Nov 12, 2006  Lesotho: Anti-Corruption Actions http://www.africafocus.org/docs06/les0611.php
    Search the World Bank's website section on anti-corruption (http://www.worldbank.org/anticorruption) for "Lesotho" and you will get the following response: Your search - Lesotho - did not match any documents. No pages were found containing "Lesotho". But while the World Bank may not be paying attention, the small Southern African country has taken the lead in attacking corruption in the Lesotho Highlands Water Project, a giant scheme financed by the World Bank itself.

Nov 5, 2006  Africa: Economics of Climate Change http://www.africafocus.org/docs06/ster0611.php
    "All countries will be affected. The most vulnerable - the poorest countries and populations - will suffer earliest and most, even though they have contributed least to the causes of climate change." - Stern Review on the Economics of Climate Change

Nov 5, 2006  Africa: Up in Smoke? http://www.africafocus.org/docs06/clim0611.php
    "The level of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere is historically a result of rich world activity. Therefore to be fair, the rich world should bear the full costs of adapting to climate change, at least in the early years." - Working Group on Climate Change and Development

Oct 15, 2006  Africa: Green Revolution? http://www.africafocus.org/docs06/gr0610.php
    The Gates Foundation has joined with the Rockefeller Foundation in promoting a new "Green Revolution" in Africa. But will the new effort learn from the mistakes of earlier "Green Revolution" initiatives? Sceptics say that the new proposals still disregard the interests of small farmers and the environment.

Sep 30, 2006  Africa: Making Aid Multilateral http://www.africafocus.org/docs06/aid0609a.php
    The current international aid system, says a new UN report, is chaotic, and suffers from high transaction costs, politicization, lack of transparency, incoherence, and unpredictability. What is needed, says the report, is a shift to a multilateral model similar to the Marshall Plan and to the European Community's regional funds.

Sep 30, 2006  Africa: Innovative Financing http://www.africafocus.org/docs06/aid0609b.php
    Beginning in July, international air travelers from France have been paying a 4 euro tax on an economy ticket and 40 euros on a first-class ticket, with proceeds going to pay for treatment of children with AIDS, tuberculosis, and malaria. Eighteen other countries have pledged to implement the tax, including Brazil, the United Kingdom, Norway, Mali, and South Korea.

Sep 16, 2006  Africa: Migration and Development http://www.africafocus.org/docs06/mig0609b.php
    "[The] potential benefits [from international migration] are larger than the potential gains from freer international trade, particularly for developing countries," notes an extensive recent United Nations report on migration. But while the liberalization of the flow of goods and capital continues to increase, restrictions on the movement of people are leading to thousands of deaths in border areas such as the U.S. southwest desert and the sea routes between Africa and Europe.

Sep 16, 2006  Africa: Migration and Rights http://www.africafocus.org/docs06/mig0609a.php
    Chartered planes started flying illegal African immigrants back from Spain to Senegal last week, resuming a repatriation program aimed at stemming the flow of immigrants to this southern European country. But judging by experience, the return is unlikely to stop thousands of others from risking their lives in small boats to reach the Canary Islands from the West African coast, or finding other perilous ways of reaching the European continent.

Sep 10, 2006  Africa: Africa's Lakes http://www.africafocus.org/docs06/lake0609.php
    "For now, the future of Lake Chad does indeed look bleak. With a high population growth rate, pressures on water resources in the lake basin will invariably continue. While in the past Lake Chad has been able to rebound from low to high water levels, climate change and people's water use may now act in concert to block the natural forces of recovery." - atlas of Africa's Lakes

Sep 10, 2006  Africa: Environmental Threats/Opportunities http://www.africafocus.org/docs06/unep0609.php
    Many of Africa's ecosystems are not just serving the region, but the whole world, for example, through the carbon soaking value of tropical forests. This alone probably equals or exceeds the current or exceeds the current level of international aid being provided to developing countries.

Jul 17, 2006  Africa: Real Aid? http://www.africafocus.org/docs06/aid0607a.php
    World leaders gathered at the G8 Summit in St. Petersburg, Russia, gave only token attention to Africa issues that had been a major focus at last year's meeting in Gleneagles, Scotland. Although they pledged to keep Africa on the agenda for Germany next year, evaluations of the summit noted little progress beyond the pledges on debt relief implemented over the past year.

