GLOBAL: Recession still hitting poor countries

Photo: Masoud Popalzai/IRIN

Poor countries are reeling from the impact of high cereal prices

ROME,  – The 2008/09 economic crisis has hit poor households in developing countries harder than any crisis in recent times, pushing more than a billion people into hunger, said the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) in its latest annual report, The State of Food Insecurity in the World.

Somalia, Afghanistan, Ethiopia, Iraq and Eritrea top a list of 16 countries identified as the most vulnerable, all of which have experienced either man-made or natural crises, or both, at least once in the past 10 years.

The financial crisis has been particularly devastating, as it “came on the back of the 2007/08 food price crisis”, said David Dawe, technical editor of the report.

“The crisis affected large parts of the world simultaneously, and affected traditional coping mechanisms such as remittance flows, or the possibility of migrating to an unaffected area,” he noted.

Remittance flows to developing countries are expected to drop from an estimated US$328 billion in 2008 to $304 billion in 2009, according to the World Bank.

Somalis made destitute by years of conflict have depended on remittance flows, which contributed 71 percent to the country’s gross national income in 2006, the World Bank said.

Poor countries are still reeling from the impact of high cereal prices, which doubled at the peak of the food crisis. Although prices have fallen somewhat, in real terms they remain 17 percent higher than two years ago, said the FAO report.

Dawe pointed out that as the recession was still unfolding, it was too early to assess the full extent of its impact. Many countries have experienced an across-the-board drop in trade and financial inflows, reducing employment opportunities and the amount of money available for government programmes.

The FAO report looked at inflows into Latin American economies, which were the worst hit. “The 17 largest Latin American economies, for example, received $184 billion in financial inflows in 2007, which about halved in 2008 to $89 billion, and is expected to halve again to $43 billion in 2009,” Dawe said.

Many other countries found themselves in a similar situation, which would affect their capacity to buy food and badly needed medicines and health-care equipment.

jk/hesource.irinnews.org

ZAMBIA: Mosquito-net fishing threatens Lake Tanganyika

Photo: UN

Fishermen on Lake Tanganyika bring in their catch

MPULUNGU,  – Frederick Sinjela, a fisherman in Mpulungu district in Northern Province, Zambia, cannot imagine how his actions could affect something as big as Lake Tanganyika, but his harmful practices, multiplied by thousands like him, are a real and growing threat.

“At least we know that fish will never finish – [there are] thousands and thousands – it is just that now [they] have gone deeper.” Nevertheless, the extended boat trip was still worth it: “I make about 20,000 kwacha [US$6] per day,” giving him a better-than-average income.

“We mount many lamps on our boats at night so that the fish think it is day-time and come out, and we catch [them].” This is the main fishing method on the lake. “But finishing? It will never finish,” he said confidently.

There was really no reason to think fish would run out: Lake Tanganyika is huge and has always provided food and an income to the millions of people living along its shores; up to 40 percent of the protein in their diet comes from fish.

It is the world’s longest (670km) and second-deepest (over 1,400m) freshwater lake; at over nine million years old it is also home to some of the oldest fishing settlements on the planet.

Its importance to the region cannot be overestimated: a rapidly growing population of some 10 million people in four different countries – Tanzania, Democratic Republic of Congo, Burundi and Zambia – share the lake’s watershed and depend upon it for fresh water, food, transportation and income.

Now we have to go very far away to catch fish. In the past, we would catch a lot just 10 metres from the shore

Yet some of Sinjela’s colleagues, like Justin Mambwe, were worried: “Now we have to go very far away to catch fish. In the past, we would catch a lot just 10 metres from the shore. There is a difference between now and the way fish used to be.” The catches were also smaller.

Fishing ‘sustainably’

Wilfred Sikanyika, a local environmental campaigner who used to work for Zambia’s Ministry of Agriculture, told IRIN: “We are deeply concerned at these indiscriminate fishing activities on the Zambian side of Lake Tanganyika.”

Fish stocks have been declining over the years and there are very few fish on the Zambian side. “Our people are now going as far as Tanzania and DRC [Democratic Republic of Congo],” he said.

“People are using mosquito nets and everything they can [to catch fish] – these mosquito nets take in everything,” he told IRIN.

Using mosquito nets, which have an extremely fine mesh, means the fish are caught before they can reach maturity and spawn, a major reason for declining fish stocks. Moreover, the nets, which are mainly distributed in government malaria eradication campaigns, are not being used for their intended purpose.

