentally friendly uses for this valuable area.

Author: (WWF/ile)

Grim outlook for the environment

Wed, 25 Apr 2012 15:36:00 +0200

The Environmental Outlook to 2050 presents the latest projections of socio-economic trends over the next four decades, and their implications for four key areas of concern: climate change, biodiversity, water and the health impacts of environmental pollution. Despite the recent recession, the global economy is projected to nearly quadruple to 2050. Rising living standards will be accompanied by ever growing demands for energy, food and natural resources – and more pollution.

The costs of inaction could be colossal, both in economic and human terms. Without new policies:

World energy demand in 2050 will be 80 percent higher, with most of the growth to come from emerging economies and still 85 percent reliant on fossil-fuel-based energy. This could lead to a 50 % increase in greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions globally and worsening air pollution.
Urban air pollution is set to become the top environmental cause of mortality worldwide by 2050, ahead of dirty water and lack of sanitation. The number of premature deaths from exposure to particulate air pollutants leading to respiratory failure could double from current levels to 3.6 million every year globally, with most occurring in China and India. Because of their ageing and urbanised populations, OECD countries are likely to have one of the highest rate of premature death from ground-level ozone in 2050, second only to India.
On land, global biodiversity is projected to decline by a further 10 percent, with significant losses in Asia, Europe and Southern Africa. Areas of mature forests are projected to shrink by 13 %. About one-third of biodiversity in rivers and lakes worldwide has already been lost, and further losses are projected to 2050.
Global water demand will increase by some 55 percent, due to growing demand from manufacturing, thermal power plants and domestic use. These competing demands will put water use by farmers at risk. 2.3 billion more people than today – over 40 percent of the global population – will be living in river basins under severe water stress, especially in North and South Africa, and South and Central Asia.

Policies to tackle environmental problems can also help to address other environmental challenges, and contribute to growth and development. Tackling local air pollution contributes not only to cutting GHG emissions but also to reducing the economic burden of chronic and costly health problems. Moreover, climate policies help protect biodiversity, for example by reducing emissions from deforestation.

To avert the grim future painted by the Environmental Outlook to 2050, the report recommends a cocktail of policy solutions: using environmental taxes and emissions trading schemes to make pollution more costly than greener alternatives; valuing and pricing natural assets and ecosystem services like clean air, water and biodiversity for their true worth; removing environmentally harmful subsidies to fossil fuels or wasteful irrigation schemes; and encouraging green innovation by making polluting production and consumption modes more expensive while providing public support for basic R&D (research and development).

Green growth policies are already in place in many countries. For example, Mexico’s new pilot programme gives direct cash transfers to farmers instead of subsidising the electricity they use to pump irrigation water, thus removing the price distortion that encouraged over-use of groundwater. The UK government has earmarked GBP 3 billion for the new UK Green Investment Bank; this should leverage an additional GBP 15 billion of private investment in green energy and recycling by 2015. The US government has been working to phase out preferential tax provisions worth about USD 4 billion per annum that continue to support the production of fossil energy. Capitalising on its knowledge-base and environmental technologies, the city of Kitakyushu in Japan is working with businesses to enhance its competitiveness as a “green city” for low-carbon growth. Governments, businesses, consumers: all have a part to play to move towards greener growth. Download key facts and figures from the Environmental Outlook to 2050

More information: www.oecd.org/environment/outlookto2050 Author: (OECD/ile)

New partnership to rid Eastern Europe, the Caucasus and Central Asia of obsolete pesticides.

Fri, 20 Apr 2012 14:55:00 +0200

According to the United Nations Food and Agricultural Organisation (FAO) around 200 000 tons of obsolete pesticides can be found in twelve of the former Soviet Union republics. Kept in tens of thousands of unprotected sites, they pose a serious threat to the health of the people around them and to the environment. It is for this reason that the European Union (EU) and (FAO) have formed a partnership with twelve countries in Eastern Europe, the Caucasus and Central Asia. The four-year partnership launched at FAO’s headquarters in Rome, Italy, on April 12th will assist these countries in managing their vast stocks of obsolete pesticides.

