http://www.irinnews.org/irin-fp.aspxUpdated everydayen-gbWed, 17 Mar 2010 12:54:08 GMTNAIROBI Wednesday, March 17, 2010 (IRIN) - An acute water shortage after a prolonged drought in central Galgadud region of Somalia has forced thousands of people to abandon their villages, say officials. "A prolonged drought, coupled with a drying-up of wells and barkads [water pans], is forcing many people to leave their homes," said Abdirahman Mohamed Adawe, the district commissioner of Adado, one of the areas hardest hit. NAIROBI Wednesday, March 17, 2010 (IRIN) - An acute water shortage after a prolonged drought in central Galgadud region of Somalia has forced thousands of people to abandon their villages, say officials.

"A prolonged drought, coupled with a drying-up of wells and barkads [water pans], is forcing many people to leave their homes," said Abdirahman Mohamed Adawe, the district commissioner of Adado, one of the areas hardest hit.

However, some parts of the region are receiving the Gu (long) rains.

More than a dozen villages around Adado town, housing an estimated 35,000 people, are affected. Those with livestock are moving in search of pasture and water, while those who lost their livestock, the economic mainstay of the area, are moving to towns.

Many rural people are arriving almost every day "with nothing and camping on the outskirts of town”, he said.

"In February alone, over 500 families [3,000 people] arrived in Adado town [some 620km north of Mogadishu]," he said.

The problem was most acute in Baá Dheer, 75km north of Adado; Goryale, 40km northwest of Adado; Hin Jilaabo, 40km southwest; and Ada kibir, 70km southeast.

"In many of these villages the wells and barkads have dried up and the only other option is water trucking, which is difficult and expensive," Adawe told IRIN. "Some villagers are going as far as 100km to get water."

Moalim Hassan, an elder in the village of Baá Dheer, told IRIN: "The closest water point is 75km away and a drum of trucked water costs 120,000 Somali shillings [about US$4], a sum of money most cannot afford.”

The area has not had any rain for the past two years and the Gu rains – which should have begun – have failed.

In Ada Kibir, the situation is even worse. "We have been in a drought situation for a few years. We had very little rains or none at all in the last two years," Abdullahi Moalim, a resident, told IRIN.

Many residents have left the town. The one borehole had dried up and water was being trucked in from a borehole 60km away. "Those who are left in Ada Kibir are paying the equivalent of $4 or $5 for 200l of water."

Authorities in Adado were setting up a committee to deal with the influx of drought displaced, said DC Adawe.

"We are appealing to aid agencies and Somalis in the diaspora to come to the rescue of the people," he added.

He said there had been no reports of people dying, "but it is just a matter of time if the situation is not addressed soon".

ah/mwhttp://www.irinnews.org/report.aspx?ReportId=88454YANGON Wednesday, March 17, 2010 (IRIN) - A lack of capacity on several levels is likely to hamper Myanmar’s bid to change its political structure, diplomats and analysts say. YANGON Wednesday, March 17, 2010 (IRIN) - A lack of capacity on several levels is likely to hamper Myanmar’s bid to change its political structure, diplomats and analysts say.
 
The military government this month took another step on the "roadmap" for what it says will be a transition to democracy when it unveiled laws for an election later this year, the country's first in two decades.

The government has said the roadmap, launched in August 2003, will lead to a "discipline-flourishing democracy".
 
Among the changes to be made will be the creation of a presidential system of government, a bicameral legislature and 14 regional governments and assemblies, which the International Crisis Group describes as “the most wide-ranging shake-up in a generation”. [http://www.crisisgroup.org/home/index.cfm?id=6280&l=1]

But given the military's reluctance to relinquish its grip on power and the long suppression of democratic activity in Myanmar, diplomats say the transition will face significant challenges - one of the most critical being whether the public service has the capacity to sustain the change.

A top-down decision-making process and limited development assistance and exposure to capacity-building programmes are among the factors that would hamper the ability of the public service to sustain a transition.

"There is obviously insufficient bureaucratic capacity in Myanmar today to manage and implement a 'transition to democracy'," Trevor Wilson, the Australian ambassador to Myanmar from 2000 to 2003, told IRIN.

