Lacandona, the great Mayan jungle that extends through the state of Chiapas in southern Mexico, is home to natural wealth and indigenous peoples’ settlements that are once again threatened by the probable reactivation of abandoned oil wells. Image: Ceiba
by Emilio Godoy (mexico city)
Inter Press Service
MEXICO CITY, Jan 19 (IPS) – The Lacandona jungle in the southern Mexican state of Chiapas is home to 769 species of butterflies, 573 species of trees, 464 species of birds, 114 species of mammals, 119 species of amphibians and reptiles, and several abandoned oil wells.
The oil wells have been a source of concern for the communities of the great Mayan jungle and environmental organizations since the 1970s, when oil prospecting began in the area and gradually left at least five wells inactive, whether plugged or not.
Now, Mexico’s policy of increasing oil production, promoted by the federal government, is reviving the threat of reactivating oil industry activity in the jungle ecosystem of some 500,000 hectares located in the east of the state, which has lost 70 percent of its forest in recent decades due to deforestation.
A resident of the Benemérito de las Américas municipality, some 1,100 kilometers south of Mexico City, who requested anonymity for security reasons, told IPS that a Mexican oil services company has contacted some members of the ejidos – communities on formerly public land granted to farm individually or cooperatively – trying to buy land around the inactive wells.
“They say they are offering work. We are concerned that they are trying to restart oil exploration, because it is a natural area that could be damaged and already has problems,” he said.
Adjacent to Benemérito de las Américas, which has 23,603 inhabitants according to the latest records, the area where the inactive wells are located is within the 18,348 square kilometers of the protected Lacandona Jungle Region.
It is one of the seven reserves of the ecosystem that the Mexican government decreed in 2016 and where oil activity in its subsoil is banned.
Between 1903 and 2014, the state-owned oil company Petróleos Mexicanos (Pemex) drilled five wells in the Lacandona jungle, inhabited by some 200,000 people, according to the autonomous governmental National Hydrocarbons Commission (CNH), in charge of allocating hydrocarbon lots and approving oil and gas exploration plans. At least two of these deposits are now closed, according to the CNH.
The Montes Azules Biosphere Reserve, in the Lacandona jungle in the southern Mexican state of Chiapas, faces the threat of oil exploration, which would add to phenomena such as deforestation, drought and forest fires that have occurred in recent years. Image: Semarnat
The Lacantun well is located between a small group of houses and the Montes Azules Biosphere Reserve (RBMA), the most megadiverse in the country, part of Lacandona and near the border with Guatemala. The CNH estimates the well’s proven oil reserves at 15.42 million barrels and gas reserves at 2.62 million cubic feet.
Chole, Tzeltal, Tzotzil and Lacandon Indians inhabit the jungle.
Other inactive deposits in the Benemérito de las Américas area are Cantil-101 and Bonampak-1, whose reserves are unknown.
In the rural areas of the municipality, the local population grows corn, beans and coffee and manages ecotourism sites. But violence has driven people out of Chiapas communities, as has been the case for weeks in the southern mountainous areas of the state due to border disputes and illegal business between criminal groups.
In addition, the Zapatista National Liberation Army (EZLN), an indigenous organization that staged an uprising on Jan. 1, 1994 against the marginalization and poverty suffered by the native communities, is still present in the region.
Chiapas, where oil was discovered at the beginning of the 20th century, is among the five main territories in terms of production of crude oil and gas in this Latin American country, with 10 hydrocarbon blocks in the northern strip of the state.
In November, Mexico extracted 1.64 million barrels of oil and 4.9 billion cubic feet of gas daily. The country currently ranks 20th in the world in terms of proven oil reserves and 41st in gas.
Historically, local communities have suffered water, soil and air pollution from Pemex operations.
As of November, there were 6,933 operational wells in the country, while Pemex has sealed 122 of the wells drilled since 2019, although none in Chiapas, according to a public information request filed by IPS.
Since taking office in December 2018, leftist President Andrés Manuel López Obrador has strengthened Pemex and the also state-owned Federal Electricity Commission by promoting the extraction and consumption of fossil fuels, to the detriment of renewable energy.
The state of Chiapas is home to hydroelectric power plants, mining projects, hydrocarbon exploitation blocks and a section of the Mayan Train, the most emblematic megaproject of the current Mexican government. Image: Center for Zoque Language and Culture AC
Territory under siege
The RBMA is one of Mexico’s 225 natural protected areas (NPAs) and its 331,000 hectares are home to 20 percent of the country’s plant species, 30 percent of its birds, 27 percent of its mammals and 17 percent of its freshwater fish.
Like all of the Lacandona rainforest, the RBMA faces deforestation, the expansion of cattle ranching, wildlife trafficking, drought, and forest fires.
Fermín Ledesma, an academic at the public Universidad Autónoma Chapingo, said possible oil exploration could aggravate existing social and environmental conflicts in the state, in addition to growing criminal violence and the historical absence of the State.
“The situation is always complex, due to legal loopholes that do not delimit the jungle, the natural protected areas are not delimited, it has been a historical mess. The search for oil has always been there,” he told IPS from Tuxtla Gutiérrez, the capital of Chiapas.
The researcher said “it is a very complex area, with a 50-year agrarian conflict between indigenous peoples, often generated by the government itself, which created an overlapping of plans and lands.”
Ledesma pointed to a contradiction between the idea of PNAs that are depopulated in order to protect them and the historical presence of native peoples.
From 2001 to 2022, Chiapas lost 748,000 hectares of tree cover, equivalent to a 15 percent decrease since 2000, one of the largest sites of deforestation in Mexico, according to the international monitoring platform Global Forest Watch. In 2022 alone, 26,800 hectares of natural forest disappeared.
In addition, this state, one of the most impoverished in the country, has suffered from the presence of mining, the construction of three hydroelectric plants and, now, the Mayan Train, the Mexican government’s most emblematic megaproject inaugurated on Dec. 15, one of the seven sections of which runs through the north of the state.
But there are also stories of local resistance against oil production. In 2017, Zoque indigenous people prevented the auction of two blocks on some 84,000 hectares in nine municipalities that sought to obtain 437.8 million barrels of crude oil equivalent.
The anonymous source expressed hope for a repeat of that victory and highlighted the argument of conducting an indigenous consultation prior to the projects, free of pressure and with the fullest possible information. “With that we can stop the wells, as occurred in 2017. We are not going to let them move forward,” he said.
Ledesma the researcher questioned the argument of local development driven by natural resource extraction and territorial degradation as a pretext.
“They say it’s the only way to do it, but that’s not true. It leaves a trail of environmental damage, damage to human health, present and future damage. It is much easier for the population to accept compensation or give up the land, because they see it is degraded. A narrative is created that they live in an impoverished area and therefore they have to relocate. This has happened in other areas,” he said.
Transforming food systems is key to solving food insecurity on the African continent. A powerful and unified effort is needed to ensure food systems are transformed to be robust enough to support the population. Credit: Joyce Chimbi/IPS
by Joyce Chimbi (nairobi)
Inter Press Service
NAIROBI, Jan 16 (IPS) – As hunger and food insecurity deepen, Africa is confronting an unprecedented food crisis. Estimates show that nearly 282 million people on the continent, or 20 percent of the population, are undernourished. Numerous challenges across the African continent threaten the race to achieve food security; research and innovative strategies are urgently needed to transform current systems as they are inadequate to address the food crisis.
Transforming food systems is key. A powerful and unified effort is needed to equip food systems to advance human and planetary health to their full potential. This was the message as CGIAR entered a new era under the leadership of Dr Ismahane Elouafi, the Executive Managing Director. Named one of the most influential Africans of 2023, she continues to stress the need to use science and innovation to unlock Africa’s potential to meet its food needs.
Dr Ismahane Elouafi, the CGIAR’s newly appointed Executive Managing Director. Credit: FAO
During her inaugural field visit to an IITA center in Ibadan, Nigeria, alongside Dr Simeon Ehui, IITA’s Director General and CGIAR Regional Director for Continental Africa, she oversaw extensive discussions on transforming food systems and leveraging science and technology.
“At COP28 in Dubai, UAE, there was high-level recognition and a wonderful spotlight on science and innovation. CGIAR has an opportunity to represent science and innovation at large, representing the whole community at large. We can cut down poverty and stop malnutrition, and we have the tools—we just need to bring them to the farmers,” she said.
CGIAR continues to create linkages between agricultural and tech stakeholders, emphasizing digital innovation for agricultural development. CGIAR-IITA explores leveraging ICTs to tackle agricultural challenges, boost productivity, ensure sustainability, and enhance food security, featuring presentations, discussions, workshops, and networking across sectors.
There was a significant focus on the CGIAR TAAT model as a tool to use technology to address Africa’s worsening food crisis. TAAT Technologies for African Agricultural Transformation (TAAT) is a key flagship programme of the African Development Bank’s Feed Africa strategy for 2016 to 2025.
“We have the technology, and all hands are on deck to ensure that no one sleeps hungry. There are severe food insecurities on the continent today, deepening rural poverty and malnutrition. We have the capacity to achieve food security,” Ehui emphasized.
IITA’s Dr Kenton Dashiell spoke about TAAT in the context of strategic discussions around policy and government engagement. Emphasizing the need for the government, private sector, and other key stakeholders to create effective and efficient food systems transformation paths. As a major continent-wide initiative designed to boost agricultural productivity across the continent by rapidly delivering proven technologies to millions of farmers, TAAT can deliver a food-secure continent.
Elouafi stressed the need to ensure that technology is in the hands of farmers. in line with TAAT, which aims to double crop, livestock, and fish productivity by expanding access to productivity-increasing technologies to more than 40 million smallholder farmers across Africa by 2025. In addition, TAAT seeks to generate an additional 120 million metric tons.
IITA’s Bernard Vanlauwe spoke about sustainable intensification with the aim of increasing production and improving the livelihoods of smallholder farmers in sub-Saharan Africa. Farmers are increasingly dealing with higher temperatures and shorter rainy seasons, affecting the production of staple foods such as maize. Further stressing the need for improved crop varieties to meet Africa’s pressing food insecurities.
Elouafi stressed that the needs are great, in particular, eliminating extreme poverty, ending hunger and malnutrition, turning Africa into a net food exporter, and positioning Africa at the top of the agricultural value chains. She emphasized the need to leverage progress made thus far, building on the commitments of Dakar 1, the 1st Summit of the World’s Regions on Food Security held in Dakar in January 2010, where representatives and associations of regional governments from the five continents noted that the commitments made at the World Food Summit in 2002 had had little effect and that the food crisis had only worsened.
Elouafi said the UN Food System Summit in 2021 and the 2023 Dakar 2 Summit, with an emphasis on building sustainable food systems and aligning government resources, development partners, and private sector financing to unleash Africa’s food production potential, were important meetings to build on. The commitments made at these high-level meetings had already created a pathway towards ending hunger, food insecurity, and malnutrition and transforming food systems to meet the most pressing food needs today.
It is estimated that Africa’s agricultural output could increase from USD 280 billion per year to USD 1 trillion by 2030. The visit and ensuing discussions highlighted how investing in raising agricultural productivity, supporting infrastructure, and climate-smart agricultural systems, with private sector investments, government support, and resources from multinational financial institutions, all along the food value chain, can help turn Africa into a breadbasket for the world. Private sector actors will be particularly urged to commit to the development of critical value chains.
Social media has become a lifeline for many women and girls in Afghanistan but not all can afford it. Credit: Learning Together
Inter Press Service
Jan 10 (IPS) – The author is an Afghanistan-based female journalist, trained with Finnish support before the Taliban take-over. Her identity is withheld for security reasonsThe prevalence of social media usage among Afghan women and girls has surged since the Taliban assumed control of the country in August 2021. Faced with restrictions confining them to their homes, many women find solace in the messaging app WhatsApp.
The Taliban’s prohibitions on women attending school, university, and work have spurred an increased reliance on WhatsApp for maintaining connections with friends, sharing thoughts and information, engaging in discussions, and even participating in foreign language online classes and accessing online libraries.
Farhat Obeidi, 23, lives with his parents and two brothers in Kabul. She was a fourth-year psychology student at Kabul University when she was banned from attending university by the Taliban.
“After we were banned from university, I couldn’t meet my friends anymore. I kept in touch with my friends through WhatsApp. We created groups, and our professors shared all the course materials with us through these groups. Even our friends who could not afford to have smartphones were in contact with us using the cell phones of their families, and they were able to take part in our online study groups”, Farhat says.
Farhat says that the use of social media has helped in reducing the pressures and psychological problems caused by the unemployment of women and girls. Since the apps have no time and place restrictions, the women can stay connected also with friends and relatives who have immigrated. Using the app is safe and messaging is possible even when the internet connection is poor.
Nilab Noori, a resident of Kabul, says that the easiest way to be in touch with a large number of friends and colleagues at the same time is to create groups on messaging app.
“Although virtual communication can never be as effective as being present in the community, school and university, this method has helped women and girls to communicate with each other.”
Power outages in Afghanistan prevent young people who study online from continuing their education. Another obstacle is the high price of the internet connection or its poor quality.
“Since the majority of women have lost their jobs and income, and most Afghan families live below the poverty line, women can hardly afford the internet access”, Nilab says.
Tamna Alkozi had to quit her online studies, because she could not afford the fast internet connection. She used to study at Coventry University of England online via Zoom.
At the same time, Tamna was working as a volunteer in one of the non-governmental organizations. Her task was to run online educational programs related to the mental health of adolescents and young people. The organization paid for her internet usage.
“After finishing my work, I couldn’t continue my studies because the Zoom program requires a fast internet connection which I couldn’t afford”, Tamna says.
Sara (pseudonym) was a first-year student of a fine arts faculty who was banned from going to university.
“Our professors left Afghanistan after the political changes and opened an online class for us from abroad. I had one online class a week, but I could not participate because I did not have internet access”, Sara says.
The lack of security in cyberspace causes concern among women, especially activists. Those who live inside Afghanistan cannot express their opposition to the Taliban group even through social media because it will cause their account to be shut down and even get them arrested.
Marina (pseudonym) is a journalist who works online under a pseudonym. “I used to share my reports with the media through WhatsApp, but my number was blocked and my account was deleted”, Marina says.
When she asked the telecommunications company why her number was blocked, they told her that they had received an order from the Taliban, and they could not activate the number again.
Marina says that several women’s rights activists who are imprisoned by the Taliban have been traced and arrested through social media. She says the Taliban is violating people’s privacy by checking people’s personal mobile phones and WhatsApp messages at checkpoints.
