Tag: Development & Aid

World Leaders Need to Prioritize the More Than 1 Billion People Living in Informal Settlements — Global Issues

If people living in informal settlements gained access to adequate housing, the average life span would jump 2.4 years on average globally, saving 730,000 lives each year. Credit: Lova Rabary-Rakontondravony/IPS
  • Opinion by Jonathan Reckford, Joseph Muturi (cape town, south africa)
  • Inter Press Service

CAPE TOWN, South Africa, Aug 16 (IPS) – When representatives from dozens of countries gathered recently at the UN High Level Political Forum in New York to share progress on their efforts to achieve the UN’s 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), this disturbing reality was clear: the world is not even close to meeting the goals by 2030 as intended.

According to the report released at the meeting, progress on more than half of the SDG targets is weak and insufficient, with 30% of targets stalled or in reverse. In particular, progress towards SDG 11, which centers on making “cities inclusive, safe, resilient and sustainable” is stagnating, signaling regression for the third year in a row.

Unless governments take urgent action to address the plight of more than 1 billion people struggling daily to survive in slums and other poorly constructed informal settlements, we will not achieve the SDGs.

Access to affordable, safe housing is a fundamental human right, and intrinsically linked to building sustainable and resilient communities. It’s time world leaders turned their attention to improving housing conditions in informal settlements as a critical first step in helping to solve the most pressing development challenges of our time, from health and education to jobs and climate resilience.

Consider Milka Achieng, 31, who lives among the more than 250,000 residents of Kibera, a bustling hub of mud-walled homes and small businesses that make up one of the world’s largest informal settlements on the south side of Nairobi, Kenya.

Every day, Milka heads out for work and walks past the kiosk where she pumps water that isn’t clean enough to drink without boiling. She passes neighbors who live with the constant fear of eviction and the threat of deadly fires sparked by jerry-rigged electrical lines.

Yet despite these conditions, Milka remains upbeat. She works for a Kenya-based startup that, from its production facility in the heart of Kibera, cranks out firesafe blocks designed to make homes in informal settlements safer and more resilient. These are the kinds of innovative, scalable solutions that not only hold promise for the future of Kibera, but also for the millions of families struggling to keep their loved ones healthy and safe in informal communities around the globe.

By 2050, nearly 70% of the world’s population is expected to live in urban areas, making the proliferation of informal settlements inevitable – unless world governments take bold, collective action.

A new report reveals the incredible, transformational benefits – in terms of health, education, and income –  if world leaders invest in upgrading housing in informal settlements. The International Institute for Environment and Development (IIED) modeling from 102 low- and middle-income countries shows that if people living in informal settlements gained access to adequate housing, the average life span would jump 2.4 years on average globally, saving 730,000 lives each year.

This translates to more deaths prevented than if malaria were to be eliminated. The report also found that as many as 41.6 million additional children would be enrolled in school worldwide.

Economic growth, meanwhile, would jump by as much as 10.5% in some countries, whether measured as GDP or gross national income per capita. The resulting increase in living standards would exceed the projected cost of improving informal settlements in many countries.

These findings provide a long-overdue wake-up call to governments and municipal authorities that prioritizing safe and secure housing would have far-reaching implications for advancing not just community wellbeing, but national and global economic prosperity.

World leaders whose countries contribute billions of dollars annually to foreign assistance yet don’t prioritize improving informal settlements are making a grave mistake. Their goals related to education, health, and other areas of human wellbeing hinge on how well the world responds to trends such as growing inequities, rapid urbanization, and a worsening global housing crisis.

As the heads of an international housing organization and a global network of slum dwellers, respectively, we believe governments have an urgent responsibility to invest in comprehensive solutions to our global housing crisis.

This includes supporting start-ups, such as Milka’s factory, which are pioneering innovative, low-cost, and community-driven solutions to strengthen the foundation of unsafe housing settlements worldwide.

Simultaneously, officials at the global, national and municipals levels must ensure that residents have land tenure security, climate-resilient homes, and basic services such as clean water and sanitation.

Importantly, IIED researchers also concluded that, while they couldn’t put a precise number on it, the rehabilitation of informal settlements would have a clear and positive “spillover effect” by strengthening environmental, political and health care systems for all. This, in turn, would improve overall societal wellbeing for generations to come.

Upgrading the world’s supply of adequate housing is a lever for equitable human development and a cornerstone for sustainable urban development. Global, national and community stakeholders must join forces with the more than 1 billion voices clamoring for greater access to safe and secure homes.

When residents of informal settlements do better, everyone does better. Strikingly, it’s that simple.

Jonathan Reckford is president and CEO of Habitat for Humanity International. Joseph Muturi is chair of Slum Dwellers International. 

© Inter Press Service (2023) — All Rights ReservedOriginal source: Inter Press Service

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Pre-Colonial Delicacy Could Help Food Security and Climate Change — Global Issues

Togotia, a forgotten African leafy vegetable, has found its way back into markets as its high nutritional value could help address food security. CREDIT: Egerton University
  • by Wilson Odhiambo (nairobi)
  • Inter Press Service

NAIROBI, Aug 16 (IPS) – Kenya’s fight for food security may have just gone ‘Old School’ as Egerton University dons win a grant to help bring back a pre-colonial delicacy that was gradually sliding its way off consumers’ plates.

Their project, dubbed ‘Exploring Potential of Togotia (Erucastrum arabicum), a forgotten African leafy vegetable for nutritional security and climate adaptation in Kenya,’ won the grant in October last year in a bid to help farmers and consumers realise the importance of the crop that many, today, term as a weed.

According to the project’s lead researchers, Togotia falls among the forgotten African leafy vegetable (fALVs), which have been ignored in formal research and policy and their nutritional values.

The project focuses on Togotia’s nutritional value and hardy nature compared to other vegetables such as cabbage, kale and spinach that are exotic to Kenya.

It involved the expertise of Prof. G Mendiodo (University of Nottingham), Dr Maud Muchuweti (University of Zimbabwe), Dr Miriam Charimbu (Egerton University) and Dr Charles Kihia (Egerton University).

The grant, worth Ksh 4.9 million (about USD 37 000) was awarded to the institution by the Global Challenge Research Fund (GCRF) UK.

“Togotia and many other traditional vegetables have their roots embedded deep in the pre-colonial era, where they formed a daily delicacy for many. However, the colonial period brought exotic crops that quickly became a favourite for many, majorly due to their high market demands,” Kihia told IPS.

Between 1960 and 1980, these exotic vegetables flooded the local markets, especially in towns, thus relegating Bogota and other traditional vegetables to the rural areas.

And, due to high market demand for the exotic vegetables, farmers in the villages also transitioned to cash crop farming, a move that saw Togotia gradually cast out as a weed.

However, the current global changes in climate conditions have seen many farmers suffer the consequences of unpredictable weather patterns that have seen crops dwindle in the local markets.

Most food crops that serve towns come from rural areas where farmers rely heavily on weather patterns to meet the market demands.