Lack of experience

Myanmar has been under military rule since 1962, when military commander Ne Win seized power in a coup.
 
The lack of experience with a genuine parliamentary government since has contributed to a situation where "democratic processes of decision-making - involving open public debate, meaningful consultation, and responsive and caring structures - were almost unknown”, said Wilson.

"These processes cannot be introduced overnight, but need to be learned and practised," he said.

"There are some excellent officials, with good technical knowledge and experience," said a British diplomat based in Yangon. "But the worry is that this is an ageing demographic, close to retirement," said the diplomat, who requested anonymity in line with British government policy.

"The younger generations, whilst committed and with a level of expertise, have lower qualifications and less experience or exposure," the diplomat said.

Centralised decision-making

Myanmar is ruled by the State Peace and Development Council (SPDC), where power is concentrated in a group of high-ranking military officials who maintain tight control over political decisions.

"The structure of decision-making, highly centralised, also has an impact on the effectiveness of the public service as a whole, and the ability and morale of individuals within a structure that does not encourage personal responsibility or initiative," said the British envoy.

Another Yangon-based diplomat said that while the public service had well-developed administrative processes, "considerable developmental support" in basic areas such as parliamentary services, public sector budgeting and policy development and application would be needed.

"Policy is issued in the form of orders and therefore tends not to have the benefit of cross-ministry coordinated consultation to ensure that the law itself is not in conflict with other policy areas," he said, speaking on condition of anonymity.

Sanctions and international support

Unrealized public sector capacity is mainly due to chronic under-investment in education, but the withdrawal of international financial institutions (IFIs) has also hampered reform efforts.

The European Union imposed sanctions on Myanmar in 1996 and the US a year later, while international assistance has been restricted mostly to humanitarian programmes.

The persecution of Myanmar's opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi - who has spent about 14 of the last 20 years in detention - and the harassment of her pro-democracy party, were the underlying rationale for the move.

"The system is badly in need of restructuring and this can really only come about with exposure, technical advice and financial input," said the British diplomat.

The International Monetary Fund and World Bank blocked development lending to Myanmar as part of western sanctions, while senior officials only had limited contact with the organizations and opportunities to train and learn, said Wilson.

"Sanctions have made a bad situation worse by cutting off much normal contact and exchange with democracies," he said.

David Steinberg, director of Asian Studies at Georgetown University in Washington, said the gap created by the absence of IFI training programmes should have been taken up by the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) [http://www.aseansec.org/], of which Myanmar is a member.

ASEAN "would be the logical place to have them and they should have begun long ago", Steinberg said.

But while sanctions are a factor, "the blame has also and fundamentally to be placed on the Burmese administration, which through thought control, censorship, and fear of alternative ideas has stifled creative thinking and scholarship", he said.

contributor/ey/ds/mw

http://www.irinnews.org/report.aspx?ReportId=88455NAIROBI/DAR ES SALAAM Tuesday, March 16, 2010 (IRIN) - New maps pin-pointing the exact location of "wellness centres" in sub-Saharan Africa are improving truck drivers' access to treatment and care for HIV and other sexually transmitted infections (STIs).NAIROBI/DAR ES SALAAM Tuesday, March 16, 2010 (IRIN) - New maps pin-pointing the exact location of “wellness centres” in sub-Saharan Africa are improving truck drivers' access to treatment and care for HIV and other sexually transmitted infections (STIs).

Oil giant Shell, with risk specialist Maplecroft http://www.maplecroft.com/ and the North Star Alliance [http://www.northstar-alliance.org/], which builds roadside clinics at truck stops, have developed and printed 20,000 maps for distribution to truck drivers in Kenya, South Africa, Cote d'Ivoire, Burkina Faso, Togo, Tanzania, Uganda, Botswana, Guinea, Mali and Namibia. The maps show the locations of more than 160 clinics.

"Many of us want treatment but at times you might not know where to get it when you are on the road but these maps can help us now," Eliud Musili told IRIN/PlusNews at Mlolongo, a truck stop in the Kenyan capital, Nairobi. "Now you can even advise other drivers where to get [health services]."