Internet connections are in high demand in Afghanistan, but the content remains tightly controlled under the influence of the Taliban. Credit: Learning Together
Sexualized online abuse and hate speech targeting women in Afghanistan has significantly increased. Afghan Witness, an open-source project run by the non-profit Center for Information Resilience, collected and analyzed over 78,000 posts written in Dari and Pashto — two local Afghan languages — directed at almost 100 accounts of politically active Afghan women between June-December 2021 and the same period of 2022.
The number of abusive posts tripled during that time. Afghan Witness said it found the online abuse was “overwhelmingly sexualized,” with over 60% of the posts in 2022 containing terms such as “whore” or “prostitute.”
Some politically active women have decided to deactivate their social media accounts.
Despite these challenges, the use of social media has seen significant growth in Afghanistan. A recent survey indicates that over nine million of the 40 million Afghan population use the internet and engage with at least one social media platform. The majority of young Afghans prefer Facebook, WhatsApp, Instagram, and TikTok.
BioNTainers, facilities equipped to manufacture a range of mRNA-based vaccines have been inaugurated in Rwanda in December 2023. Credit: Supplied
by Aimable Twahirwa (kigali)
Inter Press Service
KIGALI, Jan 08 (IPS) – An agreement signed between the Rwandan government and the Africa Pharmaceutical Technology Foundation (APTF) gives impetus to Africa’s domestic industry with the hope of helping the continent tackle vaccine inequity and fill the critical gap in vaccine manufacturing.
The agreement to operationalize the foundation was signed in Kigali, Rwanda, in late 2023.
What is important, according to stakeholders, is to focus efforts on building a resilient and self-reliant pharmaceutical industry for the continent. This became apparent during COVID-19, when, for example, COVAX, a multilateral mechanism for equitable global access to COVID-19 vaccines, helped lower-income economies achieve two-dose coverage of 57 percent, compared to the global average of 67 percent.
Both officials and scientists take delight in pointing out that the benefit of having such an initiative is to close the vaccine equity gap between African countries and the world’s developed nations.
During the implementation phase, the African Development Bank (ADB) has committed to investing up to USD 3 billion over the next decade in the development of pharmaceutical products.
The foundation, which is ready to hit the ground running in January 2024, will dedicate its core mandate to addressing some of the common challenges facing African indigenous pharmaceutical companies, including weak human and institutional capacities and low technical capacity for using and applying new technologies.
“The Foundation was a pledge that Africa will have what it needs to build its own health defense system, which must include a thriving African pharmaceutical industry and a quality healthcare infrastructure, ADB President Dr Akinwumi Adesina said.
These solutions, according to experts, aim to close technical capacity gaps in their use and lack the ability to focus on the production of basic active pharmaceutical ingredients for drugs or antigens for vaccines.
Professor Padmashree Gehl Sampath, Chief Executive Officer of the APTF, told IPS that access to know-how, technologies, and processes for manufacturing pharmaceutical products is clearly needed on the continent to ensure the sustainability of financial investments.
She, however, points out that, with the current move to ensure the sustainability and reliability of the domestic pharmaceutical industry in Africa, it is not enough just to have financial, infrastructural, strategic, and regulatory support.
“There is a need for a clear and coherent focus on technology transfer and knowledge sharing for capacity building and diversification within the pharmaceutical value chain,” she said in an exclusive interview.
While technology is described as the main transformative tool that will enable the development of a competitive pharmaceutical industry in Africa, Sampath stresses the need to build policy capacity to facilitate the sector.
According to her, this can be done by implementing the flexibilities contained in the Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property and then also enabling local companies to access domestic markets.
In a move to overcome these challenges, the foundation’s work received a major boost with a memorandum of understanding signed in December 2023 in Kigali, Rwanda, to partner with the European Investment Bank.
The European Investment Bank will be a partner in the foundation’s “regional biosimilars program for the production and innovation of relevant biosimilars in Africa and to facilitate the creation of common active pharmaceutical ingredients parks in any chosen specific sub-region of Africa,” the organization said in a press release.
According to Sampath, there is a need to remove barriers to domestic innovation in Africa.
“We need to work with our universities and public research institutions to transform them into centers of excellence,” she said.
During the implementation phase, the first modular elements of the German company’s factory, BioNTech, based on shipping containers, were delivered to the Kigali construction site in March and were then assembled to form the so-called BioNTainers that were inaugurated in December 2023.
The company, which developed the most widely used COVID-19 vaccine in the Western world with its U.S. partner Pfizer, developed a plan in 2022 to allow African countries to produce its Comirnaty-branded vaccine under the supervision of BioNTech.
BioNTech said the initial vaccine factory could, over the next few years, be part of a wider supply network spanning several African countries, including Senegal and South Africa.
At the time BioNTech announced plans to expand into Africa, the shipment of coronavirus vaccine doses manufactured in the West to the continent had been delayed, which had been the subject of much criticism.
“The African Union has come together to make a firm commitment not to find ourselves in this situation again,” Rwandan President Paul Kagame said at the inauguration ceremony of the plant site located in Masoro, a suburb of Kigali.
The company, which developed the most widely used COVID-19 vaccine in the Western world with its U.S. partner Pfizer, developed a plan in 2022 to allow African countries to produce its Comirnaty-branded vaccine under the supervision of BioNTech.
“What BionTech’s partnership with Africa demonstrates is that vaccine technology can be democratized, but we could not have reached this point without a wider set of partnerships.” Kagame said.
Gelsomina Vigliotti, Vice President at the European Investment Bank, said that the bank is committed to working with its partners to strengthen public health and health innovation across Africa.
“Strengthening access to finance is essential to scaling up pharmaceutical investment and innovation across Africa,” Vigliotti said.
An important manifestation of Africa’s scientific and technological innovation capability, according to experts, is the application of innovations to its pharmaceutical industry development.
The newly-established plant, located in the suburb of Rwanda’s capital city, Kigali, is expected to start by producing 50 million vaccines, but production will increase depending on the demand for mRNA-based vaccine candidates to address malaria and tuberculosis.
But researchers and policymakers argue that trust and cooperation are critical for the successful implementation of this innovation.
The latest estimates by the World Health Organization (WHO) show that industrial development should be combined with national policy for universal health coverage so that local vaccine production can address local health needs.
Before the inauguration of the BionTech factory in Rwanda, there were fewer than 10 African manufacturers with vaccine production, which are based in five countries: Egypt, Morocco, Senegal, South Africa, and Tunisia.
The capability to produce vaccines in Africa, according to the UN agency, requires a fully integrated approach, pulling together some key elements including finance, skills development, regulatory facilities, and technology know-how.
Gladys Mugabe (69) lives with her disabled son in Harare Gardens, a well-known recreational park in the Zimbabwean capital. Credit: Jeffrey Moyo/IPS
by Jeffrey Moyo (harare)
Inter Press Service
HARARE, Jan 04 (IPS) – It is do or die on the streets of Zimbabwe as homeless families battle for survival solely depending on begging. Such is the life of 69-year-old Gladys Mugabe, who lives with her disabled son in Harare Gardens, a well-known recreational park in the Zimbabwean capital, Harare.
Over the decades, Zimbabwe’s economy has underperformed. It started in 2000 with the departure of white commercial farmers, and the country has experienced subsequent periods of hyperinflation, which the International Monetary Fund estimated reached 172% in July last year.
ISS Africa estimates that two out of five Zimbabweans were living in extreme poverty (living on less than US$3.20 per day) in 2019, and although this “poverty rate of nearly 45% is projected to decline to 20% by 2043, 4.7 million Zimbabweans will be living in extreme poverty on the current path.”
Many, like Mugabe, find themselves in their open-air dwellings, and it would seem that being homeless has become a perpetual crisis.
Trynos Munzira, a 43-year-old vendor in Harare, feels that the homeless have moved into the area, making it unsafe for regular people like him to visit the streets and parks.
“People of my age—the 43-year-olds, the 44s—we used to frequent recreational parks, wiling away time, but nowadays it’s impossible because the homeless are all over the parks, contaminating the parks, and there in the parks, they just relieve themselves anywhere,” Munzira told IPS.
Another Harare resident, 33-year-old Nonhlanhla Mandundu, said: “We have suffered because of homeless people who are picking left-over food containers from rubbish bins and leaving these on the streets; they have no toilets because all the toilets in towns are paid for, and so they relieve themselves all over town and urinate anywhere.”
Meanwhile, Zimbabwe’s countrywide housing shortage is estimated at 1,25 million units, translating to a national backlog of five million citizens, or over 40 percent of the total population.
As such, more than 1.2 million Zimbabweans remain on the government’s national housing waiting list.
But this list is not likely to include everybody, like 21-year-old David Paina, an orphan who fled from his foster parents due to abuse. He moved to the streets for safety.
“I started living here in Harare Gardens in 2012. What drove me here was the abuse I faced living with people who were not my parents. I am just crying for help from well-wishers so that I may do better in life,” Paina told IPS.
Yet authorities in the Zimbabwean regime often don’t address the situation of the homeless.
“I left the housing ministry. I am no longer allowed to talk about such issues,” July Moyo, the current Zimbabwean Minister of Local Government, told IPS.
As authorities like Moyo evade accountability, more than two decades after the land reform program here, homeless families have turned out to be a growing issue in every town and city.
Some teenage parents and their children also find themselves on the streets. Although the method of their relocation varies, they frequently experience eviction, move from door to door, find lodging with family and friends, and eventually end up living on the streets where they don’t need to pay rent.
Baba Ano (19) said he started his family on the streets of Harare not so long ago.
In cold and heat, these homeless families find life tough and uncertain, yet they have no choice except to soldier on.
“I came here in October last year. The rain has been pounding me all this time in the open here. Up to now, I am still living here. I am looking for help with accommodation. I have my son, who is disabled, staying with me,” Mugabe told IPS.
There are no official statistics from the country’s Ministry of Social Welfare documenting the number of homeless families.
Local authorities have acknowledged the homelessness crisis that has gripped many Zimbabweans but don’t seem to have any ready answers.
“It’s true we have a problem of homeless people in Harare—in Harare Gardens, Mabvuku Park, Budiriro, Mufakose, Mabelreign, and several others—all these parks have been taken over by homeless families. People are living in the streets and waking up every day, breaking up water pipes to access water, digging holes on the ground to trap water for bathing, and they bathe right there,” Denford Ngadziore, an opposition Citizens Coalition for Change Ward 16 councilor in Harare, told IPS.
Stanely Gama, the Harare City Council spokesperson, said, “We have homeless people for sure who live in parks like Harare Gardens, Mabelreign, and Africa Unity Square. We always do operations to remove them, but we don’t know where they come from, and each time they are removed, they always come back. This is a case to be better handled by the government’s Social Welfare Department.”
But lack of housing may not be the only factor that has rendered many Zimbabweans homeless, according to human rights activists.
Some may be ex-convicts who struggle to return to society.
“People who stay on the streets or in recreational parks are young children and adults—as young as 10. Some of the homeless adults living on the streets are ex-convicts who could not find acceptance with their relatives back home, forcing them to live on the streets and in recreational parks because they have nowhere to go,” said Peace Hungwe, founder of PeaceHub Zimbabwe, an organization that handles mental health cases in Harare.
While the authorities dither, Mugabe counts her losses.
“Where I used to stay, the plot of land was sold, and my belongings were burned in the house in which I used to live. Nothing was saved of all the things I worked to generate for the past 25 years. I am now just a nobody; the things you see gathered here are my only belongings in this world.”
NEW DELHI, Dec 21 (IPS) – Criminal justice systems in South Asia are failing women, despite stark statistics on the prevalence of violence. WHO estimates translate to one in every two women and girls in the region experiencing violence daily.
Nawmi Naz Chowdhury, a Global Legal Advisor at Equality Now, told a webinar titled ‘Future of Legal Aid in South Asia for Sexual Violence Offenses Against Women and Girls: Lessons from the Past Five Years’ that women and girls experience indifference and neglect at all levels, and there are gaps in legal protections that leave them vulnerable to sexual violence. Where laws do exist, common failures in implementation effectively prevent survivors from accessing justice.
Research by Equality Now, Dignity Alliance International, and partners has revealed that sexual violence laws in South Asian countries are insufficient, inconsistent, and not systematically enforced, leading to extremely low conviction rates for rape.
Long delays in medical examinations, police investigations, prosecutions, and trials are widespread. Survivors often have difficulties filing cases with the police and face community pressure to withdraw criminal complaints and accept informal mediation. Other protection gaps in legal systems include overly burdensome or discriminatory evidence requirements in rape cases and the failure to fully criminalize marital or intimate partner rape.
To bring about change, more needs to be done by governments, and this requires an increase in budgeting and strategizing on a national level, taking lessons derived from best practices in the region and elsewhere.
Training and raising awareness must go hand in hand with giving the police the tools to operate and upgrade their role to better meet society’s needs. This could include being trained in sign language interpretation, using technology to offer services and information, understanding communities and their intersectionality, and including women and girls from various backgrounds and diversities within the police force.
Chowdhury spoke about how women from excluded groups are frequently targeted. “Women and girls from socially excluded communities are often at higher risk of being subjected to sexual violence as compared to other communities due to the use of rape as a weapon of suppression.
“This is accompanied by a general culture of impunity for sexual violence and particular impunity for those from dominant classes, castes, or religions, which often leads to a denial of justice,” she said, with Dalit women and girls and those from indigenous communities encountering even greater obstacles to accessing justice.
Legal weak spots also make young and adolescent girls more vulnerable to sexual violence and, in some circumstances, enable perpetrators of rape to avoid punishment, typically by marrying the victim or obtaining ‘forgiveness’ from the victim, says Choudhury. “Victims of crime have a right to free legal aid, but in countries where these protection gaps exist, access to legal aid for women and girls seeking justice for sexual violence is hindered.”
Choudhury pointed to the high levels of stigma attached to rape in South Asian societies that often lead to the non-reporting or withdrawal of cases or settlements outside the court. Other factors that impede the reporting of sexual violence include fear of repercussions, such as violence, threats to life, or social ostracization.
“How much support are women and girls in South Asia getting?” she asked. “While accessing the criminal justice system, they are met with indifference and neglect at all levels, and this often results in the withdrawal of cases or long delays in adjudication—despite the pervasiveness of sexual violence in the region.”
Governments in the area rarely provide psychosocial care. While India, Nepal, and Sri Lanka have schemes for the payment of compensation to rape survivors, practical barriers often make compensation inaccessible for survivors, Choudhury explained.