The concerns go far beyond long-term food security, health and livelihoods: this destructive practice is putting the lake’s renowned biological diversity at risk.

According to the International Union for Conservation of Nature, a global environmental network, no place on earth holds such a variety of life. Lake Tanganyika harbours over 2,000 different species, of which more than half are found nowhere else. The fishermen target only six species, but the mosquito nets are indiscriminate.

The lake is under threat: overfishing caused by population growth along the shore is depleting its stocks and shrinking their diversity; industrial and agricultural pollution, like fertilizers and pesticides, are degrading water quality; deforestation is contributing excessive amounts of sedimentation, changing the aquatic environment.

“We are currently working on forming an association that will look at protecting the biodiversity of Lake Tanganyika and promoting sustainable fishing methods,” Sikanyika said.

The future of fishing

Justina Zimba, a research officer at the fisheries department in Mpulungu, said exact figures on fish stocks were hard to come by, making it difficult to assess the extent of the decline.

“Data collected since 1980 shows that the catch and catch-per-unit effort of certain species like kapenta [also known as the Tanganyika sardine] has drastically declined, especially in the heavily exploited [Zambian] southeastern arm of the lake,” she noted.

Photo: Nebert Mulenga/IRIN

Protein rich Kapenta fish for sale on the shores of Lake Tanganyika

“There are no resources at the moment for us to do the monitoring, or even carry out the latest fish-census exercise. We are currently depending on data from the fishing companies and going by their figures.”

The problem transcends national boundaries. “Addressing these threats effectively requires the cooperation of the four countries [sharing the lake] and appropriate regulations for the lake, because at the moment the lake is regarded as a ‘no man’s land’ and people fish everywhere.”

However, the Lake Tanganyika Sustainable Management Project, a cooperative effort by Tanzania, Burundi, DRC and Zambia, has been set up under a common Lake Tanganyika Authority.

“We realised that the dwindling of fish stocks … was a matter of serious concern among all the … [lakeshore] countries. We do not even know whether all the 350 endemic fish species can be easily found in the lake today,” said Kenneth Nkowani, Director of Zambia’s Department of Environment and Natural Resources.

The Zambian component of the project will stem overfishing and control sediment flows from the steep mountainous terrain. According to Nkowani, “We want to see change in the way people manage the lake within a year or two.”

nm/tdm/he source.irinnews.org

ANGOLA-DRC: Retaliatory expulsions reach a new peak

Photo: ReliefWeb

Map of Angola

JOHANNESBURG,  – The tit-for-tat expulsion of thousands of Angolan refugees living in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), and the repatriation of thousands of undocumented Congolese migrants working in Angola, is raising fears of a “humanitarian catastrophe” in the making.

According to ANGOP, the Angolan state-run media outlet, the number of Angolans forcefully removed from the DRC since a large-scale repatriation operation kicked off in August 2009 had topped 23,000 by 13 October.

The move has been widely regarded as retaliatory response by DRC to Angola’s deportation of thousands of Congolese nationals, which had been going on for years, said Maurizio Giuliano, Public Information Officer and Advocacy Manager for the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), in the DRC capital, Kinshasa.

“Expulsions in both directions have been going on for some time now, but what is new is the number and intensity we are seeing in this latest wave,” Giuliano told IRIN. Since 2003 there have been six major waves of expulsions, in which 140,000 Congolese were repatriated.

A recent OCHA Situation Report said the new wave “started in January 2009, and reached a climax between late August and now. Since the beginning of this wave, approximately 18,800 DRC nationals have reportedly been expelled from Angola.”

The statement noted that the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR) had started receiving reports of ill-treatment, detention, and theft of property during a campaign against irregular migrants in Angola’s northern Lunda Norte province in May 2009.

Most Congolese in Angola were thought to be illegal diamond diggers, while the majority of Angolans in DRC had been living there for decades after fleeing in Angola’s protracted civil war, which ended in 2002.

The Angolan government described the DRC’s decision to apply the principle of reciprocity, and the ensuing action, as “disproportionate”, and has since announced the cessation of flights between Luanda, the Angolan capital, and Kinshasa.

According to the OCHA statement there were concerns over the risk of “an actual humanitarian catastrophe” near the border post of Luvo/Lufu, in the northern Angolan province of Zaire, “where a huge number of expulsees are gathering”.

Whether the situation would turn catastrophic, Giuliano said, depended on the number of new arrivals, and on how soon transport for them could be provided.