Kenya is currently facing one of the worst drought periods in its history, making food production a burden for the farmers who town dwellers rely on for their needs. Lack of rainfall means low food production, which leads to high food prices in the market.

“The drought has led to a scarcity of many vegetables, such as kale and spinach, which have the highest demand in town. The ones that we are getting right now have tiny leaves, which customers complain about,” said Nancy Mulu, a local grocer in Nairobi.

“We are forced to sell them in small bunches at high prices due to the trouble we go through to get them,” she explained to IPS.

“The only traditional vegetable I sell in my shop are Terere (Amaranthus), Managu (Solanum), Saga (Cleome), and Kunde (Vigna). I have never come across a fellow vendor selling Togotia in town. They are mostly found in the village areas, and even there, many still treat them as weed,” she added.

Despite the rains that recently kicked off, the meteorological department warned farmers that it may not be enough to meet their agricultural demands.

Charimbu told IPS that if embraced, Togotia will be important in helping the country meet both the supply and nutritional demand of the people.

“Emergence and intensification of climate change with associated unreliable rainfall (either too much or too little) limit capacity of local farmers, not only to produce their own food but also surplus for sale, resulting in impoverishment,” she explained.

“The high cost of farm inputs required for the exotic vegetable also makes them an expensive and unsustainable venture during draught seasons such as the one the country is experiencing. Being a hardy crop, Togotia easily has an edge over them.”

“They flourish in marginal soils, require limited agrochemical input, are fast maturing (takes two weeks), widely occurring and are resistant to many local pests, and hence are ideal candidates for sustaining nutritional and household food security even during such draught periods, Charimbu added.

In major crop production towns like Molo and Kuresoi, known for maize, potatoes, carrots, onions, kales, and cabbages, Togotia is usually considered a weed and farmers prefer to get rid of it or feed it to the livestock. Few people in the area consider it a food crop.

From their analysis, the dons found out that apart from being hardy, Togotia was a rich source of vitamin C, iron, zinc, protein and calcium, which are important for the human body.

Kihia believes that the project will not only help to redefine the current understanding of the use and ecology of Togotia but also identify and develop appropriate agronomic cropping protocols suitable for adoption among small-scale farmers in Kenya and elsewhere.

“For a farmer with a healthy crop of maize targeted for sale in the lucrative Nairobi market, it is a weed. But when the same farmer hires a number of locals to do weeding at his farm, they remove the weed and eat it. Similarly, when there is massive crop failure and the maise crops do poorly, this weed becomes an important survival crop for the farmer and the community,” Kihia added.

In counties like Baringo, which falls among the hardest hit by the drought, Togotia is one of the residents’ main vegetables to supplement their needs. If this can be incorporated in other drought-prone areas like Turkana, Marsabit and Samburu, it will go a long way in helping address the recurring food crisis in Kenya.

“Incorporation of Togotia and other fALVs into current land-use will not only increase farms agrobiodiversity and household food diversity but also provide important forage crop for bees and other pollinators that are disappearing from Kenyan landscapes,” he concluded.

The project will involve setting up demonstration farms at the university and sensitising local farmers and communities around on their importance in helping supplement their nutritional needs.

They aim to produce Togotia varieties that are responsive to environmental needs in terms of resistance to pests, diseases, and drought.

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World Bank Climate Finance Plan Little Help, Unfair — Global Issues

Khoo Wei Yang
  • Opinion by Jomo Kwame Sundaram, Khoo Wei Yang (kuala lumpur, malaysia)
  • Inter Press Service

KUALA LUMPUR, Malaysia, Aug 16 (IPS) – The World Bank plans to use public funds to subsidize private finance, ostensibly to mobilize much more capital to address the climate crisis. But the new plan is likely to be a distraction, not the solution it purports to be. Rich nations have contributed most to the current climate crisis. They are primarily responsible for the historical emissions and greenhouse gas (GHG) accumulation of the last two centuries.

Developing countries, especially in the tropics and sub-tropics, are the main victims of global warming today. Most need finance and other means to build resilience and to develop in the face of the climate crisis. But the rich have resisted major efforts to help developing nations better cope with the crisis.

Jomo Kwame SundaramClimate finance lacking
But recent international climate finance flows fall far short of developing countries’ needs, not only in the aggregate, but also due to their restrictive terms. Nonetheless, increasing demands have been made of the global South to stem the growing crisis.

Meanwhile, climate finance has become increasingly commercial, not concessional. After all, most international agreements tend to be poor compromises reflecting corporate and political power in the world. They fail to address the crisis, let alone advance climate justice.

Rich nations have fallen far behind on their $100 billion annual finance commitment for the 2009 Copenhagen climate conference. This modest commitment was supposed to increase significantly after 2020, but there have been no signs of progress, e.g., at French President Macron’s recent summit.

Instead of helping developing countries cope with more funds for adaptation, most available resources have been earmarked for mitigation. Finance for mitigation is over ten times more than the $56bn (8.4%) available for adaptation in 2020.

Meanwhile, official development assistance (ODA) has long fallen short of the promise of 0.7% of rich nations’ national incomes made over half a century ago. This fell further after the end of the first Cold War, over three decades ago, to barely 0.3%!

Khoo Wei YangMuch ODA has gone to climate finance, resulting in double counting. As concessional finance – especially its grant content – declines, developing countries have no choice but to turn to commercial loans as ‘debt-pushers’ gain influence the world over.

Meanwhile, the USA, the dominant World Bank (WB) shareholder, has blocked increasing WB capitalization, to avoid China gaining more influence with a greater capital share.

WB subsidizes private finance
The WB has revised its earlier failed ‘playbooks’ as global warming accelerates, with worsening consequences, especially for the global South. Its new plan – Evolving the World Bank Group’s Mission, Operations, and Resources – was issued in early 2023.

Eurodad warns, while it “seeks to incorporate climate considerations, the Roadmap does not address the continuing contradictions in its operations”. Most worryingly, ever more private commercial finance is being touted as development and/or climate finance.

Despite being among the world’s largest public lenders, the WB has been slow to provide climate finance, and is already years behind schedule. It is not even aligned with the non-binding 2015 Paris Agreement goals, with new operations only scheduled to become aligned from mid-2023!

Worse, WB subsidiaries – the International Finance Corporation and the Multilateral Investment Guarantee Agency – will only become aligned from mid-2025, a decade after Paris! Also, its climate finance definition, data and corporate strategy remain controversial and unhelpful.

Meanwhile, the WB has worsened the climate crisis, e.g., by providing $16 billion of project finance for fossil fuels since 2015. Its involvement in Clean Development Mechanism projects involves a ‘serious conflict of interests’, profiting from the climate crisis while worsening it!

The WB Group (WBG) intends to mobilize private capital with de-risking strategies, such as blended finance. Instead of using public finance to provide concessional terms to the deserving, public funds will thus make commercial finance more profitable.

Despite much cause for concern and caution, the WB’s problematic 2017 Maximizing Finance for Development promotes commercial finance as the main source of development and climate funding.