Participants in the webinar from various countries in the region offered insights into how access to justice rights functions on a practical level and shared methods by which civil society organizations nudge criminal justice systems to bring about progressive change.
Sushama Gautam, at the Forum for Women, Law, and Development (FWLD) in Nepal, said that legal aid provided by her organization went beyond assisting individuals and included advocacy with key players and institutions like the police and the courts through public interest litigation.
A significant achievement of FWLD was filing public interest litigation in 2001 to get the Supreme Court of Nepal to declare in 2002 that marital sex without the wife’s consent should be considered rape. Nepal’s parliament adopted in 2018 a new criminal code that increased punishment for marital rape but made it a lesser offense than non-marital rape.
Nepal’s constitution guarantees legal aid as a fundamental right, said Gautam, explaining, “The national policy on legal aid and the policy on unified legal aid have also been formulated. These policies promote victim-centered legal aid, and there are digital mechanisms to ensure that legal aid has been established.”
FWLD has an app that provides people with legal information on various violations and helps them contact legal aid providers. The organization also runs a Legal Clinic and Information Center that extends services to survivors of sexual violence, such as legal counseling, and helps take care of their immediate needs.
Manisha Biswas, senior advocacy officer at the Bangladesh Legal Aid Services Trust (BLAST), says that while Bangladesh has made progress in ensuring access to justice for rape victims, estimates show that only one in 90 cases of sexual violence reaches the stage where the victim gets compensation.
Leading the Rape Law Reform Coalition, comprising 17 rights organizations, BLAST was instrumental in getting the Bangladesh Parliament to amend evidence laws to disallow ‘character assassination’ of rape victims by questioning during prosecution.
BLAST offers a range of legal support, including providing information, advice, and free legal representation, underpinned by a network of paralegal workers, many of whom are recruited from different law colleges. Other activities include public interest litigation and advocacy campaigns to increase awareness and understanding of legal rights, remedies, and services.
“BLAST enjoys a good reputation that helps us to act as a guiding force and use our expertise in providing services such as training paralegal volunteers in police and court procedures and in proactively rehabilitating rape victims,” she said.
Biswas reflected that much remains to be done. Bangladesh has one of the highest rates of child marriage in the world, with more than half of women marrying before reaching the minimum legal marriage age of 18. Bangladeshi laws also permit marital rape.
Overall, says Choudhury, the reality in South Asia is that “the burden of supporting survivors of sexual violence falls on underfunded NGOs, predominantly legal aid organizations that may not have adequate resources.”
This is particularly true for NGOs and CSOs that operate at the grassroots level, which affects access to justice rights for women and girls who have disabilities, indigenous women and girls, and women and girls from minority groups.
Sehlisiwe Sibanda holds kindle that she uses for her energy-saving stove. Credit: Busani Bafana/IPS
by Busani Bafana (kezi, zimbabwe)
Inter Press Service
KEZI, ZIMBABWE, Dec 20 (IPS) – Having this stove has made life easy for me; I do not worry about getting a lot of firewood to cook outside, and I have more time to do other tasks because cooking is less of a hassle. I no longer have to bend when cooking, which is good for my health; besides, my family now enjoys warm meals anytime, and I get to bake buns that I sell. – Sinikiwe Ngwenya on her energy-efficient stove
Five years ago, farmer Sehlisiwe Sisanda would walk into a nearby forested area to fill a scotch cart with huge wood logs for cooking and heating; a pile of firewood would last her a week during the summer.
But now she does not need a cartful of huge logs. Small branches and twigs are enough to last for more than a month.
Since building a wood-efficient stove, twigs and kindle have provided enough energy to cook meals, warm bath water, and bake scones for her family of five.
The tsotso stove is made of bricks in the shape of a box with two holes on top covered with repurposed plough iron wheels, an oven and a smoke chimney fixed to the wall. Tsotso is a local language word for kindle.
The stoves use less wood fuel and emit less pollution than cooking over an open fire. Now Sibanda can cook in her kitchen.
“The stove has been a life saver for me; my family now eats hot meals and has hot bath water every day,” she chuckles, showing the stove in the middle of her rondavel’s kitchen.
“Cooking in the kitchen has become an easy and enjoyable task; the stove is clean and does not produce irritating smoke, and now my family gathers around in the kitchen whenever I am cooking or baking. It has brought us together.”
Sinikiwe Ngwenya shows off her energy-saving stove, which uses twigs. Credit: Busani Bafana/IPS
Sibanda bakes buns that she sells at local schools and to neighbours. She uses part of the income from her baking to buy feed for her chickens, which she sells for between USD 5 and USD 6. Selling six chickens earns her enough money to pay a tractor driver to plough her fields.
The stove has helped Sibanda and several women access energy efficiently and reduce deforestation in their village in Kezi, southern Zimbabwe. With many communities not connected to the electricity grid, wood is the key source of energy for cooking and heating. Firewood harvesting is a high price to pay for environmental protection in an arid region that experiences massive deforestation and desertification.
Biomass is a key source of energy for cooking across Zimbabwe. Most women carry the burden of collecting firewood and cooking on open fires, which exposes them to smoke pollution and puts their health at risk. The improved stoves are making a difference because they emit less smoke and use wood more efficiently, saving women the drudgery of collecting huge logs many kilometres from their homes.
Zimbabwe has been losing over 260,000 hectares of forests annually as a result of demand for wood fuel and land clearance for agriculture. This is worrisome given that the country is only planting an average of 34 hectares per year, according to the Zimbabwe Forestry Commission.
Sibanda was trained to build the stoves, and she is a community mobiliser and also trains other women to make them.
Another farmer, Sinikiwe Ngwenya, who had a stove built in her home, says the stove has also changed her life.
“Having this stove has made life easy for me; I do not worry about getting a lot of firewood to cook outside, and I have more time to do other tasks because cooking is less of a hassle,” says Ngwenya. “I no longer have to bend when cooking, which is good for my health; besides, my family now enjoys warm meals anytime, and I get to bake buns that I sell.”
Sehlisiwe Sibanda inside her kitchen. She says her kitchen is pleasant to work in because of an energy-efficient stove that does not emit a lot of smoke. Credit: Busani Bafana/IPS
Saving Health, Maybe Trees Too
By getting women to use stoves, a local NGO is not only helping save trees from deforestation but also giving women a hand in easing unpaid care work and also a chance for them to generate income. The women construct the stoves themselves.
Adapting wood-efficient technologies, such as the tsotso stove, is helping women save trees and reduce the burden of unpaid care work.
Women bear the drudgery of collecting firewood, says Lakiness Zimanyiwa, a Programme Officer with the Hope for a Child in Christ (HOCIC), a local NGO that has trained women in rural areas on constructing tsotso stoves under its Securing Rights Programme (SRP PGII) to uplift women economically.
“Tsotso stoves were developed with the aim of reducing the burden of unpaid care work by women as they reduced time taken by women to fetch firewood, and they helped improve income through baking using the stove and selling scones to the community. The stoves are faster, so families have more time to participate in other essential tasks,” Zimanyiwa told IPS.
The stoves have also helped reduce deforestation in Maphisa, as women now take less time gathering firewood and only need to collect twigs, which are enough for cooking a family meal, says Pesistance Mukwena, a project officer with HOCIC.
The world is halfway to the deadline for achieving the Sustainable Development Goals, and Africa is off the mark on several of them, including SDG 7 on access to clean energy, according to the United Nations. A UN Policy Brief on Advancing SDG7 in Africa recommends that policies and financing for clean cooking should be integrated into poverty alleviation and health strategies at the national level.
Sehlisiwe Sibanda holds a dish of freshly baked buns from an energy-saving stove in her kitchen in Maphisa village, Zimbabwe. Credit: BusaniBafana/IPS
Gender Considerations Crucial to Energy Alternatives
“The gender element is also crucial, as engaging women in clean cooking businesses will boost results and make such endeavours more lasting. Addressing this should range from awareness-raising campaigns to directly engaging women as champions and entrepreneurs,” the UN notes.
Finding alternative and cleaner energy sources is a priority for Zimbabwe, which needs more than USD 55 billion for climate change mitigation activities, mostly in the energy sector. According to the country’s “intended nationally determined contribution” (INDC), Zimbabwe aims to cut carbon emissions by 33 percent by 2030 through clean energy initiatives like boosting hydroelectric power in its energy mix, biogas digesters, and improving energy efficiency.
More than 600 million people in Africa have no access to electricity, and many lack clean cooking energy.
A Vision for Clean Cooking by the International Energy Agency released ahead of the recent COP28 held in Dubai shows that in sub-Saharan Africa, only 20 percent of the population in 29 countries have access to clean cooking, with half of the nearly one billion people without access to clean cooking concentrated in five countries, such as Nigeria, Ethiopia, Tanzania, the Democratic Republic of Congo, and Uganda.
“Financial incentives are a vital policy tool for facilitating the accelerated deployment of clean cooking technologies. In this regard, approximately USD 8 billion of equipment and infrastructure is required annually from now to 2030 to underpin universal access to clean cooking solutions. But this must be complemented by steadfast leadership from policymakers, given that governments are best placed to influence the future,” Dr Akinwumi Adesina, President of the African Development Bank Group, says in the report’s foreword.
Indoor air pollution from biomass is one of the top 10 risks for the global burden of diseases, according to the World Health Organization. Household air pollution is responsible for an estimated 3.8 million premature deaths globally.
Leleti Maluleke, researcher, Good Governance, Africa.
Climate change has worsened the demand for energy in Africa, where fossil fuels are a top source of energy for cooking, transportation, and heating, says Leleti Maluleke, a researcher for the Human Security and Climate Change programme at Good Governance Africa.
“Unequal energy access disproportionately affects women and girls due to their gender roles and responsibilities at a domestic level,” Maluleke tells IPS. “Women, especially in rural and remote areas, use polluting energy for cooking and cutting trees, therefore contributing to emissions and deforestation. The lack of electricity, education, and access to information excludes them from safer and greener ways of performing their domestic duties.”
Maluleke bemoaned the fact that, when it comes to energy discussions, decision-makers frequently overlook the struggles of women and that projects involving energy rarely take gender into account. She adds that energy poverty is an inequality issue. Africa has had a slow uptake of clean energy sources compared to Europe and America, making it necessary to focus on regions and communities that are disproportionately impacted by climate change.
“Africa happens to be one of those regions where more priority needs to be placed, as it contributes the least to emissions but is impacted the most,” she said. “Creating awareness of existing inequalities and injustices and how climate change exacerbates them will lead to the necessary dialogues, conversations, and actions that need to be taken on climate justice.”
The use of fossil fuels has taken centre stage on the back of growing climate change impacts, as seen in more and more intense floods, longer droughts, and high temperatures.
However, industrialised countries are not relenting on curbing carbon emissions, despite scientific research indicating that the world has a small window to avoid a catastrophe by phasing out fossil fuels and embracing cleaner renewable energy sources.
Clean Energy is Key to Climate Justice
Alia Kajee, a senior campaigner for public finance and climate justice at 350.org says the climate crisis will disproportionately affect those who are already vulnerable, whether because of poverty, inequality, unemployment, or gender.
“Climate justice would be that those who are most negatively impacted by the climate crisis are able to withstand extreme weather shocks and adapt to changing conditions so that effects of the climate crisis do not hinder and disrupt lives, health and livelihood, or any other human right,” Kajee said, emphasising the need to ensure that evidence-based decisions are made by the governments, ones that align with the science that shows the worsening of the climate crisis and decisions that need to be taken to mitigate the crisis.
“Government must protect society, whether by ensuring safe, reliable, and clean access to energy such as solar or wind power or by ensuring effective and efficient disaster relief,” Kajee said.
The UN Secretary General, Antonio Guterres, called for decisive climate action at COP28, warning that “trading the future for 30 pieces of silver is immoral” and that developed countries must honour their commitments to provide USD 100 billion a year to developing countries for climate support. During COP28, the Green Climate Fund (GCF) received a boost, with six countries pledging new pledges, with total pledges now standing at a record USD 12.8 billion from 31 countries. Eight donor governments announced new commitments to the Least Developed Countries Fund and Special Climate Change Fund totaling more than USD 174 million, while new pledges totaling nearly USD 188 million were made to the Adaptation Fund at COP28.
However, UNCTAD’s World Investment Report 2023 highlights a worrisome increase in the SDG investment gap, surpassing USD 4 trillion annually in developing countries alone, with energy investment needs estimated at USD 2.2 trillion per year.
This feature was made possible with the support of Open Society Foundations.
Opinion by Jomo Kwame Sundaram (kuala lumpur, malaysia)
Inter Press Service
KUALA LUMPUR, Malaysia, Dec 20 (IPS) – The World Bank insists commercial finance is necessary for achieving economic recovery and the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), but does little to ensure profit-hungry commercial finance serves the public interest.
By failing to address pressing challenges within their purview, the second-ever Bretton Woods institutions’ (BWIs) annual meetings on the African continent, in Marrakech in October 2023, set the developing world even further back.
Jomo Kwame SundaramThe International Monetary and Financial Committee, which oversees the International Monetary Fund (IMF), could not agree, by consensus, on the usual end-of-meeting ministerial communique for ‘geopolitical’ reasons. The Development Committee, which governs the World Bank Group, fared little better.
New World Bank playbook
Little was achieved on crucial outstanding issues of governance reform and sovereign debt. Implicitly acknowledging past failure, World Bank Governors endorsed a “new vision to create a world free of poverty on a livable planet”.
After all, even the World Bank now acknowledges recent increases in global poverty have been the worst since the Second World War as economic stagnation, debt distress and inflation spread across the developing world.
The Bank’s new Evolution Roadmap proposes a just energy transition plan to mobilise private capital to scale up, secure and deploy climate finance. This is mainly for mitigation, rather than adaptation, let alone losses and damages.
The blueprint wants international financial institutions to help developing country governments de-risk private investments. For Muchhala, this reflects “the failure of the Bank’s wealthy shareholders to help ensure a more equitable multilateral system that is truly fit for purpose to meet the challenges of the 21st century”.
Blending finance for private profits
The strategy proposes ‘de-risking’ foreign investment with various types of ‘blended finance’ – such as co-financing, loan guarantees, political risk insurance or public equity co-investments – as well as complementary legal and other reforms.
The Bank and its allies have been promoting ‘blended finance’ for development, the environment and global warming since before the 2008 global financial crisis. Their main recommendation has been to induce profit-seeking private capital to fill growing financing gaps.
Undoubtedly, most poor developing countries have limited public resources to make needed social and environmental, including climate investments. In such arrangements, public funds are used to ‘de-risk’ or otherwise subsidise commercial finance, ostensibly to serve public policy priorities.