“The main concern now is transportation,” and how soon it could be provided, he said. It was also crucial for humanitarian actors to determine the water, sanitation, health and food needs, should the situation deteriorate.

tdm/he source.irinnews.org

In Brief: When health facilities become casualties

Photo: Brahima Ouedraogo/IRIN

Burkina Faso’s largest hospital, Yalgado Ouédraogo hospital, days after flooding 2 September 2009. The hospital is still barely functioning (file photo)

DAKAR,  – Designed to be safe havens in times of disaster, health facilities are vulnerable to upheaval when catastrophe strikes, according to the UN, which is focusing on hospital safety for International Day for Disaster Reduction.

Only half of UN member countries have set aside money for health facility emergency preparedness, according to World Health Organization (WHO).

The world’s 49 least-developed countries house at least 90,000 health facilities, most of which have not been evaluated for disaster preparedness. Latin American and Caribbean countries have created a Hospital Safety Index that has been used in Bolivia, Ecuador, Peru, Oman, Sudan and Tajikistan.

In Burkina Faso September 2009 flooding forced the largest hospital to shut down. The facility is barely functioning six weeks later.  Health Minister Seydou Bouda told IRIN he believes disaster can effect change. “In Burkina Faso nothing will be like it was before. Each [health] sector activity should integrate crisis management into its operations because catastrophe can arrive at any moment.”

UN Special Representative for Disaster Risk Reduction Margaret Wahlström said much has been done to boost hospital safety worldwide, but more investment is needed to brace hospitals for potential disasters.

pt/np source.irinews.org

GLOBAL: Put women at core of climate change debate, say activists

Photo: Jefri Aries/IRIN

A quake survivor waits for aid amid the ruins of her house in West Sumatra, October 2009 (file photo). Women are increasingly affected by climate-change related natural disasters

BANGKOK,  – Women are being excluded from the debate over climate change, despite being most at risk, and governments should do more to ensure their situations and views are represented, campaigners and experts say.

So far, climate change negotiations have responded poorly to the effects on women, activists say. And while global policies advocate a gender perspective, and including women in environment and development efforts, few governments have incorporated such policies into their national plans.

“Extreme events and environmental degradation become a women’s issue because we are responsible for providing for the whole community,” said Anna Pinto, programme director with the Centre for Organisation, Research and Education (CORE), based in northeastern India.

“If the rice yield is bad, men have to migrate, find a job and send money back, while women have to ensure the day-to-day survival of the helpless.

“When the environment degrades it becomes more of a women’s problem. These issues need to be genderised on behalf of everyone,” she said.

UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon last month called for women to have a greater role in climate change debates. “The special perspective of women is often overlooked in global discussions on climate change,” Ban told an event on women’s leadership held in New York.

Climate change-related weather events claim between two and three times as many female as male victims, according to the Asian Development Bank (ADB).

“Women are prone to more danger,” Robert Dobias, the ADB’s senior adviser on climate change, told IRIN. “It’s the clothes they wear. Maybe they will run back and get the kids. They are often not in public places where information surfaces about disasters,” he said at the sidelines of recent climate-change negotiations in Bangkok.

Excluded from adaptation

“Well-designed, top-down approaches to adaptation can play a role in reducing vulnerability to climate change; yet they may fail to address the particular needs and concerns of women,” said Christina Chan, senior policy analyst for CARE International.

In Africa, women farmers produce up to 80 percent of the continent’s food, according to the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO).

However, because most women work in the subsistence sector, they cannot take part in market-based adaptation schemes, according to Rose Enie, from Women for Climate Justice (GenderCC).

Photo: David Gough/IRIN

A Vietnamese farmer tends her crop of Jatropha, which grows in extremely arid conditions and produces a seed used to create bio-fuel (file photo). Activists say more women should become involved in new technology

“It doesn’t work for women because they are mostly in the informal sector,” she said.

Campaigners say such omissions mean women will continue to be bypassed by resilience-building initiatives – including access to land, credit, support services, new technologies and decision-making.

In addition, women are particularly overlooked when it comes to the development of environmentally friendly technology that can be used in their daily activities, said GenderCC’s Ulrike Roehr.

“Men tend to look at big-scale technology, while needs for smaller-scale technology, such as energy-efficient cooking stoves, are not taken into consideration,” Roehr told IRIN.

“These are the technologies which help in reducing women’s double and triple burdens, having benefits not only for emissions reduction, but also for poverty reduction and health,” she said.