The project is also intended to build capacity, for example in the areas of legislative reform, pesticide registration processes, the promotion of alternatives to the most hazardous chemicals in use and the development of communication strategies to raise awareness among farmers and the public. In addition, the project hopes to find ways to avoid a build-up of additional stockpiles in future.

The EU is contributing six million euros to the initiative, and FAO, which is to act as implementing agency, has allocated one million euros in funding.

This initiative aims to act as a catalyst for the development of obsolete pesticide and hazardous waste management in the region, by helping provide the resources needed for technical and policy support to enable countries to help themselves.

For more information: Food and Agricultural Organisation (FAO)

Author: (FAO/ob)

BRICS states consider establishing their own Development Bank

Fri, 20 Apr 2012 12:42:00 +0200

The leaders of the Federative Republic of Brazil, the Russian Federation, the Republic of India, the People's Republic of China and the Republic of South Africa, met in New Delhi, India, on 29 March 2012 at the Fourth BRICS Summit entitled “BRICS Partnership for Global Stability, Security and Prosperity”. On this occasion, the possibility of setting up a new development bank was also discussed. The Summit Declaration called it a bank “for mobilising resources for infrastructure and sustainable development projects in BRICS and other emerging economies and developing countries, to supplement the existing efforts of multilateral and regional financial institutions for global growth and development”. The BRICS Finance Ministers will now examine the feasibility and viability of such an initiative and set up a joint working group for further study in time for the next summit. World Bank Group President Robert B. Zoellick supports the idea of a new development bank for BRICS, explaining in an interview and the end of March 2012 that ”if a BRICS bank is formed, we would like to work with it to try to share the experience we have and perhaps it could add additional financing.”

Author: (BRICS/The World Bank/ile)

New network to promote “Re-greening Africa”

Fri, 20 Apr 2012 12:11:00 +0200

The four-day meeting-also dubbed Re-greening Africa conference was organised by the World Vision and the World Agroforestry Centre (ICRAF) and brought together policy-makers from across Africa, leading agriculture, food security and environment experts, international NGOs, donors and the academia among others. And focused on practical, low cost and proven techniques to reverse land degradation and deforestation, lift incomes, adapt and mitigate against climate change, and ultimately prevent famine. “This re-greening will have multiple benefits;increased crop yields and livestock, increased resiliency to environmental shocks and climate change, and increased bio-diversity,” said Tony Rinaudo, World Vision’s research and development specialist on climate and natural resources. The idea of the fifty million USD network was conceived at the end of the conference following presentations by different countries. It proposes five million USD to create the global fund; five million USD to promote the brand and ten million USD for pilots to create data. The remaining thirty million USD will be used to create strategic investment for expansion. The conference comes as yet another food crisis sweeps across the Sahel region of Africa, this time through Niger, Mali, Burkina Faso, Chad and Mauritania. “The world watched as millions suffered from famine in the Horn of Africa last year and now that suffering is spreading to parts of West Africa,” said conference organiser Rob Francis. In the Horn of Africa, at least ten million people are still food insecure because of lack of reliable rains, according to the UN Office of Humanitarian Affairs. The Nairobi conference focused on affordable techniques farmers can apply to reverse land degradation and deforestation, adapt and mitigate against climate change. One of the techniques presented is known as Farmer Managed Natural Regeneration (FMNR). Here, rather than disposing of indigenous tree stems, farmers are actively encouraged to prune and cultivate them. They then plant their crops around the indigenous trees. This is because trees and ground vegetation hold the soil together stopping floods and winds which would sweep away precious topsoil and leach nutrients from the remaining soil layer. “Farmers don't need an economist, if the technology matches their immediate needs, capability and resources; perception of risks and aspirations then it is common sense,” said Rowan Reid, Project Manager, FMNR, World Vision Australia. Dennis Garrity, UN Dry lands Ambassador and senior fellow at the ICRAF said: “Governments and NGOs throughout the East African region are now partnering to implement national scaling-up programmes to create an evergreen agriculture based on smallholder adoption of trees for enhanced soil fertility, and fodder, fruit and fuel wood production.” “In essence, we hope to spark a Re-greening movement that transforms thinking across the world,” said World Vision East Africa climate change and environment specialist Assefa Tofu. Author: John Muchangi, Journalist-Nairobi