However, private commercial involvement in public services and infrastructure is costly and risky for the public sector and citizens, by deploying limited public resources for private gain. Civil society and other critics have already expressed grave concerns about the new Roadmap.
The World Bank Group also set up a Private Sector Investment Lab to scale up private finance in developing economies. It claims to be creating a “business enabling environment that unleashes private financing”.
Billions to trillions
The World Bank’s ‘billions to trillions’ slogan has been the pretext for privileging commercial finance as supposedly necessary to achieve the SDGs. But it has done little to ensure that such profit-seeking private investments will help achieve the SDGs or otherwise serve the public purpose.
The Bank does not consider that profit-seeking private investments expecting attractive returns may not serve the public interest and priorities. Nor do they necessarily support desirable transformations. Worse, their economic, social and environmental consequences may be for the worse.
The privatisation of previously public social services and infrastructure has worsened development and distribution. Unequal access to public services – increasingly linked to affordability and ability to pay – threatens hundreds of millions.
Such blended finance arrangements have also contributed to the debt explosion in the Global South – exacerbating, rather than alleviating developmental, environmental and humanitarian crises.
Debt distress spreading
Developing countries are in their worst-ever debt crises, with debt service obligations higher than ever before. Current debt-to-GDP ratios are more than twice those of LICs before the 1996 HIPCs’ debt relief came into effect, and even higher than for Latin American nations before the 1989 Brady plan.
Unlike the 1980s’ sovereign debt crises, market finance is now more important. Much more government debt from commercial sources involves relying on bond markets, rather than commercial bank borrowings.
With official credit much less important, commercial finance has become much more important compared to the 1980s. Unlike official creditors, most private creditors typically refuse to participate in debt restructuring negotiations, making resolution impossible.
Debt servicing costs equal the combined expenditure for education, health, social protection and climate. In Africa, debt servicing has risen by half. Debt service levels of the 139 World Bank borrowers are higher than during the heavily indebted poor countries’ (HIPCs) and Latin American debt crises peaks.
Debt service is absorbing 38% of budget revenue and 30% of spending on average by developing country governments. In Africa, the levels are much higher, at 54% of revenue and 40% of spending!
The BWIs’ joint debt sustainability framework insists debt-distressed economies must have lower debt-to-GDP ratios than other countries, limiting this LICs’ external ratio to 30% or 40%. This BWI policy effectively penalises the poorer and more vulnerable nations.
In 38 countries with over a billion people, loan conditionalities during 2020-22 resulted in regressive tax reforms and public spending cuts. Less expenditure has hit fuel or electricity subsidies and public wage bills, deepening economic stagnation.
Despite severe debt distress in many developing countries, no meaningful debt relief has been available for most. The most recent debt restructuring deals have left debt service levels averaging at least 48% of revenue over the next three to five years.
Debt distress limits government spending capacity, desperately needed to address social and environmental crises. Hence, overcoming stagnation and achieving the SDGs will require much more debt cancellation, relief and borrowing cost cuts.
The longstanding methods of fundraising by African NGOs are shaped by unique challenges, often rooted in economic, political, and cultural factors as well as vestiges of colonialism.
Opinion by Angela Umoru David, Tafadzwa Munyaka (new york / washington dc)
Inter Press Service
NEW YORK / WASHINGTON DC, Dec 19 (IPS) – Across Africa, non-governmental organisations (NGOs) bearing different monikers such as community-based organisations (CBOs), civil society organisations (CSOs) and nonprofits have long borne the duty of designing and implementing developmental interventions to address varying challenges.
The World Association of Non-governmental Organizations (WANGO) lists 4912 of such entities operating in the Continent, which is safe to say is only a fraction of the true number since many may not be registered on that platform. These non-state actors often rely on the goodwill of volunteers, individual donors, local grant-making bodies, international philanthropy and humanitarian aid to fund and facilitate their operations.
As lofty as their mission or magnanimous as their benefactors might be, the sheer number begs the question of how sustainable their funding methods truly are.
As practitioners in the African development space, we have observed over the years that the longstanding methods of fundraising by African NGOs are shaped by unique challenges, often rooted in economic, political, and cultural factors as well as vestiges of colonialism. These factors breed an over-reliance on funding from outside the continent, mainly from Western donor countries and international development organisations.
Overview of the Current Funding Landscape
Philanthropy and humanitarian aid from the Global North constitute a large chunk of the funding that African NGOs depend on each year. More often than not, such funding comes with ‘strings attached’ like specifying the issues that the local organisations should focus on, the proportion of the funding that should go to areas of concern and rigorous reporting demands.
It is quite common for funding to be unceremoniously withdrawn when an organisation is termed non-compliant to donor requirements.
“The global flow of aid resources hinders the effectiveness and sustainability of local NGOs, as well as their ability to scale and build capacity”, writes Carlos Mureithi, Kenyan journalist. In addition, funding is usually routed through larger international non-profits while local ones only serve as ‘implementing partners’.
With such intermediaries in the picture, local NGOs are forced to work within the confines of their funding partner’s stipulations. While there have been recent calls for localisation and shifting agency to Africa-based organisations, the reverberations are yet to be felt across the NGO landscape in Africa.
Similarly, smaller nonprofit organisations are completely cut off from international funding because they lack the social credibility and popularity. This creates a cycle where only the most ‘visible’ local non-profits continually receive funding. The ‘invisible’ nonprofits are inadvertently dependent on local grant-making bodies (which are often implementing partners of international funders), individual donors in the communities they serve, self-funding and crowdfunding platforms.
A classic scenario is a case in the South-Eastern part of Zimbabwe. A particular district had been grappling with pervasive issues of child marriages, an alarming rate of teen pregnancies, and school dropouts. In 2019, this plight of vulnerable youths caught the attention of a UN agency who reached out to offer a helping hand.
However, there were differences of opinion on what the agency was willing to support and what the District termed to be the true need. Historically, the District had been marked by severe economic challenges stemming from periods of political instability and other socio-economic issues.
These challenges had created poverty and youth restiveness that left communities to grapple with the effects presenting themselves as students dropping out, child marriages and teen pregnancies exacerbated by inadequacies in healthcare and poor education systems. To the District leadership, tackling these effects was most urgent but the international donor agency wanted to fund birth registrations instead, which according to District records, were already at a 95% coverage and success rate.
While birth registration is crucial, the highlighted issues called for a more comprehensive and holistic approach. Therefore, local needs, while pressing, may be overshadowed by the specific preferences and guidelines set by external funders.
Of a truth, the historical dependence on external funding has been both a blessing and a curse. While it provides necessary resources, it sometimes restricts the flexibility of communities to address their challenges autonomously and radically.
Why the Existing Fundraising Model is not Sustainable
1 – Agenda-setting: The landscape of international funding for community development is often a double-edged sword. While financial support from international donors can be a lifeline for communities facing various drawbacks, the attached conditions for such funding sometimes lead to clashes of values.
This poses a significant problem to the existing model of fundraising, as communities may find themselves at a crossroads between meeting immediate needs through the funding provided and adhering to their core values and principles. The model also perpetuates an imbalance of power between international donors and local communities.
The power dynamics can hinder genuine, bi-lateral collaboration and may result in decisions that prioritise the donor’s interests over the community’s needs. The Big Brother syndrome is real. Furthermore, like in the story above, international donors may have specific agendas driven by global concerns, political leanings or their organisational mandates. These may not always align with the grassroots objectives of communities. For example, a donor might prioritise teaching people their rights, while the community seeks expansion of its immunisation program.
2 – Poverty: The fundraising status quo does little to transform systems, creates an over-dependence on foreign aid and perpetuates a cycle of poverty. On the flipside, small NGOs who are not on the radar of foreign donors rely on individual giving or are self-funded and this means that the resources only trickle in.
This limits the impact of projects and forces the staff to live on the barest minimum. In Nigeria, an ongoing jab at development workers is that the NGO staff’s standard of living is so below par that they should also be beneficiaries of their own projects (especially in livelihood and economic empowerment projects).
This is due to the high poverty and unemployment rates in most African cities. Even though the Continent has a long and rich history of local organising, most community members simply cannot afford to spare the little they have for altruistic purposes.
In the same vein, the high poverty levels breeds discontent towards the government and does not inspire many Africans to support the initiatives of local NGOs. It is a widespread notion that the citizens are already doing too much by spearheading the provision of basic amenities like electricity, pipe-borne water and roads. Therefore, the questions are, “Why should we keep doing so much? Why are NGOs forced to do the work that the government should be doing?” This high poverty rate and disillusionment often stops people from donating to NGOs around them.
How Can We Improve Fundraising in Africa?
Nonprofit fundraising in Africa has been marred by economic disparities, external dependencies, and changing political landscapes. In the pursuit of sustainable development, we propose a shift that makes us look inwards at diaspora investments, local organising, and planned giving (including endowments) to provide African NGOs with the tools to navigate the historical challenges while securing long-term financial stability.
1 – Planned giving: Also known as legacy or deferred giving, it is a unique and strategic approach to fundraising that focuses on securing long-term financial support for NGOs. It comprises several key components including bequests, charitable gift annuities, life insurance, or retirement plans.
Unlike traditional donations, planned giving involves arrangements made during a donor’s lifetime that will take effect at a future date. This form of philanthropy allows individuals to leave a lasting legacy, ensuring that their contributions continue to support a cause dear to their hearts even beyond their lifetime.
The well-heeled in our African communities can be encouraged to seriously consider planned giving as not only a strategic avenue for them as donors to create a lasting impact on the causes they care about but to leave a meaningful legacy that reflects their values and commitment to positive change.
We recognize that planned giving decisions are highly personal and influenced by individual circumstances. Nonetheless, in the dynamic landscape of African fundraising, securing sustainable funding is a perpetual challenge.
Planned giving, with its focus on long-term philanthropy, presents an impactful solution for these nonprofits if they began creating educative campaigns to draw attention to this form of philanthropy. We believe that this piece also creates an opportunity for the well-to-do to explore this possibility.
In the same vein, another beacon of financial stability and long-term sustainability for NGOs in Africa are endowments. An endowment in the context of nonprofit fundraising refers to a dedicated fund established by an organisation, typically through donations or other financial contributions, with the intention of maintaining and growing the principal amount over time.
In the context of the African Union Agenda 2063: The Africa We Want and achieving the mantra ‘African solutions to African problems’, endowments offer a strategic avenue for securing a reliable source of income, fostering autonomy and resilience. Endowments, just like planned giving initiatives, offer opportunities for sustained funding, allowing organisations to plan for the future and achieve lasting impact.
The continent boasts of a large array of individuals who have the capacity to provide endowments to causes that align with their interests. In an age of social status and obscene wealth being flaunted on social media, we ask, “How might this wealth be harnessed for long-term benefits in addressing community challenges?”
The continent also boasts of a large diaspora community that can be invited to partner with local organisations through endowments in service of pressing social and community needs.
2 – Diaspora investment: The United Nations reports that in 2022 diaspora remittances reached $100 billion, surpassing funds received through Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) and Official Development Assistance (ODA).
This whopping sum is largely due to high poverty levels in the continent that compels family members who live abroad to send money back home but it shows two things– the resources collectively owned by Africans in the diaspora can make a huge difference and a strong culture of giving back already exists, so it could be structured and leveraged for a greater good.
We acknowledge that diaspora remittances are private (sent directly by immigrants to their families in Africa for personal/family use) but it still presents an exciting possibility of sustainable fundraising for local NGOs.
A Nigerian non-profit, Jela’s Development Initiatives employs this tactic through personal connections to Nigerians living abroad, and requests for recurring donations of $20 or £20, depending on the donor’s country of residence.
In Zimbabwe, Sisonke ZW Family Trust has some of their board members who live in the diaspora contributing varying amounts monthly with a minimum of $100 to support the organisation’s activities. While these have not yet yielded large scale results, with targeted campaigns and narrative change on giving, diaspora investment presents a unique way of channelling resources directly to the organisations that need them the most.
3 – Local organising: By nature, Africans are largely communal and this has resulted in many community members banding together to address societal injustice and developing local solutions.
This trait is one that can be organised and explored to fundraise for local non-profits. For example, in North-Central Nigeria, Vaccine Network for Disease Control mobilises female small business owners to ‘adopt’ a primary healthcare centre, where she makes a donation towards the facility, takes on responsibility to support the monitoring of that facility and holds it accountable in its service delivery.
The donations are not cumbersome to the women and it creates a local networked system of accountability and ownership. A similar initiative exists in Zimbabwe where the Citizen Initiative saw the construction of classroom blocks and ablution facilities in rural areas with citizens financing the projects.
These examples show that local organising works, even if it is on a small scale. However, if more grassroot NGOs adopted this methodology, involving community members in the identification of problems and design of local solutions, they would be more than willing to co-execute and monitor the success of such initiatives towards desired outcomes.
Too often, local NGOs are more concerned with catching the attention of the international funders that they neglect the advantage Africans have as a communal society and the power within that to secure lasting change.
Conclusion
Addressing the existing fundraising system in Africa and its linked challenges requires a multifaceted approach. By empowering local organisations, promoting cultural sensitivity, and advocating for supportive policies, we can pave the way for sustainable development that originates from within communities themselves.
While international funding undoubtedly plays a crucial role in community development and we are not advocating for throwing the baby with the bath water, we maintain that addressing the clash of values and power imbalance is paramount for the success and sustainability of projects.
We also recognize the effort of pan-African philanthropic organisations like the African Visionary Fund to democratise the funding space and abide by game-changing principles like multi-year funding and institutional capacity development but one organisation is definitely not enough to serve the needs of the Continent.
Such visionary approaches need to be duplicated by other indigenous philanthropic organisations. Thus, it is through collaborative efforts that we can build a more resilient and self-reliant future for Africa’s community-based initiatives. Ultimately, it is time to look inward and restructure how we give. The time is now.
Angela Umoru-David is a creative social impact advocate whose experience cuts across journalism, program design and corporate/development communications, and aims to capture a plurality of views that positively influence the African narrative.
Tafadzwa Munyaka is a nonprofit/social change professional with crosscutting expertise in fundraising, program management, and child rights advocacy.
Research associate, Tania Eulalia Martínez Cruz from Oaxaca, Mexico shows how intercropping assists communities remain self-sufficient. Credit: Conrado Perez/IPS
by Joyce Chimbi (nairobi)
Inter Press Service
NAIROBI, Dec 15 (IPS) – The world is not on track to end hunger and poverty as a future of growing food insecurity and climate challenges beckon. Small-scale farmers are the backbone of food production, producing one-third of the world’s food and up to 70 percent of the food consumed in Africa and Asia, yet they are often cut off from the services they need to pull themselves out of poverty and food insecurity.