In East and Central Africa, the maps are being distributed to truckers at “SafeTStops” [http://www.fhi.org/en/HIVAIDS/Video/redso.htm] where wellness centres provide a range of services, including screening of STIs, HIV testing and counselling and tuberculosis screening, for truck drivers and communities with whom they interact.

"The wellness centres have been put up in areas where these high-risk groups converge to provide information about HIV and other STIs, prevention methods like condoms, diagnosis of STIs and testing and counselling," says Dorothy Muroki, project director for the Regional Outreach Addressing AIDS through Development Strategies II, a project of the NGO, Family Health International (FHI). "For high-risk groups, information is critical."

There are eight SafeTStops serving an estimated 230,000 people annually in Djibouti, Tanzania, Rwanda and Uganda.

Living dangerously

For more than six years now, Julius Mwapele*, 35, a father of five, has worked as a loader at Dar es Salaam port; three months ago, he visited a clinic to treat a persistent rash on his penis.

"At first I wanted to [ignore] it but when it continued, I decided to go to a clinic here at the port," he told IRIN/PlusNews. "At the clinic, they told me I had gonorrhoea; I was afraid but they told me it can be treated."

While his job is not particularly well paid, compared with many of the residents around the port, Mwapele is well-to-do. He suspects that he contracted the STI from a local woman.

"I have three mistresses here - I buy food from them," he said. "I get into sexual relationships with them so that at times I can get free food when I don't have money but when I get money, it is my turn to give them a treat."

Sex stops

Sex work is widespread at truck stops along sub-Saharan Africa’s transport corridors; a 2006 University of Manitoba study [http://sti.bmj.com/content/83/3/242.full#ref-3] found an estimated 8,000 female sex workers on the trans-Africa highway from Kenya's coastal city of Mombasa to the Ugandan capital, Kampala. It also reported that truckers and their assistants had high rates of reported STIs and many exhibited high-risk sexual behaviour.

The SafeTStops aim to provide truck drivers and sex workers with information and other services in a non-judgmental way. "Women do not get into commercial sex work for fun but due to economic needs, just like truck drivers seek sexual services from commercial sex workers because they are rarely with their spouses," said FHI's Muroki.

The centres are also a source of entertainment. "We provide facilities like pool and offer reading material and TV so when one walks in, nobody knows for sure what has brought them except the clinic personnel," said Victoria Jonathan, head of the wellness centre in the port of Dar es Salaam. "This gives a sense of privacy; the uptake of the services is very impressive.

Alcohol a factor

"The centres are alcohol-free to send the message that alcohol abuse is one of the key drivers for risky sexual behaviour," she added.

Ben Manyala, an HIV-positive trucker in Dar es Salaam, agreed that alcohol was an important factor in HIV transmission among truck drivers.

"Alcohol is contributing [to the spread of HIV]; we have a joke that after five bottles of beer, every woman is beautiful," he said.

ko/kr/mw

* Not his real name

http://www.irinnews.org/report.aspx?ReportId=88443ANTANANARIVO Tuesday, March 16, 2010 (IRIN) - Madagascar's political deadlock masks an increasingly fragile humanitarian situation that will keep deteriorating if no solution to the ongoing crisis is found. ANTANANARIVO Tuesday, March 16, 2010 (IRIN) - Madagascar's political deadlock masks an increasingly fragile humanitarian situation that will keep deteriorating if no solution to the ongoing crisis is found.

A year after former President Marc Ravalomanana was forced from power by current President Andry Rajoelina and part of the army, the country is still without an internationally recognized government.

The African Union (AU) is set to announce what action it will take against Rajoelina and his administration, known as the Higher Transitional Authority (HAT), should they fail to implement agreed power-sharing measures - signed in 2009 with the leaders of Madagascar's three other main political parties - by March 17, exactly a year after the coup-style change of leadership.

Amid the political turmoil and economic decline, aid organizations are worried about a worsening humanitarian situation and diminishing capacity to respond to emergencies on the disaster-prone island - in the most recent calamity, tropical storm Hubert struck Madagascar's east coast on 10 March, killing at least 36 people and leaving some 37,000 homeless.

Dramatic cuts in public spending by a government struggling to deal with the combined economic impacts of a domestic political crisis and the global financial crisis has meant that basic commitments in sectors like health and education cannot be met.