The WBG claims to want greater development and climate impacts from private commercial finance. This is undoubtedly in line with the WB creed that only the private sector can overcome the climate crisis despite being its major enabler, if not cause.

Such initiatives by former WB president Jim Kim and former Bank of England governor Mark Carney are considered ‘much ado about nothing’ by many in the global South. Enabling profit-seeking businesses to call the shots can hardly be the solution, and may instead worsen the problem.

Way forward?
Developing country leaders have long appealed for a new ‘international financial architecture’ to better address development and climate challenges, drawing support from civil society, especially in the global South.

Without any agreed multilateral definition of climate finance, governments and corporations are ‘greenwashing’ their financial abuses by labelling their financial operations as constituting climate and development finance.

As poor nations in the tropical zone suffer the worse consequences of accelerating global warming, only multilateral recognition of the need for financial reparations to address historical and contemporary losses and damages.

It is unlikely the needed climate financing will be voluntarily provided by those most responsible for the climate crisis. At the very least, rich nations should support regular issue of IMF Special Drawing Rights in the near term within the constraints imposed by likely US Congressional disapproval.

These should be urgently reallocated for concessional climate finance in the coming years prioritizing the adaptation needs of developing nations, prioritizing cumulative losses and damages due to the climate crisis.

Meanwhile, Eurodad urges penalizing “the private sector of the developed global north for failure to meet its carbon emission reduction” promises as it is responsible for over 90% of excess GHG emissions.

It has also called for “providing developmental space for developing countries” to progress, and re-orienting “the bank’s developmental model towards climate reparations”, especially for Africa, the least developed countries and small island developing states.

But the WB plan offers no major improvements, only more of the same. Instead, the WB should help the UN design and implement a comprehensive monitoring and reporting framework for all development and climate finance, including private finance.

By recognizing the international and intergenerational inequities of global warming, the WB can become far more equitable by ensuring all nations develop sustainably while addressing the climate crisis.

To do so, it will need to uphold ‘polluters pay’ and ‘common, but differentiated responsibilities’ principles, enshrined in international climate agreements.

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Climate Change Colludes with Bad Development — Global Issues

Monsoon rains flooding Indian cities is more widespread in 2023, raising questions on business-as-usual development policies that continue even as climate conspicuously shifts. CREDIT: Manipadma Jena/IPS
  • by Manipadma Jena (bhubaneswar, india)
  • Inter Press Service

BHUBANESWAR, INDIA, Aug 15 (IPS) – As torrential rains, cloudbursts, floods, and landslides continue to wreak colossal damage and claim lives in Himachal Pradesh, India’s Himalayan foothill provinces. The question everyone is asking is: why is this happening?

Himachal Pradesh received 250 millimetres or ten inches of rain in just four days, between 7 to 11 July, which accounted for almost 30 percent of the total monsoon rainfall in a year. This sent mountain rivers spilling over their banks into villages and towns and caused widespread flash flooding, mud, and landslides.

Over the whole month of July, the State received 71 percent excess of 438 mm actual rainfall against 255.9 mm normal rainfall. It is the second-highest rainfall in 43 years, since 1980, according to the government’s meteorological department.

Himachal Pradesh has witnessed a six-time increase in major landslides in the past two years, with 117 occurring in 2022 as compared to 16 in 2020, according to data compiled by the State disaster management department.

This year until now, the state witnessed 79 landslides and 53 flash flood incidents, with the monsoon only halfway, arriving in late June, as per the developing data.

There have been 223 deaths from these disasters to date. Cloudbursts and losses continue in Himachal Pradesh. Even on August 10, a family of 5 were buried under their collapsed home.

Is Faulty Ecological Development Worsening the Damage?

A video that has gone viral worldwide sums up not just the magnitude of destruction but answers some of the reasons why. The video opens with loud panic calls as a thickened river of muck and huge logs swerve downhill monstrously into a narrow village lane flanked by rows of shops in Thunag village in the Mandi district of Himachal Pradesh.

Locals claimed the trees are Himalayan Cedars chopped down in tens of thousands to widen highways as the government rapidly develops its mid-hills as go-to summer holiday destinations for tourism.

Trees from forest land cleared for roads, tunnels and hydro-power dams are disposed on hill slopes, in rivers banks and streams along with the earthen muck and debris, said Tikender Singh Panwar, a city administrator who had earlier held office.

The course of the rivers has narrowed down, and the riverbeds filled up with silt, causing them to break banks much sooner than they normally would when torrential rains come.

Both tourism and hydro-electricity sectors are the highest earners for the government and are currently being developed on priority.

The planned development is responsible for this colossal damage, is not so much climate shift, Panwar categorically says. An urban specialist and earlier deputy mayor of Shimla, the State’s summer capital, Panwar, says the focus of Himachal Pradesh, with a fragile Himalayan ecosystem, is on (risky) exploitation of natural resources of water, forest, and nature to pull in more State income.

Warming in Asia has almost doubled in the last 30 years. Chart indicating the warming trend in Asia in 1991–2022 vs 1961–1990 period. CREDIT: Courtesy WMO State of the Climate in Asia 2022 report

Traditionally, mountain regions for building infrastructure were not cut with vertical slits but terraced to minimise instability in these geologically vulnerable regions. Unfortunately, in a hurry to complete projects, mountains have been cut into vertically, leading to landslides, according to Panwar.

The government’s Himachal Pradesh State Disaster Management Authority agrees. “Vulnerability of the geologically young and not-so-stable steep slopes in various Himalayan ranges has been increasing at a rapid rate in the recent decade due to inappropriate human activity like deforestation, road cutting, terracing and changes in agriculture crops requiring more intense watering.”

Land use change is another trigger being viewed as causing a natural disaster to become more damaging. Spreading concrete infrastructures, including “river-view” hotels and homestays, encroach on the riverbanks and basins.

Cement plants have proliferated to meet the demand for leap-frogging constructions.

When more rainfall lands in an area than the ground can absorb, or it falls in areas with a lot of impermeable surfaces like concrete and road asphalt that prevent absorption, the water runs downhill, gathering force and everything on its way, turning streams and rivers into raging torrents. It seeks the lowest point in a potential pathway, often reclaiming its own encroached space – the river basin.

In India’s mostly unplanned urban areas, these often are roads, parking lots, slum settlements, and even multi-storied shops and homes. Changes in land use and land cover contribute to acerbate disaster damage.

Sand mined illegally from riverbanks to keep pace with the high demand from construction activities could also have played a role in the devastation that rivers caused in Himachal Pradesh, environmental activists said.

Question Mark on Hydro-Power Projects in Fragile Himalayan Region

Hydropower is the biggest source of income for Himachal Pradesh, with the national government having a major stake. The State has five major rivers. It sells electricity to other states. Rural electrification, too, remains a major focus. But the environmental cost of the dams in the Himalayan region may be high and already being experienced, said activists.

The State’s hydroelectricity potential is high, around 27,436 megawatts, which is 25 percent of the national potential. Of this, 10,519 MW is harnessed so far. More projects with lengthy tunnels to channelise river flow are being added quickly. “Sometimes the course of rivers was diverted to build dams for hydro-power projects. This is like playing with nature, says Panwar.