As small-scale farmers and communities in rural areas—where 80 percent of the world’s poorest live—edge even closer to the epicenter of climate-induced disasters, there is an urgent need for world leaders to increase funding to provide much-needed tools for rural communities to adapt to and mitigate these challenges.
To address these challenges, the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD) received record-breaking pledges in support of its largest replenishment ever, putting the organization on track to positively impact the lives of millions of rural people across the globe.
“This is a clear sign of the confidence member states have in IFAD and the importance they place on our ability to deliver results and impact through targeted investments that transform agriculture, rural economies, and food systems. They understand that investing in rural people and small-scale producers, who produce one-third of the world’s food and up to 70 percent of the food in low- and middle-income countries, is the only path to a food-secure future,” said Alvaro Lario, President of IFAD, following the pledging session in Paris.
IFAD is on track to receive a record replenishment as contributions increase substantially from both big and smaller nations. Photo: Joyce Chimbi/IPS
The fourth replenishment session, which Angola and France hosted in Paris, saw an increase in pledges. IFAD is both a UN organization and an International Financial Institution (IFI), working in remote rural areas where poverty and hunger are at their deepest, so that rural populations are not left behind and are equipped to lift themselves out of poverty.
A replenishment session is the process by which IFAD mobilizes its core resources—an exercise in accountability by which IFAD reports to its Member States on its strategy, reform, and performance, usually at the mid-term of the previous replenishment period.
To date, 48 Member States have pledged USD 1.076 billion to replenish their core resources. Ten countries have increased by more than 50 percent from their previous contribution, and 31 countries have committed to their highest contribution ever, marking a record level of financing achieved for IFAD’s 2025–2027 programme of work.
IFAD launched its 13th replenishment in February 2023, calling for increased investments in small-scale farmers and rural people across developing countries. Every three years, member states replenish IFAD’s resources. The consultation culminated in a pledging session in Paris. Fundraising will then continue in 2024. Typically, over 100 countries contribute to IFAD’s replenishments, making it the most widely supported of all the major IFI replenishments.
“I am humbled by the positive momentum from today’s session and confident that IFAD’s ambitious call to mobilize USD 2 billion in new funding to support a USD 10 billion programme of work impacting over 100 million rural people will be achieved in the coming months,” said Lario.
To address today’s complex challenges facing rural communities, IFAD urged world leaders to increase rural investments. IFAD’s Member States have demonstrated their record-breaking support and IFAD’s pivotal role in revitalizing the 2030 Agenda of Sustainable Development Goals through investing in rural people.
“We rely on IFAD to ensure the resilience we seek to build, taking into account climate change and all other factors that hinder our development,” said Carmen do Sacramento Neto, Minister of Fisheries and Marine Resources, Angola, at the opening of the session.
“There has been an improvement in the living conditions of rural and fishing populations where the IFAD project was implemented, and it has had a significant impact. We announce that Angola will maintain its contribution and increase it in the coming years as a clear sign of our commitment.”
“With four in five of the world’s poorest people living in rural areas, the road to a prosperous, resilient, and food-secure future runs through rural communities. As multiple crises converge, rural people need us to invest in them more than ever before. As countries scramble to respond to unforeseen crises, development budgets are stretched, making the right investments is urgent and critical.”
Eunice Mwape is 26 and the mother of four children. She used to travel far to the garden because there was not enough water near her village of Shatubi. Now, thanks to the IFAD-sponsored project E-SLIP, Eunice has water close to her house. Credit: IFAD
Collaborating with member states, IFAD invests in rural development and across food systems to help small-scale farmers produce more food in greater variety, access markets, apply new technologies, and adapt to climate change. IFAD ensures that member state contributions reach those who need them the most, with 45 percent of total concessional financing going to low-income countries and at least 30 percent of core resources dedicated to fragile situations.
Pledging funds towards SDGs 1 and 2 today means spending less on development tomorrow. For every USD 1 spent on resilience, it now saves up to USD 10 in emergency aid in the future, not to mention avoiding hardship for millions of people the world over. IFAD’s work achieves measurable impact.
Between 2019 and 2021, IFAD’s investments improved the incomes of 77.4 million rural people, while 62 million rural people increased their production, and 64 million rural people improved their access to markets, enabling them to sell their production.
Additionally, thanks to improved agricultural practices, access to technical assistance and credit, as well as the diversification of their income sources, IFAD assisted 38 million people in building their resilience, which is a measure of their capacity to recover from climatic and non-climatic shocks.
Women and children in Afghan cities endure hours-long queues for a vital resource—water. Credit: Learning Together
Inter Press Service
Dec 14 (IPS) – The author is an Afghanistan-based female journalist, trained with Finnish support before the Taliban take-over. Her identity is withheld for security reasonsAccording to United Nations statistics, nearly 80 percent of Afghan families lack access to sufficient water for their daily needs. Afghanistan, a landlocked country with limited water resources, is grappling with an exacerbated drought fueled by climate change, affecting the entire region.
In the western parts of Kabul, residents must endure lengthy queues, waiting for hours to secure the water they need.
The situation has reached a critical point, exemplified by the district of Dasht-e-Barchi running out of water as temperatures rise. This crisis has persisted for months.
In the 13th district of Kabul city, the water company has suspended the water supply. Muhammad Ali and Juma, who have been living in the district for more than seven years, describe their plight as the worst they’ve experienced, emphasizing the absence of water and any communication from officials.
To obtain drinking water, residents must travel considerable distances, enduring hours of waiting only to bring home a few barrels. Families designate someone to stand in line constantly, yet they still experience several days and nights without water.
A private company that used to distribute water to people in exchange for money does not do it anymore. Residents say that there is no government water supply system in this area.
People can’t afford to dig their own wells. Therefore, they must wait for hours to get water from mosques and public distribution centers.
Groundwater levels in Kabul have dwindled significantly. In the Pole Khushk area, western Kabul, people wait from morning to evening for just one barrel of water, highlighting the severe impact of poverty and water scarcity on the city’s residents.
Water scarcity compounds the hardships of life in the Afghan capital, Kabul, adding to the misery of its residents. Credit: Learning Together
The Ministry of Energy and Water has plans to manage groundwater. The head of water program coordination, Rafiullah Stanakzai, says that there are several ongoing projects: the Kabul-Panjshir water canal project as well as the Shah Tut and the Shah Arous projects that supply water to Kabul. The work on these projects will begin after the technical team has reviewed them.
Officials attribute the decline in groundwater levels to population growth and excessive groundwater usage, underscoring the urgency of resolving the water crisis.
The water crisis needs a quick resolution. The Taliban government lacks a comprehensive plan to address the population’s needs for drinking water and essential necessities, casting a dark and hopeless shadow over the country plagued by drought.
29-year-old Proud Mugunhu, a popular Zimbabwean dancer, has mesmerized crowds and onlookers with his dancing skills at events as he gyrates to gather sanitary pads in order to give them to girls and women who are too poor to afford them. Credit: Jeffrey Moyo/IPS
by Jeffrey Moyo (bulawayo)
Inter Press Service
BULAWAYO, Dec 13 (IPS) – At first, he danced for money, but later on, he realized the need to dance for sanitary pads in order to help poor girls and women. Now, 29-year-old Proud Mugunhu conducts dance tutorials that earn him 100 pads from each session.
Mugunhu started his commercial dancing in Zimbabwe’s Epworth informal settlement east of Harare, the country’s capital, where he said he grew up seeing poor girls and women making do without sanitary pads during menstruation.
Now, Mugunhu, who has turned into a popular dancer, has become famed for combating period poverty.
He (Mugunhu) does not only dance to please onlookers, but has now chosen to dance in order to be rewarded with sanitary pads to pass these on to the girls and women pounded by period poverty.
In and outside Zimbabwe, Mugunhu now dances at events where he has struck deals to receive sanitary pads as payment in his war against rampant poverty.
As a result, his dancing has seen many of the girls and women graduate from using rags to something that gives them dignity and confidence.
“I started dancing in 2015—dancing commercially at weddings. I only began dancing for sanitary pads last year, and I am gathering as many sanitary pads as I can in order to help,” Mugunhu told IPS.
“Growing up in Epworth, I saw a lot in terms of the ravages of poverty, especially on girls. So, what I do is that I conduct dance classes for ordinary people, and I choose to be paid using sanitary pads in order for me to then use these to donate to poor girls and women.”
He claims that he gets more than 100 pads per dancing class that he conducts.
“I just want to help those in need. I’m praying that I will be able to get more sanitary pads so that I will be able to give to many girls and women in need.”
The destitution Mugunhu witnessed as he grew up in Epworth compelled him to dance.
In 2019, Zimbabwe’s Finance Minister, Mthuli Ncube, made a surprise announcement that US$12.5 million had been allocated to acquire sanitary pads for poor rural girls in the country who had reached puberty.
Apparently, the news brought joy to Priscilla Misihairambwi-Mushonga, the then chairperson of Zimbabwe’s Parliamentary Portfolio Committee on Primary and Secondary Education.
For many years, she (Misihairambwi) passionately lobbied for the provision of sanitary pads to schoolgirls, while she also made calls for a tax regime that made sanitary wear affordable to every woman in the country.
Whether or not the poor girls eventually received free sanitary pads from the government remains unclear to this day.
But a top government official in Zimbabwe’s Ministry of Women Affairs has claimed that next year they are set to provide sanitary pads free of charge to the country’s poor women and girls.
“Next year, we have plans to work with women who are into sewing to sew reusable sanitary pads, which they will give to girls and women at no cost,” the Chief Director of the Ministry of Women Affairs, Lilian Matsika, told IPS.
With period poverty the norm in poor communities, women’s rights activists like Bridget Mushayahanya called on the government to end the crisis.
“What we want is for our government to understand that menstruation is something that women don’t choose to have. If it were possible, Mushayahanya said, “I would like for our government to work with other regional governments that do ‘pink tanks,’ which means that all items needed by women during menstruation are available for very low prices or free of charge.
Chipo Chikomo, founder of an organization called Nhanga Trust, which manufactures reusable sanitary pads for girls, bemoaned poverty, which she blamed for forcing many to be absent from school during their menstruation.
“We see many girls walking long distances to school; this means that during their monthly menstrual cycles, they don’t then go to school because they won’t have pads to use when they are having menstruation,” she told IPS.
Yet many, like Chikomo, complained of persistent period poverty. For others, like Anna Sande and Sharon Bare, heroic individuals such as Mugunhu stand out as saviors for poor girls and women hammered by period poverty.
Following this year’s elections, at 23 years of age, Sande became Epworth’s youngest mayor, taking charge of a poor local authority where period poverty is common for many.
“I am so grateful for the help I have obtained from Proud Tatenda Mugunhu, who gathers sanitary pads using his dancing talent to help poor girls and women in my community during their monthly periods,” Sande said in an interview with IPS.
Even ordinary Epworth residents like Sharon Bare cannot hide their joy as Mugunhu thwarts period poverty in their midst.
“I really appreciate everything that Mugunhu is doing. I am so proud he is doing a good thing to help poor girls and women get sanitary pads during menstruation,” Bare said.
Peace Hungwe, who is the founder of Peace Hub Zimbabwe, an organization that handles mental health cases in Harare, also showered Mugunhu with praise for his initiative to help poor girls and women surmount period poverty.
“At first, I want to thank Proud. Like his name suggests, he should be proud of himself. There are very few people who do what he is doing. Menstruation is a hard time for many poor girls and women, which leads them into sex work to merely get sanitary pads to use during menstruation,” she told IPS.
Colombian President Gustavo Petro presented his environmental plans at COP28 in Dubai and added his country to the small group of nations that support the negotiation of a binding treaty to prevent the proliferation of fossil fuels, despite his country being an oil producer. CREDIT: Emilio Godoy / IPS
by Emilio Godoy (dubai)
Inter Press Service
DUBAI, Dec 12 (IPS) – One of the most heated debates at the annual climate summit coming to a conclusion in this United Arab Emirates city revolved around the phrasing of the final declaration, regarding the “phase-out” or “phase-down” of fossil fuels within a given time frame.
Experts who talked to IPS at the summit agreed on the magnitude of the bill, which for some Latin American nations could be unaffordable.
Fernanda Carvalho of Brazil, global leader for Energy and Climate Policy at the non-governmental World Wildlife Fund (WWF), referred to the amount without specifying a figure.
“Financial support will be needed. There must be a differentiated approach, differentiated timing, and developed countries must come up with the resources,” the expert, who was present at COP28, held at Expo City on the outskirts of Dubai, told IPS.
COP28 engaged in an acrimonious debate between phase-out and phase-down, with a definite date, of oil, gas and coal, which has already anticipated a disappointing end in Dubai, that in line with the tradition at these summits extended its negotiations one more day, to conclude on Wednesday, Dec. 13.
The “phase-down” concept has been in the climate-energy jargon for years, but it really took off at the 2021 COP26 in the Scottish city of Glasgow, whose Climate Pact alludes to the reduction of coal still being produced and the elimination of inefficient fossil fuel subsidies.
Throughout the climate summits since 1995, developing countries have insisted on differentiated measures for them, in accordance with their own situation, the need for financing from developed nations and the transfer of technology, especially energy alternatives.
Enrique Maurtúa of Argentina, senior diplomacy advisor to the Independent Global Stocktake (iGST) – an umbrella data and advocacy initiative – said they hoped for a political signal to determine regulations or market measures regarding a phase-down or phase-out.
“If a target date is not set, there is no signal. If you set a phase-out for 2050, that is a pathway for the transition. With a deadline, the market can react. And then each country must evaluate its specific context,” the expert told IPS in the COP28 Green Zone, which hosted civil society organizations at the summit.
Available scientific knowledge indicates that the majority of proven hydrocarbon reserves must remain unextracted by 2030 to keep the planetary temperature rise below 2 degrees Celsius, the threshold agreed in the 2015 Paris Climate Change Agreement to avoid massive disasters.
On Sunday, Dec. 10 the non-governmental Climate Action Network (CAN) delivered at COP28 a dishonorable mention to the United States for its role in Israel’s carnage in Gaza, in the traditional Fossil of the Day award for “doing the most to achieve the least” in terms of progress on climate change at the summits. CREDIT: Emilio Godoy / IPS
Failed attempts
In the Latin American region there are unsuccessful precedents of fossil fuel phase-outs.