"The one thing that ... [everyone] should be able to agree upon is that the longer the crisis drags on, the worse the economic situation becomes for the Malagasy people," said John Davis, Madagascar country director of CARE International, which works to reduce poverty.

"What has been difficult over the last year is that food security issues in the south have become more severe, and we have seen tropical storms and flooding affect some areas. As a result, we are seeing signs of declining livelihoods, but it is hard for outsiders to understand these various distinct and recurrent humanitarian crises and separate them from the political situation," he told IRIN.

Economic hardship

It's been a tough year. The World Bank noted in its February Programme Update that "the existing political situation and the global financial crisis are exacting a heavy toll on Madagascar's economy, leading to a decline in economic growth and job losses."

Falling demand for Madagascar's main export products, including vanilla, cloves, coffee and shrimps, has reflected the downturn in global trade. As a direct result of the political crisis, international donors cut non-essential humanitarian aid, which previously accounted for up 70 percent of government spending, the International Monetary Fund noted.

The World Bank put job losses at 228,000, mainly in urban areas and largely as a result of a sharp decline in tourism and the suspension of a preferential trade agreement with the US, on which Madagascar's textile industry had relied heavily. Up to 50,000 jobs are at risk as textile factories that can no longer afford to export to the US start closing.

According to the Bank, economic growth in Madagascar collapsed to just 0.6 percent in 2009, from 7 percent in 2008. The figures suggest that public investment is down by around 30 percent, construction by 40 percent, imports by 22 percent, and energy consumption by 15 percent.

Tax collection was down about a quarter in 2009, and a February brief by the Bank's Lead Madagascar economist concluded that "authorities need to get more out of each dollar they spend. The local economy has certainly been in recession since the second quarter of 2009 and perspectives are even more sombre for 2010."

Social hardship

Nearly 70 percent of Malagasy live below the poverty line, according to the UN Children's Fund (UNICEF). "In this context ... ensuring the basic rights of the population remains crucial," UNICEF said in a report released in February. "The situation presents a risk of increasing vulnerability levels, particularly of children and women."

With social investment estimated to have shrunk by around US$200 million, the corresponding cut in the health budget has brought the provision of basic services into question, in particular common inoculations like measles, tetanus, polio and BCG (Bacillus Calmette-Guérin a vaccine against tuberculosis), up to half of which is paid for by the government.

"Our priority now is to monitor child vulnerability and to respond accordingly, taking into consideration the erosion of essential services for children," Bruno Maes, head of UNICEF Madagascar, told IRIN. The agency projects that expenditure on routine vaccinations will double in 2010 to plug the gap in government funding and ensure that children receive routine inoculations in 2010.

Continued support

Despite some donor disengagement the international community has remained remarkably supportive said Benoit Kalasa, acting Resident Coordinator for the UN system in Madagascar. "They have not abandoned the Malagasy population ... who have already paid a high price for political instability in the past."

The World Bank, Madagascar's largest donor, has processed no fund withdrawal requests since 17 March 2009, but "with a view to minimizing adverse impact on the lives of poor Malagasy citizens", the Bank had resumed disbursements for critical project components with a "direct bearing on human well-being", such as nutrition, HIV/AIDS and food security, the Bank said in its February statement.

USAID, another large donor, halted "development" aid but increased "humanitarian" aid. Richard Marcus, Director of the International Studies Programme at California State University in the US, who has just returned from Madagascar, noted that "very few donors have pulled out" completely.

Besides the money, it was also important that donors stayed "because it is relatively easy to ramp up funding if conditions allow when there is still an operating country office ... it can take years before new funding initiatives can be negotiated and the infrastructure for funding can be established," Marcus told IRIN.

Still, the reduction in project spending by donors is being felt, particularly in social sectors like education and healthcare, and "that pressure will increase dramatically in 2010," Marcus warned.

"The current government is surely under financial pressure", he said, and without external support from donors "It will be increasingly difficult to meet public salary demands. That is a priority in Madagascar, as civil servants are well organized and have a history of leading social action, particularly in the capital."

Breaking the cycle

Resolving Madagascar's political crisis is a long-term project that will take complex political reform and education. Since the beginning of the crisis the international community has taken the winding path of reconciliation between the island's current and three former presidents. An International Contact Group has been formed to broker dialogue between the parties.