Alternative energy

Women and the communities they look after could be big losers in schemes being considered by governments to mitigate the emission of greenhouse gases, activists say.

These include plans to preserve forests, so trees can absorb and store carbon in the air. The UN’s Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Degradation (REDD) scheme, for example, will see large areas of land closed to women who had hitherto depended on the fuel, medicine, food and fodder they could find there, said Jeannette Gunung, director of Women Organising for Change in Agriculture and Natural Resource Management (WOCAN).

“Women’s exclusion from forests is not new, but as long as forest land had little economic value they could get away with these practices,” Gunung told IRIN.

“When the resource becomes of central importance, women have little voice in decision-making and are denied access,” she said.

Yet environmentally friendly solutions, such as the use of biogas – flammable gas produced by the fermentation of organic material – as an alternative and cleaner source of energy than firewood, are available, Gunung said.

“Once planners put rural women’s needs as a priority, they will come up with solutions that involve sustainable forest management and alternative energy resources,” she said.

ts/ey/mw source.irinnews.org

UGANDA: Camp closures worry HIV-positive IDPs

Photo: Manoocher Deghati/IRIN

Many new homes are far from healthcare providers

GULU,  – The imminent closure of internally displaced persons (IDP) camps in northern Uganda is causing concern among HIV-positive residents, who fear they may not have access to vital health services when they return to their villages.

The decommissioning of the IDP camps started in the region on 1 October, with six closed in Gulu district. The camps have accommodated more than one million people for the duration of the 20-year war between the government and the rebels of the Lord’s Resistance Army; peace talks between the warring parties and more than two years of sustained security in the region prompted the decision to close the camps.

“I don’t know what is going to happen to some of us on ARVs; we are not being told where to access these drugs from our villages,” said Joseph Ochieng*, who lived in Bobi camp, in Gulu district, until its recent closure.

No services at home

“There are no health or distribution centres for these drugs in the return villages,” said Jane Atimango*, another former IDP. “We have no option but to travel long distances to look for these drugs.”

Organizations working in HIV have also expressed concern that monitoring their clients may become more difficult as they disperse to places lacking easy access to health centres.

“In camps the facilities were in abundance, but now we need transport for proper monitoring as people are scattered in the villages,” said Louis Okello, a representative of people living with HIV in Patiko sub-county, Gulu district.

Prevention services are needed as well. Recent research by the AIDS, Security and Conflict Research Hub shows that the transition from war to peace can increase risks of HIV transmission as refugees go home, soldiers leave the army, relief agencies wind down, and rapid economic growth occurs around key urban centres.

According to the Ministry of Health, HIV prevalence in Uganda’s northern-central region is just over 8 percent, higher than the national average of 6.4 percent.

Government officials say there are plans to roll out health services to the community by building new health centres and improving the capacity of existing ones.

“There are already health centres in the return areas, although they are not sufficient,” Kabakumba Masiko, the Minister of Information and National Guidance, told IRIN/PlusNews. “The government is committed to the rehabilitation and development of the region.”

“At the moment the services are only available at health centres … in county headquarters,” said Stephen Oloya, chairman of Gulu District’s camp phase-out committee.

“For VCT services [voluntary counselling and testing], we are expanding them to sub-county level as we have tried to operationalize all the health centres at sub-county level,” he added. “We are also planning to open health centres at parish level.”

Community distribution

One local NGO, however, has already put in place measures to ensure people in its care continue their treatment uninterrupted; the AIDS Support Organization has opened community drug distribution points in various villages where patients can collect their drugs as well as seek psycho-social support and medical care.

“We have the capacity to map and follow the clients to the places they will go; to make our work easy, we encourage them to give us maps to their places,” said Sam Emukok, a TASO public relations officer. “TASO will continue delivering services to the registered clients regardless of where they will go after camp decongestion.”

Emukok said most HIV-positive IDPs would be happy to return to their homes, where they could cultivate their own food and eat a more balanced and varied diet than in the camps.

“People who are living with HIV and are under our care know the importance of camp closure given the challenges they have faced in the camps; they can now engage in agriculture to get food to supplement their diets,” he added. “We give this information during health education in the clinics, outreaches and during radio talk shows.”

More than two-thirds of the IDPs in the region have already left the camps – some returning to their original villages and others to satellite camps between the IDP camps and their villages.

so/kr/mw

* not their real names

source.irinnews.org