In 2007, the then president of Ecuador, Rafael Correa (2007-2017), launched the Yasuní-Ishpingo Tambococha Tiputini initiative, which sought the care of the Yasuní National Park in the Ecuadorian Amazon rainforest, in exchange for funds from governments, foundations, companies and individuals of about 3.6 billion dollars by 2024 to leave the oil in the ground.
The aim was to leave 846 million barrels of oil untouched underground. But a special fund created by Ecuador and the United Nations Environment Fund only raised 13 million dollars, according to the Ecuadorian government. So Correa decided to cancel the initiative in 2013, at a time when renewable energies had not yet really taken off.
In a referendum held in August, Ecuadorians decided to halt oil extraction in a block in Yasuní that would provide 57,000 barrels per day in 2022 – the same result sought by Correa, but without foreign funds.
The result of the referendum is to be implemented within a year, although the position of the government of the current president, banana tycoon Daniel Noboa, who took office on Nov. 23, is still unclear.
Meanwhile, in Colombia, President Gustavo Petro has put the brakes on new oil and coal exploration contracts, a promise from his 2022 election campaign.
In addition, the president announced on Dec. 2 in Dubai that his country was joining nine other nations that are promoting the formal initiation of the negotiation of a Fossil Fuel Non-Proliferation Treaty.
Colombia will thus become the first Latin American nation and the largest oil and coal producer to join the initiative that first emerged in 2015 when several Pacific Island leaders and NGOs raised the urgent need for an international mechanism to phase out fossil fuels.
For the undertaking of a just energy transition to cleaner fuels, Petro estimates an initial bill of 14 billion dollars, to come from governments of the developed North, multilateral organizations and international funds.
The latest summit of hope for the climate kicked off on Nov. 30 in this Arab city under the slogan “Unite. Act. Deliver” – the least successful in the history of COPs since the first one, held in Berlin in 1995.
The hopes included commitments and voluntary declarations on renewable energy and energy efficiency; agriculture, food and climate; health and climate; climate finance; refrigeration; and just transitions with a gender focus.
In addition, there were financial pledges of some 86 billion dollars, without specifying whether it is all new money, to be allocated to these issues.
Like many countries, the host of COP28, the United Arab Emirates, has had a pavilion in the so-called Green Zone, which hosts non-governmental organizations, companies and other institutions. The Emirati government bet a lot on the climate summit to deliver results, but without directly targeting the fossil fuels on which its economy depends. CREDIT: Emilio Godoy / IPS
Billions
Given the production and exploration plans of the main hydrocarbon producing countries in the region, the magnitude of the challenge in the medium and long term is enormous.
In October, Brazil, the largest economy in the region and the 11th largest in the world, extracted 3.543 billion barrels of oil and 152 million cubic meters (m3) of gas per day.
This represented approximately two percent of the domestic economy that month.
Mexico, the region’s second largest economy, extracted 1.64 million barrels and 4.971 billion m3 of gas per day in October, equivalent to 52 million dollars in revenues.
Meanwhile, Colombia produced 780,487 barrels of oil in the first eight months of 2023 and 1,568 cubic feet per day of gas, equivalent to 12 percent of public revenues.
“We have to think about decarbonization measures. We want Latin America to be a clean energy powerhouse,” said Carvalho.
As of September, Brazil’s state-owned oil giant Petrobras was working on obtaining 9.571 billion barrels of oil equivalent, according to the Global Oil & Gas Exit List produced by the German non-governmental organization Urgewald.
This represents an excess of 94 percent above the limit set by the 2015 Paris Agreement to keep global warming below two degrees Celsius.
Meanwhile, Mexico’s state-owned oil company Pemex is producing 1.444 billion barrels of oil equivalent, 56 percent above the threshold set by the Paris Agreement.
Finally, the public company Ecopetrol, mostly owned by the Colombian state, is working to obtain 447 million barrels, 98 percent above the Paris Agreement limit, according to Urgewald.
In addition, the cost of action against the climate crisis is far from affordable for any Latin American nation.
For example, Mexico estimated that the implementation of 35 measures, including in the power, gas and oil generation sector, would cost 137 billion dollars in 2030, but the benefits would total 295 billion dollars.
But Maurtúa says the budget question is only relative. “There is a lot of public money with which many things can be done,” complemented by international resources, he argued.
A mask seller in an Indian food market in Kerala during a recent zoonotic disease outbreak. COP28 is the first climate negotiation where the majority of the countries have agreed to declare their commitment to prevent the worsening health impacts of climate change. Credit: Stella Paul/IPS
by Stella Paul (dubai)
Inter Press Service
DUBAI, Dec 09 (IPS) – One Health activist, Kelly Dent, has been attending UNFCC COPs since 2009, when it was held in Copenhagen. From there, it has been a 15-year-long journey to Dubai, but Dent is finally having a reason to feel good: for the first time, the majority of the countries have come together to formally declare their commitment to prevent the worsening health impacts of climate change.
“After 14 years of working for this (inclusion of One Health in the climate change negotiations), it is finally there in the health declaration, so we are very happy. It is mentioned clearly—says what it is and uses the exact term; there is no ambiguity,” says Dent, who is the Global Director of External Engagement at World Animal Protection, one of the 14 organizations that issued a statement of endorsement soon after the health declaration was issued in Dubai on December 3.
The Health Declaration
The three-page document called “COP28 Declaration on Climate and Health” says that the parties will facilitate collaboration on human, animal, environmental, and climate health challenges. Implementing a One Health approach would include addressing environmental determinants of health, stepping up research on the connections between environmental and climatic factors and antimicrobial resistance, and finding zoonotic spillovers early to stop, prepare for, and respond to future pandemics.
While the declaration is not legally binding, it serves as a voluntary call to action outside the formal process of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC). So far, 124 countries have signed it.
According to Dent, this health declaration should be viewed alongside the “Emirates Declaration on Sustainable Agriculture, Resilient Food Systems, and Climate Action,” another landmark declaration made at COP28 on December 4. This is also the first-ever leaders’ level declaration on food systems and climate at a COP, and it highlights the unique and crucial role that food systems play in either driving or mitigating climate change—as well as adapting to its impacts.
Put together, the two declarations widen the scope of addressing and tackling environmental, human, and animal health, all of which are interrelated. “Even a couple of years ago, there was nothing on One Health or climate and health connections in the COPs. And now we have not one but two declarations on this. So, this is definitely a great start,” Dent says.
Nathalie Beasnel, a surgical nurse and health philanthropist from Chad. Credit: Stella Paul/IPS
Perspective of a Developing Oil-Producing Country
Nathalie Beasnel is a surgical nurse from Chad, a nation in sub-Saharan Africa with alarmingly high levels of air pollution due to industrial emissions, such as the production of oil and gas.
According to Energy Intelligence – a global energy information company, in the first quarter of 2023, Chad’s crude oil production was 141,700 barrels per day. Of this, the country only uses a marginal portion—slightly over 2 thousand barrels; the rest is used by consumers outside of the country. The total revenue from the oil is estimated to be over USD 1.13 billion.
Ironically, Chad ranks 190 out of 191 countries on the UN Human Development Index which makes it among the poorest countries in the world. 42% of the country’s population lives below the national poverty line.
In addition, air pollution has emerged as one of the biggest health crises in Chad. The current PM2.5 concentration in Chad is 4.9 times higher than the WHO 24-hour air quality guidelines, according to live data gathered by AQI.in, the global air quality monitoring tool.
Beasnel, who provides specific and basic medical supplies to hospitals in the rural areas of Senegal, Chad, and South Africa through her charity Health4Peace, receives dozens of requests every quarter from pregnant women to help them go abroad to give birth in a “clean air environment.”
Beasnel feels that the health declaration has hopes for communities facing health challenges induced by climate change and fossil fuel burning in poorer countries like Chad; they can expect some concrete action and support, especially since the announcement of a total of 1 billion USD in financing for climate and health. The billion-dollar funding comes from an array of existing and new funders, including the Green Climate Fund, Asian Development Bank, Global Fund, and Rockefeller Foundation.
“This is a portal. We know that USD 1 billion has already been raised, specifically by the health sector. Now I want to see where this 1 billion goes. For example, we have sudden floods, droughts, farm failures, and air pollution. However, we now need to see the mechanism of the flow of this fund—whether it is through leadership, whether it is through people, or whether it is through the people who are directly affected,” she says.
Coming up Next: One Health Guidelines From the Quadripartite
Last year in Sharm El Sheikh, Egypt, four UN agencies (quadripartite)—WHO, UNEP, FAO, and WOAH—collectively drew a Joint Plan of Action (JPA) to advocate for and support the implementation of One Health at all levels and across sectors to tackle interconnected health risks and protect the health of all species.
Since then, the quadripartite has taken several steps to advance the adoption of the One Health approach, which include, among others, a workshop on environmental determinants of health and the One Health Assembly.
At COP28, the quadripartite has developed an implementation guide to provide the countries with step-by-step guidance on how to adopt and adapt the OH JPA at the national level. Scheduled to be launched on December 10, 2023, the guideline is expected to focus on how to adopt a multidisciplinary and inclusive principle. According to Cristina Romanelli, Programme Officer & Biodiversity, Climate and Health Focal Point, World Health Organization, this is one of the most exciting developments that we can expect during the remaining days of COP28. Now that we understand what a holistic, multilayered One Health framing means, how does that apply in terms of implementation? So, what will happen on December 10 is the launch of the plan for this implementation,” Romanelli says.
Some Words of Caution
Meanwhile, One Health advocates are urging people to make note of some missions in the health declaration that could affect its successful adoption and implementation. One of these is factory farming of animals, which significantly raises the chances of trauma and sickness in animals and contributes to at least 11% of total greenhouse gas emissions.
“There is a powerful agriculture lobby that doesn’t allow any changes. We have to challenge this dominant lobby and their business model and expose the harm they are causing. The governments also need to take responsibility, rid away subsidies in industrial agriculture, and support protein diversification,” says Dent.
Dent cites the example of Germany, which, in November, allocated 38 million euros to support the production of alternative (plant-based) proteins.
The German government’s decision follows similar steps taken by the Netherlands, which has already invested 60 million euros to develop an ecosystem for cultivated meat and precision fermentation. Denmark (168 million euros) France (65 million euros) and the UK are other European countries that have announced investing in developing plant-based, alternative proteins.
The so-called “Green Zone” at COP28, which brings together pavilions of non-governmental organizations and companies that are not officially accredited by the Secretariat of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, features a clean energy area showcasing progress made on the ground, at the climate summit in Dubai. CREDIT: Emilio Godoy / IPS
by Emilio Godoy (dubai)
Inter Press Service
DUBAI, Dec 08 (IPS) – One of the world’s largest solar power plants, the Mohammed bin Rashid al Maktoum Park, captures solar rays in the south of this United Arab Emirates city, with an installed capacity of 1,527 megawatts (Mw) to supply electricity to some 300,000 homes in the Arab nation’s economic capital.
However, it is difficult to find solar panels on the many buildings that populate this city of nearly three million inhabitants, host to the 28th Conference of the Parties (COP28) to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) – an unlikely venue for a climate summit at a site built on oil industry wealth and at the same time highly vulnerable to the effects of the climate crisis.
But it is not unusual considering that this Gulf country, made up of seven emirates, is one of the world’s largest producers of oil and gas, which it is trying to compensate for by hosting the annual climate summit, which began on Nov. 30 and is due to conclude on Tuesday, Dec. 12, with the Dubai Declaration.
That is why the Dec. 2 launch of the Global Renewables and Energy Efficiency Pledge, endorsed by 123 countries and consisting of tripling by 2030 the alternative installed capacity to 11 terawatts (11 trillion watts) and doubling the energy efficiency rate to four percent per year, along with other announcements, comes as a surprise in a scenario designed by and for crude oil.
Governments, international organizations and companies have already pledged five billion dollars for the development of renewable energy in the coming years at the Expo City Dubiai, the summit venue.
For Latin America, a region that has made progress in the transition to alternative energy, although with varying levels of success depending on the country, these voluntary goals involve financial, regulatory, social and technological challenges to make real progress in that direction.
Peri Días, communications manager for Latin America of the non-governmental organization 350.org, said the existence of a declaration on renewables at COP28 is essential for the phasing out of fossil fuels, the burning of which is the main cause of global warming.
“It is fundamental that the energy transition be fair, include affected communities and the most vulnerable. We have to ask ourselves why generate more electricity and for whom. What we see today is a complementary growth that does not replace fossil fuels, it is not what we need,” the activist told IPS in the summit’s Green Zone, which hosts civil society in its various expressions.
The Jebel Ali power plant, the world’s largest gas-fired power plant, includes a seawater desalination plant to supply water to Dubai in the United Arab Emirates. The plant is visible on the outskirts of the city, where the climate summit is being held in the Expo City this December. A reminder that renewable energy is still far from replacing fossil fuels, the main cause of global warming. CREDIT: Emilio Godoy / IPS
In the Latin American region, Brazil has emerged as the undisputed leader, developing an installed capacity of 196,379 MW, 53 percent of which comes from hydroelectric plants, 13 percent from wind energy and 5 percent from solar power.
In Chile, solar energy contributes 24 percent of energy, wind 13 percent and hydroelectric 21 percent, although thermoelectric plants still account for 36.9 percent.
Despite the lag since 2018 due to the current government’s outright support for hydrocarbons, which has halted the transition to low-carbon energy sources, Mexico is next in line, with 7000 Mw of solar power capacity and 7312 Mw of wind power, although its energy mix still depends 70 percent on fossil fuels.
Meanwhile, in Argentina, 73 percent of renewable energy comes from wind, 15 percent from the sun, 6 percent from bioenergy and 5 percent from mini-hydroelectric plants.
The Climatescope 2023 report, produced by the private consulting firm BloombergNEF, found that Brazil, Chile and Colombia are the most attractive countries in the region for investment in renewables, while Mexico is one of the least attractive.
Limitations
While it is true that most Latin American nations have set renewable generation targets, they also face hurdles to reaching them. Around the world, this segment suffers from high interest rates for financing, a bottleneck in the manufacture of wind turbines that affects producers, and slow delivery of environmental permits.
Ricardo Baitelo, project manager of the non-governmental Brazilian Institute of Energy and Environment, said the maintenance of policies plays a central role in the evolution of renewables, which require higher generation speed, integration in the electric grid and the reduction of energy losses by moving them from one point to another.
“In recent years, Brazil has intensified the regimentation of renewables, expansion has been steady, but planning is important. And it is necessary to improve processes and build infrastructure, which costs more money,” he told IPS.