"There were several factors that sparked the current crisis: first among them was poor governance, characterized by a collision between public and private interests [under former president Ravalomanana]," said Guy Ratrimoarivony, director of the Centre for Diplomatic and Strategic Studies, based in the capital, Antananarivo.

"This helped spark popular discontent at a time when Madagascar was also suffering from the global economic crisis. Rajoelina was a catalyst, the person that came to represent the opposition." He suggested that political dialogue should include national discussion of issues as complex as federalism and decentralisation.

"To avoid a repeat crisis, I believe the civil society should play a role, and that it is necessary to completely restructure the republic. We need to start from the base, to see what people want and what they attach value to," said Ratrimoarivony, who believes that Madagascar needs a new constitution to lay the foundation of a more stable state.

However, some observers say the strength of the civil society movement in Madagascar has historically been weakened by political bias. "Civil society is not independent, and successive governments have worked only with those groups that support them," Hanitra Rafolisy, president of the National Union of Human Rights, a platform for rights groups, told IRIN.

"The number of people out of work rises every day, the number of children not in school rises every day, and every day the security situation deteriorates," he commented.

Ratrimoarivony said finding a sustainable solution to Madagascar's seemingly chronic political instability could take many years. "Education is fundamental; we need education and time. This may take one or two generations, but we must start now to change the mentality of young people."

Marcus pointed out that "Every president since independence has manipulated the constitution to suit his needs. The populace appears, if anything, sickened by leadership, and perceive the problem as a battle between leaders from which they suffer, but of which they are not a part."

cc/tdm/he

http://www.irinnews.org/report.aspx?ReportId=88447JOHANNESBURG Friday, March 12, 2010 (IRIN) - The executive director of the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria, Michel Kazatchkine, sat down with IRIN/PlusNews at the launch of the organization's 2010 report, where he answered some hard questions on what may be a turning point in HIV/AIDS funding. JOHANNESBURG Friday, March 12, 2010 (IRIN) - The executive director of the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria, Michel Kazatchkine, sat down with IRIN/PlusNews at the launch of the organization's 2010 report, where he answered some hard questions on what may be a turning point in HIV/AIDS funding.

QUESTION: Is AIDS still exceptional? Is it still the threat we once thought it was?

ANSWER: It's a huge threat; it's the largest epidemic the world has witnessed in history. It's about 34 million people living with HIV worldwide, and there are about 2 million deaths every year [from it] – deaths that should be preventable.

Why has the world focused so much on AIDS? It's about the dimension of the epidemic and the number of deaths - but because of the strong evidence that this epidemic was hitting people in the most productive age of life it was having huge societal, micro-economic and macro-economic [effect] ... So that has led to this concept of 'AIDS exceptionalism'.

Q. What would you say to arguments that we've invested too much in HIV and AIDS, to the detriment of other illnesses?

A. You may think [this has been] unfair to the other diseases but ... [the concept of AIDS as exceptional] has helped mobilize - as we've never seen before - resources that go to AIDS.

I want everyone to understand they're not just buying condoms or antiretroviral [ARV] drugs; these resources, in Africa, have allowed us to make progress when it comes to infrastructure, health worker training, to drug procurement ... Over a third of the overall funding of the Global Fund is actually going to strengthening health systems."

Q. How has the global recession affected HIV programmes?

A. None of our donors have not honoured their pledges to the Fund, despite the hard times. Where the impact may be the strongest is often in the [poor] countries. People may not realize that poor countries have suffered disproportionally more from the crisis than rich countries, because their exports have been going down and the price of imported goods has not decreased.

Poor countries, in times of crisis, have been struggling with keeping up their social investments ... their priorities are in the social sector. We've achieved significant progress that is very fragile. We know what we could achieve if we were to sustain or expand the funding ... now the challenge is our 2010 replenishment, and what will happen for the next three years.

Q. What is the future of HIV funding?

A. The Global Fund and PEPFAR [the US President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief] together are providing 100 percent of the funding for ARV treatment in the developing world. The United States is the highest contributor to the Global Fund, contributing about 29 percent of Global Fund income. To me all news about flat-lining support is worrying. Flat-lining will not take us far enough in treatment or prevention – we need to expand.