Jul 17, 2006  Africa: Phantom Technical Assistance http://www.africafocus.org/docs06/aid0607b.php
    "Technical assistance - donor spending on consultants, training and research - is one of the most heavily criticised forms of aid. ... [yet it is] still one of the most heavily used forms of aid, accounting for between a quarter and a half of all ODA [Official Development Assistance]." A significant proportion of this aid, charges ActionAid in a new report, is both over-priced and ineffective.

Apr 14, 2006  Africa: Stolen Wealth http://www.africafocus.org/docs06/corr0604.php
    "Corruption is bleeding Africa to death and the cost is borne by the poor. ... Much of the money is banked in Britain or our overseas territories and dependencies. ... We want our government to get tough on corruption." - Hugh Bayley, MP, Chair of the Africa All Party Parliamentary Group

Apr 2, 2006  Africa: User Fees http://www.africafocus.org/docs06/user0604.php
    "The government of Zambia today (1 April) introduced free health care for people living in rural areas, scrapping fees which for years had made health care inaccessible for millions. The move was made possible using money from the debt cancellation and aid increases agreed at the G8 in Gleneagles last July, when Zambia received $4 billion of debt relief; money it is now investing in health and education." - Oxfam International

Apr 2, 2006  Africa: Social Transfers http://www.africafocus.org/docs06/soc0604.php
    According to a new research report from the UK Department for International Development says social transfers - that is, regular and predictable grants to households - can have significant positive effects on human development for the poor, and particularly on health and education, even when the grants are not specifically targeted to those sectors. In other words, one of the most immediate and effective remedies for poverty is money.

Mar 9, 2006  Africa: Digital Dumps http://www.africafocus.org/docs06/dd0603.php
    Recycled computers and other electronic equipment have the potential to help bridge the digital divide. But, says a recently published study by the Basel Action Network (BAN), many quickly find their way to toxic waste dumps, being not economically repairable or usable.

Feb 26, 2006  Kenya: Githongo Report http://www.africafocus.org/docs06/git0602.php
    John Githongo, who resigned a year ago as Kenya's anti-corruption chief, this month released a report on scandals he was investigating that has already forced the resignation of Kenya's finance minister and threatens to bring down other top officials. The report is based on detailed records he kept during his investigation, and spells out how officials used security contracts worth as much as $1 billion to siphon off government funds into non-existent companies.

Feb 21, 2006  East Africa: Dams and Lake Victoria http://www.africafocus.org/docs06/vic0602.php
    Low water levels in Lake Victoria, at their lowest point in 50 years, are threatening the livelihood of people dependent on fishing, raising the prices of fish, and provoking shortages of water for electricity generation. And now a new report charges that the crisis is due not only to drought but also to overuse of the lake's water for power generation by existing powerplants. At the same time the Uganda government has signed a new $500 million contract for building a third power plant, on the Bujagali Falls. Environmentalists charge that the new plant is likely to have more negative effects and that the hope of providing more electricity will prove unsustainable.

Feb 8, 2006  Africa: Fix Resource Leaks http://www.africafocus.org/docs06/abug0602.php
    "What matters for ensuring that governments have adequate resources to finance development are net flows. This means factoring in not just inflows ... but also what is lost to the rest of the world. Debt servicing is [only] one [such] outflow. ... Indeed, the reality of Africa is that the resources that leak out far exceed those that flow in." - Charles Abugre

Jan 31, 2006  Africa: Predictable Emergencies http://www.africafocus.org/docs06/food0601.php
    "Imagine if your local fire department had to petition the mayor for money every time it needed water to douse a raging fire. That's the predicament faced by anguished humanitarian aid workers when they seek to save lives but have no funds to pay for the water - or medicine, shelter, or food - urgently needed to put out a fire." - Jan Egeland, UN Under Secretary General for Humanitarian Affairs

Oct 18, 2005  Southern Africa: Food Emergency Shortfall http://www.africafocus.org/docs05/food0510.php
    With attention diverted and disaster fatigue accentuated by response to the hurricanes in North America, the UN's World Food Programme (WFP) as well as private agencies are finding responses slow to the earthquake in South Asia and to food crises in Africa. The WFP appeal for Niger, which briefly hit world headlines in July, has still only raised $36 million of its $58 million target; the appeal for 12 million people in Southern Africa has only raised $245 million out of an estimated $622 million needed.