The deployment of renewable energies involves concerns about respect for the rights of indigenous peoples and communities, water use, deforestation risks and the impacts of mining for elements such as copper, tin, cobalt, graphite and lithium.
Several reports warn of both the demand for these materials and the consequences.
An electric vehicle recharges at a hotel in northeast Dubai, the second largest city in the United Arab Emirates and host of COP28. In this city built on oil wealth, the Dubai climate summit includes messages of promotion and commitment to renewable energies. CREDIT: Emilio Godoy / IPS
The demand for copper and nickel would grow by two to three times to meet the needs of electric vehicles and clean electricity grids by 2050. The extraction of minerals, such as graphite, lithium and cobalt, could rise by 500 percent by 2050 to meet the requirements of energy technologies, according to the World Bank Group.
Chile and Mexico produce copper; Argentina, Bolivia and Chile, lithium; and Brazil, iron – all of which are necessary for the energy transition, which is not innocuous because it leaves environmental legacies, such as mining waste or water use and pollution.
The declaration “must clearly include routes for implementation and for a just and equitable transition. Financing is the number one priority. The transition must be fully funded, with access to affordable long-term funds. Technology transfer is vital. Renewables are the most recognized and affordable solution for climate mitigation and adaptation,” she told IPS.
The Dubai commitment implies a greater effort than Latin American countries had in mind.
By 2031, renewables are to account for 48 percent of primary energy and 84 percent of electricity generation, which means wind and solar would double in Brazil.
Argentina, meanwhile, plans to add 2,600 gigawatts (Gw) of renewables by 2030 and Chile has set targets of 25 percent renewable generation by 2025, 80 percent by 2035 and 100 percent by 2050.
Under its 2015 Energy Transition Law, Mexico is to generate 35 percent clean energy by 2024 and 43 percent by 2030, although these goals are in doubt due to stagnant supply of renewables.
Jorge Villarreal, climate policy director of the non-governmental Mexico Climate Initiative, said Dubai’s commitment is feasible, but argued that there must be a radical change in the country’s energy policy.
“It is not oriented towards renewables. On the contrary, we have invested in gas. Permits (for renewable plants) are at a standstill. Mexico has the potential to expand the penetration of renewables. That is where new investment in energy should be directed,” he told IPS.
Mexico committed at COP27, held in Egypt a year ago, to add 30 Gw of renewable energy and hydropower by 2030, although there is still no clear pathway towards that goal.
While governments, NGOs and academia make their calculations, it is not yet certain that the commitment made on day 2 at Expo City Dubai will translate into a clear message in the final COP28 declaration.
Three programmes were announced at COP28 including a greening and forest partnership. This picture shows an example of landscaping for urban spaces and high-rises in Singapore.
by Umar Manzoor Shah (dubai)
Inter Press Service
DUBAI, Dec 06 (IPS) – In the spirit of global cooperation and environmental commitment, COP 28 launched a groundbreaking initiative aimed at transforming the building and construction sectors. Titled ‘Buildings and Construction for Sustainable Cities: New Key Partnerships for Decarbonization, Adaptation, and Resilience,’ the initiative marks a turning point in addressing the environmental challenges posed by the construction industry.
Three major frameworks were announced at the launch: Buildings Breakthrough, Cement Breakthrough, and the Forest and Climate Leader’s Partnership’s Greening Construction with Sustainable Wood initiative. These frameworks seek to catalyze collaboration between governments and stakeholders, providing a comprehensive solution for mitigating climate change, adapting to its impacts, and building resilience in the sector.
The sector accounts for nearly 40% of global energy-related CO2 emissions and 50% of extracted materials, which highlights the urgency of the initiative. Additionally, the sector generated one-third of global waste, highlighting the critical need for coordinated efforts to guide its transformation.
The global leaders and representatives, during the event, highlighted the urgency of the building and construction sector’s transformation. Their shared commitment to sustainability, resilience, and decarbonization set the stage for a new era of international collaboration, offering hope for a future where cities are built with a conscious effort to mitigate climate change and adapt to its inevitable challenges. The success of this initiative hinges on the continued dedication of nations, organizations, and communities to work together toward a sustainable and resilient future for all.
The COP28 panel at the launch of the ‘Buildings and Construction for Sustainable Cities, New Key Partnerships for Decarbonization, Adaptation, and Resilience’ commitment. Credit: Umar Manzoor Shah/IPS
Maimunah binti Mohd Sharif, the Executive Director of the United Nations Human Settlements Programme, emphasized the sector’s role in greenhouse gas emissions and stressed the importance of accelerating the transition to more sustainable practices.
“The way we build our cities now will determine future emissions. Housing and buildings are also at the core of resilience. We need to accelerate the transition to regenerate the material. We need to ensure that the sector is decarbonized along with a lifecycle and increasingly resilient to natural disasters,” she said.
Stafen Wanzel, Deputy Director General of International Climate Action at the Ministry of Economic Affairs and Climate Action for Germany, echoed the sentiments, focusing on the pivotal role of cement and steel in achieving net-zero and resilient buildings. “Germany pledged 20 million euros for an international climate initiative to fund advancements in building materials, showcasing their commitment to holistic approaches that consider the energy, environment, and climate nexus,” she said.
Ditte Juul-Jorgensen, Director General of the ENER European Commission, reinforced the need for action to meet the goals of the Paris Agreement. She highlighted the potential to design and construct buildings more efficiently, using greener materials, and improving energy efficiency. This, she argued, aligned with the global commitment to triple renewables and double energy efficiency, essential for staying on track with the Paris Agreement’s targets.
“Today’s initiative is a necessary contribution to our work to mitigate climate change and to mitigate emissions, and it is completely aligned with the global pledge for tripling renewables and doubling energy efficiency. To respect our 1.5 degrees as agreed in Paris, this initiative is really part of it,” she said.
Abdel Khalek Ibrahim, the Assistant Minister for Technical Affairs at the Ministry of Housing Utilities in Egypt, emphasized the initiative’s global scope. With over 500,000 informal areas, Egypt faces the challenge of balancing housing demand with green climate resilience. He said that the Egyptian government established a national council for green housing and urbanism to formulate a roadmap for gradually transforming housing to be more resilient and energy efficient. “We need to think about how to strike a balance between housing demand and green climate resilience, as Egypt has more than 500,000 informal areas.”
Ali Zaidi, assistant to the President and National Climate Advisor of the USA, highlighted the transformative potential of the initiative for people’s lives. Focusing on building codes and transitioning from fossil-based to electricity-based heating, the U.S. emphasized a worker- and community-centered approach. Zaidi stressed the importance of grants, design standards, and enforcement to facilitate the sector’s transformation.
“Buildings are the places where we worship, where we live, play, and breathe. There will be a visible difference in the lives of so many people in the coming time. This is the opportunity we must deliver for our citizens. This transformation we are making here must be worker-centered and community-centered,” Zaidi said.
Jo da Silva, Global Sustainability Director for ARUP, discussed the challenges faced by her organization in driving change amid diverse jurisdictional rules. While acknowledging the success keys in Europe, Asia, and the U.S., she emphasized the unique opportunities in Africa, where 80% of the buildings needed in the next two decades are yet to be built. Da Silva urged governments to create a level playing field, facilitating collaboration rather than competition, to unlock the full potential of innovation and industrialized construction in the sector.
In Africa, the average amount of time spent collecting firewood is 2.1 hours, which robs women and girls of hundreds of hours every year. Credit: Joyce Chimbi/IPS
by Joyce Chimbi (dubai)
Inter Press Service
DUBAI, Dec 05 (IPS) – Across the African continent, many first-born children in poor and vulnerable households do not go to school as they spend their school days collecting biomass fuel. The regional average of the amount of time spent collecting firewood is 2.1 hours, robbing women and girls in particular of hundreds of hours in a year and crippling their capacities to engage in learning and productive activities.
“I was one of those children that arrived to school late every day or not at all. I grew up in Limuru, Central Kenya, near the Kinare Forest. Every day, I would rush to the forest first thing in the morning to collect the firewood needed to prepare porridge and then dash to the neighbor’s house to borrow fire,” Njambi Muigai, a climate activist and COP28 delegate, told IPS.
“I would carry a dry firewood and light it up at the neighbor’s fireplace and rush back home with the burning firewood to light our cooking place. In the evening, I would repeat the same routine. Discussions around climate, clean energy, and women’s empowerment must find space in such high-level forums if there is to be any meaningful progress towards net zero.”
Muigai was speaking on the sidelines of a session dubbed ‘Electrifying Cooking: A Just Journey Toward Net Zero’ at the ongoing COP28 Summit in Dubai, UAE. As climate change increasingly becomes the most pressing issue facing humankind today, countries are urged to pursue ambitious climate actions towards net zero—the cutting of greenhouse gas emissions to as close to zero as possible, with any remaining emissions re-absorbed from the atmosphere by ecosystems such as oceans and forests.
Scientific evidence shows that to avert a climate catastrophe, already signaled by an increase in climate-induced disasters such as fatal floods and crippling droughts, global temperature increase needs to be limited to 1.5°C above pre-industrial levels.
UN’s research shows that currently, the Earth is already about 1.1°C warmer than it was in the late 1800s, and emissions continue to rise. To keep global warming to no more than 1.5°C, as called for in the Paris Agreement, emissions need to be reduced by 45 percent by 2030 and reach net zero by 2050.
Speaking during the event, COP28 CEO Adnan Z Amin, who also served as the founding Director General of the International Renewable Energy Agency, made a strong case for electrifying cooking and its place in accelerating climate action towards net zero.
“One of the major priorities for COP28 is in the broad area of energy, and within that, to increase access to affordable, reliable, sustainable, and modern energy for all by 2030. This represents an important strategy in our efforts to reach our global net-zero goal. Evidence shows that one of the most reliable paths to reaching the goal is based on electrification without decreasing the use of renewable energy,” he said.
He stressed that despite progress made towards access to electricity over the last decade, improved access to modern cooking remains overlooked. Nearly a billion people, or 940 million, in Sub-Saharan Africa lack access to clean cooking fuels and technologies. The rampant use of biomass for cooking has negative consequences for health, gender, climate, and the environment.
A clean cooking report shows that in sub-Saharan Africa, a staggering 29 countries have access to clean cooking at a rate below 20 percent, with half of the nearly one billion people without access to clean cooking concentrated in five countries such as Nigeria, Ethiopia, Tanzania, the Democratic Republic of Congo, and Uganda.
Indoor air pollution from biomass is one of the top 10 risks for the global burden of diseases, according to the World Health Organization. Household air pollution is responsible for an estimated 3.8 million premature deaths globally.
“This is a problem in Asia and Latin America, but the numbers are particularly concerning in Africa. Four of the five families in Africa use primitive cooking stoves made of wood. A woman spends up to four hours a day collecting firewood, and she is robbed of her time. WHO says half a million women die prematurely due to respiratory diseases caused by primitive cooking. The women cook while pregnant, which affects health in the womb, and they cook with babies on their backs, causing lung problems for the babies,” said Dr Fatih Birol, Executive Director of the International Energy Agency.
“Europe is a neighbor of Africa; in my culture and in many of our cultures, neighbors help each other in times of trouble. I cannot believe that these numbers are unfolding in front of our eyes. This, to me, is the most important gender issue, a big injustice that can easily be solved.”
“Not only are half a million women dying prematurely in Africa alone from biomass pollution as they walk long distances in search of firewood, but they also have to cross borders and contested territories, placing them in harm’s way.
“If half a million people were dying per year in war, we know what we would do, and this is happening every single year. For me, coming from the global south and being an African woman, it is even more depressing because it is as if the world is saying that because they are dying in Africa, it is not as important as if they were dying in another part of the world. There are all these social aspects that determine how we move forward.”
Nigeria’s Damilola Ogunbiyi, Special Representative of the UN Secretary-General Chief Executive Officer for Sustainable Energy for All and Co-Chair UN-Energy, Sustainable Energy for All, said that “if half a million people were dying in a war, we would know what to do, and this is happening every single year.”
Observing that coming from the global south and being “an African woman, it is even more depressing because it is as if the world is saying that it is not as important as if they were dying in another part of the world. There are all these social aspects that determine how we move forward.”
She spoke about prevailing misconceptions about the source of harmful emissions. An analysis of Nigeria shows that despite the 45 gigawatts of diesel and petrol generated, the biggest emissions are actually from the cooking sector. Stressing that clean cooking is as important, if not more important than electrification, as it buys women time to engage productively in society, lifts people out of poverty, and accelerates the growth of a country’s GDP.
Yamide Dagnet points to the urgency of climate action to meet the Paris Agreements, while protecting frontline communities and about 70 000 attendees grapple with issues during the UN Climate Change Conference COP28. Credit: COP28/Walaa Alshaer
by Umar Manzoor Shah (dubai)
Inter Press Service
DUBAI, Dec 03 (IPS) – Yamide Dagnet, the Director for Climate Justice at Open Society Foundations, delves into the intricacies of the negotiations at the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) 27th session of the Conference of Parties (COP28) in Dubai.As the world converges for COP 28, the urgency of addressing climate change has never been more palpable. In an exclusive interview with IPS, Yamide Dagnet, the Director for Climate Justice at Open Society Foundations, delves into the intricate details of this pivotal conference—from the unprecedented start to key challenges and opportunities in climate finance. She offers a comprehensive and nuanced perspective on global climate discourse.
As COP 28 unfolds, this interview provides a panoramic view of the complex landscape of climate action. From the challenges of climate finance to the critical role of the private sector and the ethical considerations in technology deployment, Dagnet offers a roadmap for navigating the intricate terrain of climate change, including an urgent call to action urging global leaders, businesses, and civil society to address the challenges that lie ahead collaboratively. As the world grapples with the consequences of climate change, the interview serves as a compass, guiding stakeholders towards a more sustainable and resilient future, and her voice clearly articulates her views that while the just energy and industrial revolution hold immense potential for economic growth in resource-rich nations, it is crucial to protect the rights of frontline communities and activists.
The Start of COP 28
The conference’s initial day set an unprecedented tone. “Positive developments like the creation of the Loss and Damage Fund and sizeable pledges, especially from countries like the UAE, Germany, and the EU, are highlights of this momentum’s emphasis on international solidarity; I hope that the momentum generated on day one will permeate the entirety of COP 28,” Dagnet told Inter Press Service.