Q. Are countries overly reliant on the Global Fund? Does that put national programmes at risk of funding delays?

A. I would argue that countries ... cannot deal with 24 donors. If you have to report to 24 people separately, countries ... [would be] drowning [in reporting commitments]. By having a Global Fund, we have a global political commitment ... and we significantly decrease transaction costs.

I am aware of a number of programmes where the money ... [has been delayed] ... Most often it's because we do not receive the request on time. There are bureaucratic reasons ... this is why we have a large amount of money channelled through civil society.

Q. Is there anything countries should be doing now in order to prepare themselves for a worst-case funding scenario?

A. No - countries have to build their ... plans to scale up prevention and treatment, and demonstrate what the macro- and micro-economic and societal impacts will be, to build a case for the donors. Never give up.

llg/kn/he http://www.irinnews.org/report.aspx?ReportId=88413CIANJUR Thursday, March 11, 2010 (IRIN) - Young unemployed men are finding opportunities in a project that also aims to introduce sustainable farming methods to Indonesia's agricultural sector.CIANJUR Thursday, March 11, 2010 (IRIN) - Young unemployed men are finding opportunities in a project that also aims to introduce sustainable farming methods to Indonesia's agricultural sector.

A year ago, 17-year-old Mohammad Maghfur was one of many high-school dropouts. Now he earns money planting and harvesting organic crops to feed 30 children in an orphanage.

Maghfur was taught organic farming techniques at the Learning Farm [http://thelearningfarm.com/], a half-hectare plot in the green hills of the Puncak area, just a few hours' drive from Jakarta.

He said the main reason he went to the farm was to stop being a burden on his parents, since he could not find a job. "I just hung around, did nothing," he said, joking that it had never been his ambition to stand knee-deep in mud and manure. "I did not want to end up as a street kid."

The farm boards 45 impoverished boys aged 16-24, who are attending a five-month programme to become organic farmers. Some are juvenile offenders or former drug addicts, but not one finished high school.

However, the Learning Farm can only help a fraction of Indonesia's 83 million children; almost half of 16-18-year-olds do not go to school, or drop out, according to the Central Statistics Agency.

High unemployment

Even with a high-school diploma, finding employment is difficult in Indonesia, the world's fourth-most populous nation, where about nine million people are jobless.

According to the latest official data in August 2009, the unemployment rate is 7.87 percent, but it hovered around 10 percent until 2008.

And with more than half the country's 245 million people living on less than US$2 a day, according to the World Food Programme (WFP), many quit school early to contribute to the family income.

"The good thing about the Learning Farm is that it will lead to the creation of livelihoods for people living in the area, because the young people at the farm will teach the surrounding community how to practise organic farming," Catharina Dwihastarini, a project manager with the UN Development Programme (UNDP) in Indonesia, told IRIN. UNDP has provided a grant of $40,000.

About 40 percent of the young men trained at the Learning Farm either go on to start their own organic farms, teach organic farming and environmental education, or are employed by commercial farms.

Escaping poverty

Poverty in Indonesia is largely a rural phenomenon, with agrarian households accounting for about 57 percent of the nation's poor, according to the World Bank. Three out of five Indonesians still live in rural areas and farming is their main occupation.

Desperate to escape poverty, villagers migrate to the city, many disappearing into the slums.

The Learning Farm's director, Jiway Tung, a Chinese-American from New York, is trying to create a new interest in farming by using ancient Indonesian organic methods.

"It's not bringing in something foreign; it's reconnecting and re-envisioning," said Tung.

Most Indonesian farmers, however, still use fertilisers and pesticides on their vegetables that are forbidden in other countries.

Although this is still common practice, organic farming is slowly making an appearance in the archipelago. The Indonesian market for organic produce might be small, but there are opportunities: the Farm's customers include the well-heeled in Jakarta and it is also negotiating with a large supermarket chain to sell its vegetables.

Such deals will make it attractive for young people to become organic farmers. While the organic field that Maghfur tends is already feeding 30 children in the orphanage, his goal now is to grow more vegetables, so they can also be sold to the community.