Oct 3, 2005  Africa: Whose Energy Future? http://www.africafocus.org/docs05/gw0510.php
    With oil prices rising worldwide, African oil-producing countries are expecting windfall earnings. Global oil companies and consuming countries are giving even greater attention to Africa's oil. The World Petroleum Congress, held last month in Africa for the first time, in Sandton, South Africa, celebrated the potential. But a new report from South Africa's groundWork questions the fundamental structure of the oil industry on the continent.

Sep 15, 2005  Africa: Human Development Report http://www.africafocus.org/docs05/hdr2005.php
    Among the many reports issued as world leaders gather in New York to discuss their commitment to fighting world poverty, the annual Human Development Report is among the most blunt in concluding that the "promise to the world's poor is being broken." In addition to documenting the failures and presenting its annual measurement of the Human Development Index (HDI) for 177 countries, this year's report identifies specific actions that could begin to reverse the trend.

Sep 6, 2005  USA/Africa: Call for Food Aid Reform http://www.africafocus.org/docs05/iatp0509.php
    On August 26, just before Hurricane Katrina hit the Gulf Coast of the United States, the World Food Programme called for the international community not to turn away from Niger, as food contributions began to tail off with less than half of the budget funded. As subsequent images of devastated New Orleans both displaced and evoked comparisons with "Third World" catastrophes, there was abundant material for reflection on U.S. and international responses to entirely predictable disasters.

Jul 22, 2005  Niger: Background to Famine http://www.africafocus.org/docs05/nig0507.php
    With a BBC film crew in Niger broadcasting images of starving children to the world, food aid shipments to the country are starting to pick up. But UN under secretary-general for humanitarian affairs Jan Egeland, who has repeatedly warned of neglected emergencies in African countries, told reporters that if donors had responded to earlier appeals, a child's life could have been saved for little more than a dollar a day. Now the estimated cost has risen to 80 times that, and for many it is too late.

Jul 13, 2005  Africa: G8 Reaction, Perspectives http://www.africafocus.org/docs05/glen0507.php
    "Outside of British officialdom," writes Sanjay Suri of Inter Press Service from the Gleneagles summit, "celebrations of increased G8 aid for Africa were confined mostly to a population of two - rock stars Bob Geldof and Bono." Non-governmental groups in the Make Poverty History campaign, in contrast, were generally skeptical.

Jul 13, 2005  UK/Africa: The Damage We Do http://www.africafocus.org/docs05/ras0507.php
    "The African Union estimates that the continent loses as much as $148 billion a year to corruption. This money is rarely invested in Africa but finds its way into the international banking system and often into western banks. The proceeds of corrupt practices in Africa ... are often laundered and made respectable by some of the most well known banks in the City of London." - Royal African Society, London

Jun 28, 2005  Africa: "Aid" Reality Checks http://www.africafocus.org/docs05/aid0506.php
    The world's richest nations greatly exaggerate the amount they spend on aid to poor countries, says a study released by ActionAid International. The report says that between 60%-90% of aid funds are 'phantom' rather than 'real' with a significant proportion being lost to waste, internal recycling within donor countries, misdirected spending and high fees for consultants.

Mar 18, 2005  UK/Africa: Commissioning Development? http://www.africafocus.org/docs05/act0503.php
    UK Prime Minister Tony Blair's Commission for Africa report, released earlier this month and intended to galvanize common action by rich countries on African development, has received mixed reviews. The report is largely a composite of frequently repeated but not yet implemented proposals on issues such as increasing aid, reducing rich-country trade subsidies, canceling debt, and improving governance. It did, however, also feature new stress on how rich countries themselves fuel corruption in Africa through failure to stop money-laundering and bribery by their own institutions.