Yamide Dagnet, Director for Climate Justice at Open Society Foundations. Credit: TJ Kirkpatrick, Open Society Foundations
Wealthier Nations and Climate Change
Dagnet delves into the role of wealthier nations in the fight against climate change. “While there is an expectation for these nations to fulfil their commitments, reality paints a different picture. Adaptation finance has not seen the necessary investment,” she said while pointing to a critical gap in addressing the immediate impacts of climate change. Looking at the financial dynamics, Dagnet dissected the pledges made by key nations and highlighted the ongoing challenges in reaching the financial targets made since 2009 and outlined in the Paris Agreement. Dagnet contends that “fulfilling pledges and demonstrating seriousness are essential steps for wealthier nations to regain trust and ensure a unified front in the fight against climate change.”
Key Trends in Climate Change Policy
Transitioning into a discussion on key trends shaping climate change policy in the next decade, Dagnet underscored the critical importance of aligning investments with the goals of the Paris Agreement. A concerning trend emerges as she highlights the “doubling of subsidies for fossil fuels, signaling a misalignment with the imperative to transition to clean energy. There is a need to redirect investments toward clean energy, adaptation, and activities in line with the Paris Agreement.”
Dagnet also highlights the challenge of balancing economic goals while adhering to climate policies, emphasizing the integration of climate policy into the broader development agenda. She illustrated the economic risks posed by climate-related disasters, citing examples of hurricanes causing widespread destruction. “Resilient infrastructure is vital, as even substantial economic gains can be wiped out if development projects are not resilient to floods, hurricanes, and other climate-related events,” she said.
Exploring the business sense of investing in reducing emissions, Dagnet highlights that, with the decreasing costs of renewable energy, it is not only an environmental imperative but also financially prudent. “The cost-effectiveness of renewable energy makes a compelling case for nations to prioritize emission reduction efforts, aligning economic goals with sustainable development,” she said.
It also means recognizing that the rare transition minerals needed to scale up the use of renewable energy require a just energy and industrial revolution, which holds immense potential for economic growth in resource-rich nations.
“However, the risk of human rights abuses and other adverse effects should be taken into account and mitigated by focusing on value addition in mineral supply chains by reconciling with the protection of activists and frontline communities, including people’s rights in land use, labor, and conservation of cultural heritage.”
The Role of the Private Sector
Dagnet further delves into the role of the private sector in climate action, focusing on areas such as adaptation and loss and damage. She acknowledged the challenges faced by the private sector in engaging with these aspects, emphasizing the need for them to integrate climate risk into their business models. “While adaptation may not seem immediately profitable, the long-term consequences of inaction are severe,” she says. She suggests that insurance companies need to review their business models, considering how they can better contribute to tackling losses and damages.
Technology for Addressing Climate Change
Turning to the role of technology in addressing climate change, Dagnet discussed the potential and pitfalls. She advocates for a “balanced approach that leverages indigenous knowledge alongside technological solutions. Dagnet highlights the importance of proper assessment, monitoring, safeguards, and global governance to mitigate the risks associated with less-proven and more controversial solutions like geoengineering, carbon dioxide removal, and carbon capture and storage. This is critical for responsible technology deployment, recognizing that while technology can offer solutions, it must be guided by ethical considerations, an understanding of potential risks, and the design of appropriate guardrails to minimize unintended adverse impacts.” She suggested that a holistic approach, which includes both technological advancements and indigenous knowledge, together with a more participatory process bringing various constituencies from both the global north and global south, provides a more robust foundation for addressing climate change challenges in an innovative and equitable way.
Civil Society’s Accountability Role
Dagnet further highlighted the vital role of civil society in holding governments accountable for their climate commitments, including their financial pledges. She contends that efforts to “measure progress and scrutinize government actions are essential tools for civil society to hold governments accountable for their commitments.” She also acknowledged the power of public pressure to drive governments to take more ambitious climate action. Dagnet emphasized the need for a multi-faceted approach, combining legal frameworks, grassroots movements, and international collaboration based on robust data and supported by nuanced and more sophisticated communication strategies, to hold governments accountable on the global stage effectively.
Assessment of International Agreements
Dagnet provided a sober assessment of the international agreements reached so far in the fight against climate change. She also acknowledged that the world is far from achieving its climate objectives, and the window to meet temperature goals is shrinking rapidly. But like many climate justice avengers, she is not defeated and points out ways COP28 and its global stocktake can create an inflection point, with a “course correction pathway” that highlights the need for increased attention to scaling up efforts to keep global temperature increases to 1.5 degrees Celsius and enhance resilience, especially in the face of recent climate-related disasters globally. “No country is immune to the disasters the climate change is unleashing. It is imperative to scale up and speed up efforts to keep fossil fuels on the ground while focusing on building resilience to mitigate the impact of climate change,” she concluded.
The land at St Denis Libolina primary, a school for physically challenged has been transformed into food forests and gardens using agroecology and feed the children, teachers. They have now sent a challenge to the community to do the same. Credit: Isaiah Esipisu/IPS
by Isaiah Esipisu (dubai)
Inter Press Service
DUBAI, Dec 02 (IPS) – Students of St Denis Libolina Primary have used agroecology farming techniques to transform the entire school garden and any free space into food forests and gardens for different vegetable varieties, legumes, and herbs.
Now the students, who are physically challenged, have challenged their parents, villagers, and farmers in the outskirts of Myanga Township, in Kenya’s Bungoma County, in the Western region, to do the same.
“Barely one year ago, teachers had to contribute money to buy green vegetables to be used by staff members,” said Gladys Orlando, the school head teacher, told IPS during a recent media visit. “But today, there are always more than enough vegetables, not just for the teachers but for all students in our boarding facility.”
With rainwater harvested from classroom rooftops, several trenches dug on the school garden, and the use of cover crops, the school has managed to sustainably trap water and soil moisture to support farming of diverse crops, not limited to vegetables, cereals, fruits, tuber crops such as cassava, sweet potatoes, and arrowroots, among others.
“I have never known that this area can be this productive,” said Naomi Sitati, a parent at the school and a smallholder farmer who has always cultivated maize and beans. “I have since been coming here to learn alongside the pupils, and now I have established my own agroecology unit on a half-acre piece of land at home.”
According to experts at the ongoing climate negotiations (COP 28) in Dubai, UAE, such agroecological farming techniques are key to the continent’s food systems because they optimize the use of local resources such as manure and local water sources for irrigation, thereby minimizing the ecological footprint and enhancing the sustainability of agricultural practices.
“Techniques such as rainwater harvesting, use of cover crops, and drought-resistant crops help conserve water,” said Dr Million Belay, the General Coordinator for the Alliance for Food Sovereignty in Africa.
“This is especially vital as climate change is expected to make water sources more unpredictable and scarce,” he said during an event on the sidelines of the 28th round of climate negotiations in Dubai.
According to Xavier Emodo, the teacher in charge of the farming project at St Denis Libolina School, all organic waste in the school and rubbish collected under tree sheds are all used to make compost manure to keep the soils nourished.
“We have particular students who are always dedicated to the management of compost manure in this school; others are dedicated to pest control and crop management; and we even have a treasurer who takes record of any income generated from the surplus,” said Emondo. “These students are very passionate about whatever they are doing, given that our new teaching system, also known as competency-based curriculum, calls for such practical lessons as part of the syllabus.”
Each and every block at the school has small vegetable gardens in front of classes. Each garden is managed by learners from those particular classes. “Students from these classes are always competing to outdo each other,” said Emodo.
So far, the school has acquired two dairy cows, whose cow dung is instrumental in composting the manure, and they provide milk for the learners.
“We have found that by leveraging traditional knowledge and practices, agroecology empowers communities (such as St Denis Libolina School) to be stewards of their own land and resources, fostering local innovation and self-reliance in the face of climate change,” said Belay, who is now pushing for agroecology to be included in the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change’s (UNFCCC) future negotiations agenda.
“We are calling for agroecology’s diversified cropping systems to be recommended for climate resilience because the techniques reduce the risk of total crop failure, providing a safety net for food production systems,” he said.
During last year’s climate negotiation (COP 27) in Sharm El Sheikh, Egypt, the “Sharm el-Sheikh joint work on implementation of climate action on agriculture and food security” was adopted by all parties. The four-year joint work includes implementation of the outcomes of the Koronivia joint work on agriculture and previous activities addressing issues related to agriculture, as well as future topics, recognising that solutions are context-specific and take into account national circumstances.
One of the objectives for the joint work was to promote a holistic approach to addressing issues related to agriculture and food security, taking into consideration regional, national and local circumstances, in order to deliver a range of multiple benefits, where applicable, such as adaptation, adaptation co-benefits and mitigation, recognising that adaptation is a priority for vulnerable groups, including women, indigenous peoples and smallholder farmers
Evidence-based studies have demonstrated that diversification inherent in agroecology provides farmers with multiple income sources, such as different kinds of crops, livestock, and value-added products, thereby reducing economic vulnerability to climate-related shocks.
“It integrates food production’s ecological, economic, and social aspects, thereby promoting sustainable and equitable systems while also addressing farm-level production and socio-economic processes like markets and distribution,” said Belay.
So far, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) has repeatedly recommended the use of agroecological principles and practices, among other approaches that work with natural processes to support food security, nutrition, health and well-being, livelihoods and biodiversity, sustainability, and ecosystem services in adaptation to climate change.
Nordan Otzer during a cancer awareness event in a village in Ladakh, India. Credit: Athar Parvaiz/IPS
by Athar Parvaiz (ladakh, india)
Inter Press Service
LADAKH, INDIA, Nov 29 (IPS) – While working as a doctor in the initial months of his medical career in southern India, a telephone call from his home in the Ladakh Himalayas convinced Nordan Otzer to involve himself with cervical cancer awareness.
“While I was working in a hospital in rural Tamil Nadu (in 2007), one day I received a distressing call from my family informing me that my mother’s health had deteriorated and she urgently needed my presence back home,” says Otzer, an ENT surgeon who is now in his mid-40s and works as a medical practitioner and social worker in Ladakh, a cold desert in the Himalayan Plateau in India.
“When I saw my mother lying on the bed, she was hardly recognizable. It was only at that point that she disclosed to me that she had been experiencing persistent spotting and occasional abdominal pain that had worsened over time,” Otzer tells IPS. “Unfortunately, she only sought medical assistance when her pain (because of cervical cancer) became intolerable.”
According to the WHO, a large majority of cervical cancers (more than 95%) are caused by human papillomavirus (HPV), which is the most common viral infection of the reproductive tract.
“Although most HPV infections clear up on their own and most pre-cancerous lesions resolve spontaneously, there is a risk for all women that HPV infection may become chronic and pre-cancerous lesions progress to invasive cervical cancer,” reads a segment of a fact sheet about cervical cancer on the WHO website.
“When screening detects an HPV infection or pre-cancerous lesions, these can easily be treated, and cancer can be avoided. Screening can also detect cancer at an early stage where treatment has a high potential for cure,” the WHO fact sheet says and urges the countries that screening (of women for HPV infection) “should start from 30 years of age in the general population of women, with regular screening with a validated HPV test every 5 to 10 years, and from 25 years of age for women living with HIV.”
Otzer says his mother was flown to the All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) in New Delhi for treatment, but her condition deteriorated, and she succumbed to the disease within days.
“Throughout the journey from my home to Delhi, she held my hand, perhaps also hoping that her doctor son would save her life. But unfortunately, I couldn’t do anything except watch helplessly while she slowly faded away,” Otzer recalls ruefully.
As someone who has studied medical sciences, says Otzer, “I knew my mother’s life could have been saved if she was aware of cervical cancer and its preventable measures.”
“My mother’s death due to cancer altered the course of my career, leading me to make the choice to remain and contribute to my own community.” Since those days, Otzer says that he started making efforts to launch an awareness campaign about cervical cancer and screening of women for HPV infection in Ladakh, a remote mountainous region more than 14,000 feet above sea level in the Tibetan Plateau, which remains cut off from the rest of the world in winters.
Since 2009, Otzer, with the help of his local supporter, Stanzin Dawa, and visiting doctors from Singapore led by Swee Chong Quek, has organized over 140 awareness and screening events for women across Ladakh, where villages are spread out across the terrain and not easily reachable.
“We have conducted screenings for 12,400 women thus far, among whom one out of every 10 women has precancerous lesions. This implies that without timely treatment, these lesions could progress into full-blown cancer,” Otzer says.
Besides the logistical challenges, such as travelling long distances and traversing tough terrain, other challenges, according to Otzer, included women being too shy and reticent.
“Women in Ladakh tend to be reticent about discussing women’s health matters openly, not even with their own family members. Therefore, when I initially launched a cervical cancer screening program, there was a noticeable reluctance among them to undergo checkups,” he says, adding that initially, women would avoid making eye contact and refrain from asking any questions.
“However, with the passage of time, they gradually became more receptive and started attending our screening camps for examinations.”
Cervical Cancer Awareness and India
In India, cervical cancer is the second most common cancer in women, and India contributes the largest proportion of the global cervical cancer burden. In December last year, the federal government in India urged the state governments to create awareness and take steps to prevent cervical cancer.
According to an article published by Lancet in March 2023, the Indian Ministry of Health and Family Welfare plans to vaccinate 68 million girls across India against human papillomavirus (HPV) by the end of 2025, which will be followed by vaccination of a further 11,2 million girls aged 9 years and older each year.
Cervical cancer accounted for 9.4 percent of all cancers and 18.3 percent (123,907) of new cases in 2020 in India, says this December 2021 Springer study, adding that cervical cancer is still among the most common cancers in India and a leading cause of cancer-related deaths in women in low- and middle-income countries.
According to the Springer study, cervical cancer is the second leading cause of cancer deaths for females in 12 Indian states. “The situation is more alarming in rural areas where the majority of women are illiterate and ignorant about the hazards of cervical cancer and healthcare resources are scarce.
Research has established that awareness and the availability of medical infrastructure play a significant role in preventing cervical cancer. Results of a study published in the Asian Pacific Journal of Cancer Prevention have confirmed that stages (of cervical cancer) “are strongly correlated with survival outcome, and early stages of the disease are associated with an exceptionally favourable prognosis provided they are adequately treated, whereas survival for stage III and IV cancers was dismally low.”
A study published by Lancet in October 2023 found heterogeneity in cervical cancer survival across India, with higher survival rates in urban areas where healthcare facilities are much better than predominantly rural and mountainous north and northeastern regions.
“The disparity in survival between the populations could explain the overall effectiveness of the health care system. This informs policymakers to identify and address inequities in the health care system,” the study says, emphasizing the “importance of promoting awareness, early detection, and improving the health care system.”