Tropical hardwood identified in paper

Tue, 17 Apr 2012 09:27:00 +0200

400 million tons of paper are produced each year – and an unknown quantity of this contains illegally logged tropical hardwoods. A rapid and inexpensive method to detect which wood fibres are used in production is therefore urgently needed. To date, non-definable fibres were considered to be an indication of tropical hardwoods but it was not possible to differentiate more clearly. It is difficult to precisely classify the fibres because during paper manufacturing lignin is removed by boiling, which destroys much of the fibre information. It has rarely been possible to exactly determine the wood species to date. The scientists are drawing up a fibre atlas containing information on the cells of tropical hardwoods and their distinctive features. Images of the fibre form and structure make it easier to identify the fibres using light microscopy. It will be possible to identify at least 28 species of tropical trees and make this available to the public. The atlas is to be completed this year. In a second step, the paper engineers intend to create a suitable microscopy procedure to identify the fibres. The third step aims to automate the light microscopy process and lower the inputs of time and costs needed to analyse the paper. The scientists plan to develop an automatic recognition analysis of the individual cells of a paper product; each individual cell can then be scanned and screened for typical features of specific tropical hardwood species. The von-Thünen Institute is developing an electron microscopic technique to support this process which will be ready for use by the end of 2013. The fibres described in the atlas are species from south-east Asia, because the scientists’ experience has indicated that suspicious publishing products often contain fibres originating from that region. In addition to the laboratory in Darmstadt, only two other laboratories – one in the USA and one in Great Britain – analyse paper and fibre products for evidence of the use of tropical hardwoods. The tropical forest foundation OroVerde estimates that some 20 per cent of the forests cut down each year are used to produce paper. Of the paper consumed annually worldwide (391 million tons in 2007), 71 per cent is used in industrialised countries which are home to only 22 per cent of the world's population.

Author: (TU Darmstadt/OroVerde/proplanta/ile)

Yam Production in Ghana and Nigeria gets a much needed boost

Thu, 12 Apr 2012 09:28:00 +0200

Yams are said to provide the most important source of dietary calories in Nigeria and Ghana. And for many people in the region, they rank above meat as a source of protein. However due to pests and diseases yields have continued to decrease dramatically. As a result, yam scientists at IITA and the national researchers are already developing a host of new yam varieties that can address these challenges and are confident that with additional investments, there is tremendous potential to rapidly boost production and income from yam.

The Yam Improvement for Income and Food Security in West Africa (YIIFSWA) project, which is supported by a 12 million US dollar grant from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, will be led by IITA in collaboration with the governments of Ghana and Nigeria, the UK’s Natural Resources Institute (NRI), the Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa (AGRA), and Catholic Relief Services (CRS).

The multifaceted five-year YIIFSWA project will focus on increasing yields through better seed tuber supply and improving markets. The initial focus of the project is on 200,000 smallholders farm families in Ghana and Nigeria, 90 percent of who cultivate less than two acres. A key priority is to ensure that affordable pest- and disease-free seed yams are available to farmers, along with storage and handling technologies that can reduce post-harvest loss. Yam breeders will develop and widely disseminate new, higher-yielding, disease-resistant varieties. The private sector partners are expected to play a key role by providing certified seed and working closely with efforts to link small-holder farmers, particularly those in remote areas, to markets where a strong and steady demand for yams should allow them to realize the economic benefits of increased productivity.

More information:

IITA

Author: (IITA/ob)