By 2030, some 1088 hydropower projects are planned to generate 22640 MW of electricity, according to Panwar. India has committed to achieving 500 Gigawatts of renewable energy by 2030.

This is raising alarm bells for more impending disasters.

In a Warming Asia: The Role of Climate Change in Increasing Water Disasters

When the cloudburst in the Thunag area dumped torrential rains, locals said they had no warning. But cloudbursts are characteristically localised, and sudden torrential rainstorm phenomena, categorised when rainfall is 100 millimetres per hour, have been increasing.

Cloudbursts occur when warm air currents block rain from falling, causing an accumulation of moisture. When the upward air currents become weak, the cloud dumps rain.

Flash flooding similarly occurs after excessive rainfall pours down in less than six hours. Both are unexpected and often catch victims unprepared.

The role of climate change is becoming increasingly evident in these types of deluges across continents.

The simplest part of the explanation for a complex phenomenon is that warmer temperatures lead to increased evaporation. This leads to extra moisture in the atmosphere, which in turn leads to heavy rainfall, especially when two weather systems coincide in a high-altitude, mountainous region. This is what happened in Himachal Pradesh in early July.

A low-pressure weather system carrying moisture all the way from the Mediterranean Sea to northern India, known as a Western Disturbance, coincided with the normal monsoon system, together resulting in torrential rain. This is not abnormal and, as such, not attributable to changing climate.

However, studies by scientists around the world show that the climate shift is intensifying the water cycle and will continue to intensify as the planet warms. A number of factors are intensifying the water cycle, but one of the most important is that warming temperatures raise the upper limit on the amount of moisture in the air. That increases the potential for more rain.

An international climate assessment in 2021 documented an increase in both wet extremes, including more intense rainfall over most regions, and dry extremes. These will continue to increase with future warming.

In India’s Himalayan region, with its complex terrain and varied weather patterns, deep, intense convective clouds form under normal circumstances. However, studies find instances of deep convection have increased over recent years. Sixty-five percent area in the Himalayan States now shows a trend towards ‘daily extreme rainfall’ categorised when 15 cm of rain falls in 24 hours. Climate change is thought to be one of the main causes of this, according to Madhavan Rajeevan, a senior retired official of India’s Ministry of Earth Sciences. “This can have severe consequences,” he says.

According to the International Disaster Database (EM-DAT), Asia is the world’s most disaster-impacted region; 83 percent of the 81 weather, climate, and water-related disasters in Asia in 2022 were flood and storm events. More than 50 million people were directly affected.

WMO State of the Climate in Asia 2022 report released in July said Asia, the largest continent with 30 percent of Earth’s land area, is warming faster than the global average. The warming trend in Asia in 1991–2022 was almost double the warming trend in the 1961–1990 period (see chart), according to the World Meteorological Organisation report.

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#AfghanGirlsVoices Campaign to Elevate Voices of Young Afghan Girls on Global Stage — Global Issues

The #AfghanGirlsVoices Campaign is a compelling and poignant campaign developed in collaboration with ECW Global Champion, Somaya Faruqi. CREDIT: ECW
  • by Cecilia Russell (nairobi)
  • Inter Press Service

NAIROBI, Aug 14 (IPS) – Two years ago, the then 19-year-old Somaya Faruqi and the Afghan Robotic Team travelled from Herat City to Kabul, the heart of Afghanistan—the Taliban had taken over Herat city, cutting off electricity and internet. The all-girls team’s great passion for science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) had driven them to Kabul to rehearse for a competition.

“After three days, I woke up, looked outside the window, and saw the Taliban in the streets. I was very shocked and could not believe it. I never imagined that the Taliban could take over Kabul. There were thousands and thousands of people trying to flee the country, and after three days of trying, we flew to Qatar with the help of the Qatari government. I wondered what would become of my sister and classmates who were left behind,” Faruqi tells IPS.

It did not take long for the de facto authority to unveil their plans. Two years down the line, the Taliban has waged a gender war and women and girls are on the receiving end. The Taliban edict has banned adolescent girls from the classrooms. After year six, they are to stay at home, says Yasmine Sherif, Executive Director of Education Cannot Wait (ECW)—the United Nations global fund for education in emergencies and protracted crises.

Yasmine Sherif, Executive Director of Education Cannot Wait (ECW)—the United Nations global fund for education in emergencies and protracted crises, says the ban on girl’s and women’s education has the effect of forcing them to live once again in the shadows. CREDIT: ECW

“Afghan girls are banned from accessing secondary and tertiary education because of their gender, and this is the most ruthless form of discrimination. They cannot understand why they are not allowed to attend school like their brothers. Their pathway to education has been cut, and they are in pain, suffering and (often) struggling with suicidal thoughts. We must stand in solidarity with them, for in the words of Martin Luther King Jr, injustice anywhere is injustice everywhere. Their distress should shake us to the core,” Sherif tells IPS.

She says that the situation in Afghanistan is one of the worst in the world. To elevate Afghan girls’ voices on the global stage, ECW has launched the #AfghanGirlsVoices Campaign. A compelling, poignant campaign developed in collaboration with Faruqi, who is an ECW Global Champion.

Faruqi finished her 12th grade in Qatar, from where she applied to college and received a scholarship from the Qatar Fund for Development to pursue engineering studies in the United States. Her astounding progress and brilliance are a testament to the devasting blow being dealt to millions of Afghan girls.

“The situation in Afghanistan gets worse from one day to the next. Women and girls are prisoners in their own homes, in their own country. They cannot leave their homes without a male guardian- a father, brother or relative. They have been denied the freedom to pursue any interest outside their home, and they sit around with nothing to do. Through this campaign, I want the world to know that there is a country today where girls are denied fundamental human rights, forced out of school and into marriages,” Faruqi explains.

The campaign is to be launched on August 15, the second anniversary of the Taliban’s takeover of Afghanistan.  is in Gordon Brown—UN Special Envoy for Global Education and Chair of ECW’s High-Level Steering Group on the eve of the launch, stressed the need for the international community must hear this poignant call from the heart of Afghan girls and young women.

Faruqi affirms the need to hear from those inside Afghanistan, at the very heart of the ongoing injustice, to hear how their lives have been turned upside down and how a fragile future now hangs in the balance if the global community remains silent.

Sherif says the situation is particularly horrific because girls are simply not being left behind in the education system due to conflict or climate disaster; an official ban is keeping them out of school. As a firm fist pushes millions of girls out of school, the immediate impact is a rolling back of time to a place where women lived in the shadows. This devastating decree means that 50 percent of the population is not able to access education.

“This is not reflective of Islam. The foundation of Islam is learning. The first word in the Quran is read. It does not advocate for girls not to go to school. The ban is unacceptable,” she emphasizes.

The campaign uses moving images by a young Afghan female artist and determined testimonies from Afghan girls. It features a series of equally inspiring, heart-wrenching and determined testimonies from Afghan girls whose lives have been abruptly upended by the ban preventing them to pursue their education and dreams.