Feb 20, 2005  Chad: Oil Transparency Loopholes http://www.africafocus.org/docs05/oil0502.php
    Oil revenues for Chad are now beginning to increase rapidly from the long-debated "model project" involving World Bank financing, a pipeline through Cameroon, and a consortium of major oil companies. A new report from two U.S.-based groups says the mechanisms for transparency and accountability, while welcome, are still full of loopholes.

Feb 11, 2005  Kenya: Corruption Fight Stalling http://www.africafocus.org/docs05/ken0502.php
    The resignation of respected anti-corruption campaigner John Githongo from the Kenyan government has touched off new political furor that seems certain to escalate in coming weeks. In its two years in office, President Mwai Kibabi's government has initiated numerous anti-corruption investigations. But there is widespread skepticism that it has the will to deal with high-level corruption within its own ranks.

Dec 14, 2004  Africa: Oxfam Poverty Report http://www.africafocus.org/docs04/ox0412.php
    In one of the first reports from a global coalition to make 2005 a year of action against poverty, Oxfam International has issued a report calling on rich countries to live up to their promises to provide resources and opportunities to achieve the "Millennium Development Goals" adopted unanimously by the United Nations in September 2000. Making this finance available, Oxfam noted, is "both a moral obligation and a matter of justice."

Apr 27, 2004  Africa: Learning to Survive http://www.africafocus.org/docs04/educ0404.php
    Universal primary education is "the single most effective preventive weapon against HIV/AIDS," says a new report by Oxfam International. But donor countries are failing to come up with even the minimal funds they have pledged to support African countries under an optimistically named "Fast Track Initiative" to expand education funding.

Apr 13, 2004  Africa: World Bank Industry Review http://www.africafocus.org/docs04/wb0404b.php
    In 1996, in a report on Poverty Reduction in Sub-Saharan Africa, World Bank researchers wrote that poverty assessments "have done a reasonably good job of identifying ... options that will assist the poor ... " They added, however, that "these options, typically, are not being reflected in the Bank's assistance strategies or operations." This spring, as the World Bank delays consideration of the report of its own Extractive Industies Review, there is a similar disconnect between Bank-fostered proposals for internal change and ongoing operations.

Apr 13, 2004  Africa: World Bank Protests/Policy http://www.africafocus.org/docs04/wb0404a.php
    Controversies about the World Bank, which marks 60 years with its spring meetings this month, are attracting less attention than the high-profile debates about Iraq and terrorism. The Bank's policies and programs, nevertheless, have profound effects on countries around the world, and particularly in Africa. Both protesters and other critics remain skeptical of this powerful institution's claims to be fighting poverty and contributing to development.

Dec 15, 2003  Africa: Digital Solidarity Gap, 1 http://www.africafocus.org/docs03/it0312a.php
    Delegates from 176 countries and as many as 10,000 representatives of civil society and the private sector attended the World Summit on the Information Society in Geneva last week. They dispersed having filled dozens of web sites with documentation of the vast digital divide between rich and poor, declarations of good intentions, examples of promising initiatives, and decisions to postpone controversial decisions on internet governance and a proposed Digital Solidarity Fund.

Dec 15, 2003  Africa: Digital Solidarity Gap, 2 http://www.africafocus.org/docs03/it0312b.php
    Meeting in Lyon, France just before the World Summit on the Information Society, representatives of cities and local authorities decided to take their own initiatives to address the global digital divide. When the World Summit failed to make a firm commitment to a new Digital Solidarity Fund, the mayors of Lyon and Geneva joined with Senegalese President Abdoulaye Wade to commit 1 million euros to launch the fund themselves.

Nov 16, 2003  Africa: Agriculture Strategic, Neglected http://www.africafocus.org/docs03/fao0311.php
    "Unfortunately, development partners have paid much less attention to agriculture and rural development over the past two decades," commented Dr. Jacques Diouf, Director-General of the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), in a speech last week. "The World Bank, the major funding source for Africa, targeted 39 percent of its lending in 1978 to the agricultural sector in Africa. By 2002, this proportion had dropped to 6 percent."