Their powerful words are conveyed together with striking illustrations depicting both the profound despair experienced by these Afghan girls and young women, along with their incredible resilience and strength in the face of this unacceptable ban on their education.

ECW invites partners and the wider public to stand in solidarity with Afghan girls by posting messages from Afghan girls across social media every day—from 15 August, the date when the de facto Taliban authorities came into power in Afghanistan 2021, until 18 September, which marks the start of the official ban on school for adolescent girls.

Sherif says the campaign is in line with sustainable development goal 4 and will run through the UN General Assembly on Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) Summit from 18-19 September at the UN General Assembly in New York. The Summit aims to mark the beginning of a new phase of accelerated progress towards the SDGs with high-level political guidance on transformative and accelerated actions leading up to 2030 – progress that cannot be achieved with Afghan girls left behind.

“ECW, through our in-country partners, has invested in formal and non-formal education in Afghanistan since 2014. More than 70 percent of the Afghan population is in dire humanitarian need. It is a country on the brink of collapse in terms of people’s well-being. We are therefore calling for urgent funding to continue to fund community-based education through our grassroots organizations. We should never stop supporting Afghanistan; people are suffering,” Sherif emphasizes.

ECW has been supporting education programmes in Afghanistan since 2017. The ECW-supported extended Multi-Year Resilience Programme (MYRP) in Afghanistan supports more than 250,000 children and adolescents across some of the most remote and underserved areas of the country. The programme delivers community-based education, organised at the local level with support from local communities, and is critical to keep education going. Girls account for over half of all the children and adolescents reached by the MYRP.

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Political Will and Investment Will Score the Goal for Zero Hunger — Global Issues

IFAD says investing in smallholder farmers is key to tackling food insecurity or severe food and nutritional insecurity. CREDIT: Busani Bafana/IPS
  • by Busani Bafana (bulawayo)
  • Inter Press Service

BULAWAYO, Aug 14 (IPS) – A world free from hunger is possible, but it demands political will, investment, and effective policies to transform agriculture and rural development, says Alvaro Lario, President of the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD).

More than 800 million people in the world went to bed hungry in 2022, and 3.1 billion others could not afford to eat a healthy diet in 2021, according to the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO)’s latest State of Food Insecurity and Nutrition in the World report.

IFAD described the startling SOFI report as “a wake-up call for the fight against hunger,” noting that massive investment in rural development and small-scale agriculture will win the war on hunger.

“Every year, the hunger and food insecurity numbers remind us of this dark reality: Not only are we not reaching our targets — we are moving farther away,” Lario told IPS in an interview via email.

Enough Food but Hunger for Decisive Action

According to the SOFI, hunger numbers stalled between 2021 and 2022, but there were 122 million more hungry people in 2022 than prior to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Sustainable Development Goal #2 is the zero-hunger goal of the United Nations. It aims to end all forms of hunger and malnutrition by 2030 by ensuring all people — especially children and the more vulnerable — have access to sufficient and nutritious food all year round. But is the zero-hunger goal realistic, given that the number of hungry people globally is rising despite advances in technology to boost food production and productivity?

Alvaro Lario, President of the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD). CREDIT: IFAD

“In a world of plenty, where inequalities are increasing, zero hunger is the only objective to have,” Lario said. “Ending hunger is feasible. It is a matter of political will, adequate investments, and policies.”

Commenting on the SOFI report, Danielle Nierenberg, President of the Food Tank, said world leaders were failing to prioritize the needs of millions of people around the globe in creating better food and nutrition security.

“If we leave people behind because there is something going on in the world, whether there is conflict in Russia against Ukraine or inflation across the globe … If we do not protect and nourish those who are most in need, we are setting ourselves up for disaster,” Nierenberg told IPS in an interview.

“Hungry people tend to be angry people for obvious reasons … What we need is better political will and active policymakers to really solve this with the help of communities, nonprofits and research institutions who have been leading the charge against hunger.”

Reacting to the SOFI report, Oxfam, a global charity focusing on the alleviation of global poverty, said it was unforgivable for governments to watch billions of people going hungry in a world of plenty.

“Solutions to end world hunger exist, but they require bold and united political action,” said Hanna Saarinen, Oxfam International Food Policy Lead, in a statement, calling on governments to support small-scale food producers and promote especially the rights of women farmers, who are key in the fight against global hunger.

Lario said in Africa, conflicts, poverty, lack of infrastructure and access to energy, and poor access to education and vocational training, combined with high population growth, were converging to worsen the challenge of food and nutrition insecurity.

However, this did not mean that hunger cannot be overcome as the African continent had many assets to boost food security, including land, natural resources, and the dynamism of its youth, said Lario.

Invest in Rural Development and Small-Scale Agriculture

Danielle Nierenberg, President of the Food Tank. CREDIT: Food Tank

Asked what needs to be done to win the war against hunger and undernutrition on the back of many countries which put more money into funding war than food security.

The invasion of Ukraine by Russia as well as the tension in East Asia, have driven increased global military spending by 3.7 percent in real terms in 2022, to a record high of USD 2 240 billion, according to new data on global military spending published by the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute.

“Governments need to understand that hunger and poverty fuel conflicts, migration and ultimately instability,” Lario told IPS, noting that the Ukraine war and the dependency of many countries on food imports has led to the recognition of the importance of food sovereignty and food security for national security.

“To win the war on hunger, we need to massively scale up our investments in rural development and small-scale agriculture,” said Lario.

Lario is convinced that investing in agriculture is three times more effective at reducing poverty than investing in any other sector. Agriculture remains the backbone of many African economies.

Financial support for agriculture has been stagnant at just 4-6 percent of total Overseas Development Aid (ODA) for at least two decades. IFAD notes that agriculture ODA fell to USD 9.9 billion in 2021, far below what is needed.

Very few African governments have invested 10 percent of their budget in agriculture as per the Malabo Declaration of 2014. Besides, small-scale farmers receive less than 2 percent of global climate finance despite being major food providers, Lario said.

IFAD estimates that up to USD 400 billion would be needed annually until 2030 to build sustainable, equitable and resilient food systems.

“We need to tackle the root causes of hunger and rural poverty,” he said, adding that “Inaction will be expensive. Every USD 1 spent on resilience now saves up to USD 10 in emergency aid in the future.”

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Taking Stock of Two Decades of Trailblazing Protocol on Womens Rights in Africa — Global Issues

Women and girls in Kenya’s West Pokot celebrate as the government cracks down on those practising harmful Female Genital Mutilation in the area. CREDIT: Joyce Chimbi/IPS
  • by Joyce Chimbi (nairobi)
  • Inter Press Service

NAIROBI, Aug 09 (IPS) – It promised to be the most defining, groundbreaking, and transformative protocol on African women’s rights. Specific in its approach, broad in its reach, and unique in its all-encompassing nature, covering issues such as HIV/Aids, widow inheritance and property disinheritance in a most unprecedented manner.

To halt and reverse the systemic and persistent gender inequality and discriminatory practices against women in Africa, the African Union Assembly adopted the Protocol to the African Charter on Human and Peoples Rights on the Rights of Women in Africa 2003 in Maputo, Mozambique.

The Maputo Protocol was designed in line with the realities of the plight of women on the continent. Providing tailor-made solutions to lift women from beneath the crushing weight of a cultural system that disadvantages women from birth. Twenty years on, it is time to take stock.

“The 20th Anniversary of the Maputo Protocol is a historical advocacy moment for women’s rights advocates. It offers an opportunity to demand from African Governments real and tangible change for women and girls in their countries,” Faiza Mohamed, Africa Regional Director of Equality Now, tells IPS.

“By acceding to the Maputo Protocol, lifting reservations, fully domesticating, and implementing the Protocol, and ensuring their compliance with accountability processes. Beyond this, it signifies the generational changes over two decades and points to the need to reflect on future generations and to future-proof the Maputo Protocol and the SOAWR Coalition.”

The Solidarity for African Women’s Rights (SOAWR) is a coalition of over 80 civil society organizations, a pan-African women’s movement that pushes for accelerated ratification of the protocol in non-ratifying states while holding governments accountable to deliver for women in line with the Protocol.

Youth delegates at Maputo Protocol 20th anniversary celebrations, July 11, 2023. CREDIT: Equality Now

Mohamed stresses that the SOAWR Coalition is a remarkable testament to the power of women’s organized movements and their capacity to influence transformative policy agendas, leaving a lasting impact.

“Through its persistent efforts, SOAWR has successfully kept the protocol on the agenda of AU member states, leading to significant influence as 44 out of 55 African states have ratified or acceded to the Maputo Protocol. This achievement has turned the Protocol into a potent public education tool for women’s rights, both at the national and grassroots levels,” she explains.

“Notably, there has been substantial progress in the advancement of national jurisprudence on women’s rights, as well as in the empowerment of women themselves. Thanks to the coalition’s effective public sensitization campaigns, formerly taboo subjects like sexual and reproductive health rights, female genital mutilation, and polygamy have become open and advanced topics in various countries.”

The coalition has demonstrated how much women and like-minded partners can achieve working in solidarity. Additionally, each organization continues to push the women’s agenda forward – pushing and pulling in the same direction, to realize the dream of a society where women are fully represented in every corner of the spaces they call home.

“The Maputo Protocol comes out of the African feminist fire, and we need to keep it burning. That it is one of the most progressive legal instruments that came out of Africa. That it represents our diversity and our strength because we are not a monolith. It also represents the power of collective action and also the dream of the Africa we want,” says Nigerian-born Becky Williams, a young woman who now lives in Uganda and works for Akina Mama wa Africa.

Equality Now is currently advocating for adopting the Multi-Sectoral Approach in implementing the Maputo Protocol. The Multi-Sectoral Approach (MSA) provides a framework for convening different sectors within governments and actors outside of government in a joint effort to implement women’s rights as provided for in the Protocol.

Mohamed emphasizes that if recognized and embraced by governments and civil societies, the Maputo Protocol can be a powerful tool for change as it offers women a tool for transforming the unequal power relations between men and women that lie at the heart of gender inequality and women’s oppression.

To coincide with the Maputo Protocol’s 20th anniversary, SOAWR, Make Every Woman Count (MEWC), and Equality Now released a report titled, “Twenty years of the Maputo Protocol: Where are we now?” Providing a detailed account of progress made thus far, successes, challenges and recommendations.

Regarding rights related to marriage and child marriage, the report finds that several countries have adopted constitutional reforms related to the prohibition of forced marriage. For example, the constitution of Burundi guarantees marriage equality. The constitutions of Guinea, Malawi, Uganda, and Zimbabwe set the legal age of marriage at 18 years. AU Member States have enacted legislation on rights related to marriage.

On economic and social welfare rights, half of the African states maintain constitutional provisions guaranteeing equal remuneration for work of equal value or the right to fair or just pay. More than half of African states have laws mandating equal remuneration for work of equal value.

Regarding health and reproductive rights, almost all African states maintain constitutional provisions related to health and/or health care, and many enshrine the principle of non-discrimination based on health. Notably, six countries, including Angola, Ethiopia, Ghana, Kenya, South Africa, and Zimbabwe, enshrine rights related to reproductive health care, such as access to family planning education or reproductive/maternity care.

Group photo of the delegates at the Maputo Protocol 20th anniversary celebrations held in Nairobi, Kenya. CREDIT: Equality Now

While women’s rights have come a long way, the report stresses that there is a long way to go and makes specific key recommendations, such as the need to address the right to abortion and treat each case as espoused in the Protocol. It also suggests that the Maputo Protocol should be used to protect women and girls’ reproductive health rights and advocates that Member states remove laws that fail to protect reproductive health rights.

It advocates for the passing of family laws to protect women’s rights before, during, and after marriage and establish special courts to deal with complex marriage issues. In addition, it suggests that Governments implement regional and international treaties such as the Maputo Protocol and educate women and girls on these.

It would like to see programmes that allow young women to return to school after giving birth promoted and demands that early marriage be criminalized, and customary law is adapted so that it no longer defines what happens to women in marriage.

It asks governments to provide universal health services and insurance access, especially for pregnant, vulnerable, and/or specially protected women. It requires member states to improve infrastructure, training, and equipment for health services in rural areas.

Equally important, the protocol includes the empowerment of women and girls to realize their sexual and reproductive health rights through awareness campaigns delivered in communities and schools and wishes to see menstrual hygiene management incorporated into national legal frameworks through awareness-raising activities from more actors, especially parliamentarians.

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Mining Revenues Undermined — Global Issues

  • Opinion by Jomo Kwame Sundaram (kuala lumpur, malaysia)
  • Inter Press Service

KUALA LUMPUR, Malaysia, Aug 09 (IPS) – The primary commodity price boom early this century has often been attributed to a commodity ‘super-cycle’, i.e., a price upsurge greater than what might be expected in ‘normal’ booms. This was largely due to some minerals as most agricultural commodity price increases were more modest.

This minerals boom improved many developing country growth records, not least in Africa. With growing pressures to act urgently in response to accelerating global warming, mitigation efforts have been stepped up, promising energy transitions to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

Jomo Kwame SundaramThese require major shifts from fossil fuel combustion to renewable energy and complementary (e.g., transport) technologies. This energy transition requires more of specific minerals like lithium, copper and cobalt. This increased demand for minerals offers resource-rich economies more opportunities for greater domestic resource mobilization for development.

The Intergovernmental Forum on Mining, Minerals, Metals and Sustainable Development (IGF) and the African Tax Administration Forum (ATAF) report, The Future of Resource Taxation: 10 policy ideas to mobilize mining revenues, reviews major problems faced by African and other governments trying to greatly increase revenue from mining.

Great expectations, little taxation
Colonial and neo-colonial mining arrangements have rarely delivered the revenue needed by post-colonial governments. Weak governance, overly generous tax incentives, poor fiscal policies, bad contracts, as well as tax avoidance and evasion have all eroded mineral revenues for developing countries.

Resource-rich countries have been rethinking how to benefit more from mining in the face of the Covid-19 pandemic, worsening developing country debt crises, and increasingly uncertain government revenues and expenditures.

Mining royalties and taxation have remained largely unchanged for decades, while corporate income tax is hard to collect, vulnerable to profit shifting and often minimized with the aid of tax professionals and corrupt officials.

Improving taxation
Taxing transnational corporations has long posed major challenges. Poor laws and enforcement as well as limited funding and staff mean most developing countries are poorly equipped to apply complex international tax norms, such as the ‘arm’s-length principle’ and ‘double taxation treaties’.

Developing nations are especially vulnerable to tax base erosion and profit shifting (BEPS). International Monetary Fund staff estimate African countries have lost annual mining revenue up to $730 million annually due to BEPS.

Many developing countries identified ‘transfer pricing’ as the greatest challenge to taxing mining. The problem has been made worse by mining tax regimes and investment agreements favouring investors, especially from abroad.

Such agreements often contain fiscal incentives making mining revenue collection difficult. Worse, many governments believe generous tax incentives are necessary to attract mining investment. But these typically undermine effective tax administration, causing significant revenue losses.

Also, policy conditionalities typically ‘lock in’ poorly designed fiscal conditions and mining contracts, often required or recommended by the IMF or World Bank. These tend to benefit investors, potentially resulting in costly disputes for host governments.

Generating substantial government revenue from artisanal and small-scale mining (ASM) is difficult. As ASM induces more local spending, rather than extraction or export taxes, indirect taxes and wealth taxes are probably better for such incomes.

Governments of resource-rich developing countries require finance and reliable personnel for successful implementation, to ensure accountability and curb corruption. Sufficient financial and technical assistance can greatly improve mining revenue collection, ensuring companies pay all royalties and taxes due.

Effective implementation needs to be well supported by international agreements and organizations, development partners, and civil society. Tax incentives undermining government policy objectives and legal systems should be avoided.

Taxing better not easy
More access to information and expertise can greatly improve mining tax administration. Information, particularly from other jurisdictions, is critical for tax administrations to better collect taxes due. Sadly, progress has been painfully slow in many developing countries.

Instruments designed to improve information exchange include bilateral investment and tax treaties, tax information exchange agreements, the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) Convention on Mutual Administrative Assistance in Tax Matters, and the ATAF Multilateral Agreement on Assistance in Tax Matters.

Mining revenue collection needs to be able to verify the quantity and quality of mineral reserves and extracts. Key challenges include enhancing tax audit capacity and getting up-to-date knowledge of mining, including implications of changes in mining techniques.

Better inter-agency cooperation is often necessary for better regulation and to avoid an incoherent, fragmented approach. Many mining revenue BEPS problems are due to capacity constraints, e.g., whether governments can effectively verify the costs of goods and services and mineral prices.

Many transactions also require tax auditors to have detailed knowledge of the mining value chain. Many aspects of mining operations allow inflating actual costs to evade taxes. Valuing intangibles, such as intellectual property, is also difficult. Many countries also lack regulations to tax the sale of offshore indirect mining assets, often losing much revenue as a consequence.

Too little too late?
Mineral-rich developing countries hope for more ‘resource rents’ from mining to significantly enhance government revenue. They hope mining taxation will collect much more revenue, subject to other policy goals. However, in most cases, mining has failed to deliver the expected revenues.

Inappropriate laws and investment agreements, overly generous tax incentives, as well as tax evasion and avoidance have contributed to this failure. Some authorities lack the expertise, information and means to more effectively tax mining. Corruption and poor revenue management also remain challenges.

Thankfully, mining revenue collection has improved, albeit modestly. Many countries are improving their mining tax regulations and strengthening their tax audit capacity.

Better international cooperation can address many problems, including information asymmetries. All countries implementing the Extractives Industries Transparency Initiative (EITI) are now required to disclose mining, oil, and gas contracts. This can significantly improve transparency.

Although welcome, such improvements are still far from enough to meet the considerable domestic revenue mobilization needs of developing countries soon enough to adequately accelerate sustainable development after dismal progress for almost a decade.

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Livestock Farming Brings Economic Relief Post-COVID — Global Issues

Goat rearing is contributing to economic independence and improved livelihoods of women thanks to a post-COVID-19 empowerment project. CREDIT: Umar Manzoor Shah/IPS
  • by Umar Manzoor Shah (milonpur, india)
  • Inter Press Service

MILONPUR, INDIA, Aug 08 (IPS) – Seema Devi is a 39-year-old woman hailing from India’s northeastern state of Assam. She lives in a village called Milonpur, a small hamlet with no more than 1 000 inhabitants. While most men from the village, including Devi’s husband, move to cities and towns in search of work, women are left behind to take care of the house and kids.

Devi says that after the COVID-19 lockdown in India in the year 2020, the family income drastically plummeted. As most of the factories were shut for months, the workers, including Devi’s husband, were jobless. Even after the lockdown ended and workers were called back to the factories, the wages witnessed a dip.

“Earlier my husband would earn no less than Rs 10 000 a month (125 USD), and after the lockdown, it wasn’t more than a mere 6 000 rupees (70 USD). My children and I would suffer for the want of basic needs like medicine and clothing, but at the same time, I was considerate of the situation and helplessness of my husband,” Devi told IPS.

However, there were few alternatives available at home that could have mitigated Devi’s predicament. With the small area of ancestral land used for cultivation, the change in weather patterns caused her family and several households in the village to reap losses.

However, in 2021, a non-government organization visited the hamlet to assess the situation in the post-COVID scenario. The villagers told the team about how most of the men in the village go out to cities and towns in search of livelihood and work as labourers in factories and that their wages have come down due to economic distress in the country.

After hectic deliberations, about ten self-help groups of women were created. They trained in livestock farming and how this venture could be turned into a profitable business.

The women were initially reluctant because they were unaware of how to make livestock farming profitable. They would ask the members of the charitable organisation questions like, “What if it fails to yield desired results? What if some terrible disease affects the animals, and what if the livestock wouldn’t generate any income for them?”

Wilson Kandulna, who was the senior member of the team, told IPS that experts were called in to train the women about cattle rearing and how timely vaccinations, proper feed, and care could make livestock farming profitable and mitigate their basic living costs. “At first, we provided ten goat kids to each women’s group and made them aware of the dos and don’ts of this kind of farming. They were quick to learn and grasped easily whatever was taught to them,” Wilson said.

He added that these women were living in economic distress due to the limited income of their husbands and were desperately anxious about the scarcity of proper education for children and other daily needs.

Devi says that as soon as she got the goat kids, she acquired basic training in feeding them properly and taking them for vaccinations to the nearby government veterinary hospital.

“Two years have passed, and now we have hundreds of goats as they reproduce quickly, and we are now able to earn a good income. During the first few months, there were issues like feeding problems, proper shelter during monsoons and summers, and how and when we should take them out for grazing. As time passed and we learned the skills, we have become very trained goat rearers,” Devi said.

Renuka, another woman in the self-help group, told IPS that for the past year, they have been continuously getting demands for goat milk from the main towns. “People know about the health benefits of goat milk. They know it is organic without any preservatives, and that is the reason we have a very high demand for it. We sell it at a good price, and at times, demand surpasses the supply,” Renuka said.

For Devi, livestock farming has been no less than a blessing. She says she earns more than five thousand rupees a month (about 60 USD) and has been able to cover daily household expenses all by herself. “I no longer rely on my husband for household expenses. I take care of it all by myself. My husband, too, is relieved, and things are getting back on track,” Devi said, smiling.

Kalpana, a 32-year-old member of the group, says the goats have increased in number, and last year, several of them were sold in the market at a good price.

“The profits were shared by the group members. Earlier, women in this village were entirely dependent on their husbands for covering their basic expenses. Now, they are economically self-reliant. They take good care of the house and of themselves,” Kalpana told IPS News.

Note: Names of some of the women have been changed on their request.

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Zimbabwean Farmers Turn to Agroecology to Feed Their Families — Global Issues

Smallholder farmer Elizabeth Mpofu uses renewable energy to reduce emissions from firewood at her farm in Shashe, Mashava. Credit: Farai Shawn Matiashe/IPS
  • by Farai Shawn Matiashe (bulawayo, zimbabwe)
  • Inter Press Service

BULAWAYO, ZIMBABWE, Aug 04 (IPS) – When Nelson Mudzingwa arrived in the Shashe farming area in Mashava in Masvingo, about 294 kilometres from the capital Harare, in the early 2000s, the land was barren, with no hope that the soils could be suitable for farming.

The area used for cattle ranching had turned into a semi-arid.

Livestock was dying due to hunger while trees succumbed to deforestation, and water levels in the nearby Shashe River had decreased because of siltation.

More than two decades later Shashe farming area has transformed into a reputable farming hub.

This was done by employing agroecology techniques, including using locally available resources such as growing traditional grains, rehabilitating the area by planting trees, water harvesting to conserve water and venturing into poultry to get manure to improve soil fertility.

“When I harvest crops in the fields, I make sure that I put aside seed in preparation for the next season,” says Mudzingwa, the 53-year-old small-holder farmer who was born in Chiwundura in Midlands Province, a central part of Zimbabwe.

“By digging contours that channel water in our fields, we have improved the chances of receiving rainfall in Shashe. Even during the dry season, we receive rainfall which was not common when we first arrived.”

Peter Mudzingwa looking at harvested groundnuts at his father Nelson Mudzingwa’s farm in Shashe, Mashava. Credit: Farai Shawn Matiashe/IPS

Shashe farming area has evolved into a learning area where farmers around Zimbabwe and beyond the borders come to learn agroecology at Shashe Agroecology School, a centre of agroecology, of which Mudzingwa is one of the founders.

Zimbabwe, just like the rest of the southern African region, has been experiencing climate change-induced prolonged droughts and incessant rainfall resulting in floods.

Climate change does not discriminate.

Every living being must pay.

The majority of Zimbabweans live in rural areas, and climate change, caused by human activities, is a major threat to their livelihood.

They rely on agriculture to feed their families as well as earn a living by selling some of the produce.

Government and non-governmental organisations have been working hand in hand to introduce measures that reduce the impacts of climate change.

In Shashe, agroecology farming is basically conserving the land and environment.

This concept involves strengthening the resilience of smallholder farmers through the diversification of agroecosystems.

That is organic soil management and water harvesting for conservation.

In the Shashe farming area, smallholder farmers like Mudzingwa grow a variety of food crops, including grains, cereals, legumes, vegetables, fruit trees and medicinal plants.

They also rear livestock, including cows, sheep, goats, pigs and chickens.

The grains such as sorghum, millet and rapoko are drought-resistant crops meaning smallholder farmers can still have a bumper harvest even during droughts.

Everything on the Mudzingwa’s farm is recycled.

“Livestock are our biggest source of manure. We collect crop residues from the fields and feed the cattle. Then we collect waste and make organic manure in compost,” says Mudzingwa, who is an agriculturist by profession.

The smallholder farmers in this area have fish ponds where they farm different species like catfish and breams.

Mudzingwa says fish farming, poultry, and crops depend on each other for survival.

“We feed fish with chicken droppings and worms. We keep worms in the composts we make for manure. The water from the fish ponds after harvesting is channelled to the garden because it is highly nutritious,” he says.

Another smallholder farmer is Elizabeth Mpofu, who has fed and clothed her three children and one grandchild using proceeds from her agroecology venture in the Shashe farming area.

She turned to sustainable farming after realising that rainfed agriculture was no longer viable in this area; she was resettled following the Land Reform Programme in the early 2000s.

The chaotic Land Reform Programme implemented under President Robert Mugabe saw black farmers taking back their land from the few minority white farmers two decades after Zimbabwe gained its independence from the British colonialists.

Just like Mudzingwa, Mpofu is into fish farming, growing drought-resistant crops like millet and sorghum, poultry and water harvesting to conserve moisture in the fields.

Mpofu keeps seeds for the next agriculture season to ensure that traditional grains critical in providing high yields amid climate change do not run into extinction.

Mudzingwa and Mpofu supply other farmers in Shashe and around the country with seeds and pass agroecology knowledge and skills to them.

Mpofu has planted trees and maintained indigenous trees near her plot as part of her reforestation efforts.

Mpofu’s family relies on agroecology.

She keeps some produce for her family after harvesting and sells the excess to other residents in Mashava or Masvingo, the province’s city.

“Agroecology is the way to go. As a woman, I have been able to look after myself and my family,” Mpofu, a widower, tells IPS.

The agroecology initiative in Mashava and Bikita has reached about 500 smallholder farmers, says Simba Guzha, a regional project manager for Voluntary Service Overseas, a charity supporting farmers like Mpofu and Mudzingwa.

Guzha tells IPS that affordable and less resource-input farming practices like agroecology are important to enhance agricultural production and increase food security at the household level.

“In Zimbabwe, agriculture production is mainly rainfed, and smallholder farmers in marginalized areas contribute more than 70 percent of food production in the country, yet they lack they do not have the financial capacity to purchase synthetic inputs.”

“In Mashava, most soils are loamy sands to sandy which are prone to acidification, leaching and poor structure and can barely support plant life, the use of organic fertilisers and green cover crops that bind the soil help to replenish such soils and enhance microbial activity that supports plant life while sequestering carbon dioxide from the atmosphere.”

Guzha says agroecology in Mashava has empowered women and the youth, who are usually marginalised and vulnerable.

“It has enhanced their productive capacity as well as empowered them to have diversified food sources and income-generating activities,” he says.

“Agroecology promotes growing of indigenous or orphan crops and diversity that are well suited to low rainfall areas like Mashava, hence, farmers are guaranteed of getting something in case of severe droughts. It has promoted local diets and culturally acceptable foods that are nutritious and healthy for the local people.”

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