"We want to create agents of change, so that they take what they learned back to the streets, to their villages," said Tung.

ej/ey/ds/mw

http://www.irinnews.org/report.aspx?ReportId=88395NEW YORK Thursday, March 11, 2010 (IRIN) - Haiti's economy depends on the estimated US$1.5 billion a year in remittances sent home by its million-strong diaspora. Dilip Ratha, lead economist at the World Bank, said the figure could be even higher, accounting for perhaps half the national income.NEW YORK Thursday, March 11, 2010 (IRIN) - Haiti's economy depends on the estimated US$1.5 billion a year in remittances sent home by its million-strong diaspora. Dilip Ratha, lead economist at the World Bank said the figure could be even higher, accounting for perhaps half the national income. [ http://blogs.worldbank.org/peoplemove/a-factsheet-on-haiti]

The money is funnelled into the country via banks, transfer agencies or informal "mailmen" (factuers), who make deliveries for friends and family, sometimes for payment. A 2007 Humanitarian Policy Group report for the Overseas Development Institute estimated that "an unknown but certainly large" amount of remittances were delivered this way. [http://www.humanitarianoutcomes.org/pdf/Remittancesduringcrisesimplicationsforhumanitarianresponse.pdf]
The 7.0 magnitude earthquake on 12 January 2010 halted non-emergency travel into Haiti for a time, putting a temporary stop to the factuers and preventing the central bank from distributing funds to branches in the countryside. Haitians in the United States and elsewhere were forced to find other ways to help relatives.

One place they turned was Fonkoze, a microfinance institution that has 42 branches scattered throughout Haiti and works with money transfer services like MoneyGram and Unitransfer, and the City National Bank of New Jersey.

"A woman in New Mexico called me in a panic - she hadn't ever done anything like this before," said Katleen Felix, a New York-based liaison for Fonkoze. "There were many calls like that."

Money flow

To keep these vital funds flowing, US Senators John Kerry (D-Massachusetts) and Evan Bayh (D-Indiana) asked Western Union and MoneyGram money transfer services to reduce or eliminate fees for people sending money to Haiti.

Western Union noted that it had reduced its transaction fees on 15 February, and would maintain them through 31 December 2010. Moneygram said it had offered $1 transfer fees in the wake of the earthquake, but on 14 February it had returned to its normal pricing schedule of 2.4 percent on average. Both companies detailed charitable assistance they were providing to Haiti. [http://www.tradingmarkets.com/news/stock-alert/wu_at-kerry-bayh-urging-western-union-and-moneygram-agree-to-modify-practices-on-money-transfers-to-h-826857.html]

Also helping the flow of money is the decision by the US government on January 18 to allow 200,000 of the roughly 500,000 undocumented Haitians in the US to be granted "temporary protected status", preventing their deportation for eighteen months and enabling them to use formal remittance networks. Many believe the status will likely be extended for at least an additional eighteen months.

Hervé Sabin, founder of the Rural Haiti Projectiv, which runs a number of youth development programmes in the Haitian countryside, said the remittance networks allowed money to arrive in the country in a "structured manner", and this was vitally important in a time of such instability.

The director of the remittances and development programme at the Inter-American Dialogue in Washington, Manuel Orozco, agreed, but thought the structure could be improved. Before the earthquake Haiti had about 400 remittance transfer points, "a relatively small, insufficient number, given the volume of monthly transfers that enter the country," he said.

Improving the network

"Modernizing the networks and promoting access will contribute to development: half a million of remittance-recipient households have a stock of savings between $200 and $1,000, the majority kept informally," Orozco noted.

"Funnelling those savings through banks and microfinance institutions could increase the country's meagre credit portfolio available for small businesses, which currently represents only five percent of all credit."

The World Bank's Ratha pointed out the "need to leverage these flows for local and national development (without directly interfering with these flows). The challenge would be to tame a temptation on the part of the government and the donor community to treat remittances as a substitute for aid or public spending on rebuilding efforts, especially in communities where migrants' relatives reside."

How much money will Haitians be able to send home? Fonkoze's Felix said they were plundering their bank accounts, cashing out their 401K retirement savings accounts, maxing out credit cards, and holding fundraisers. Orozco cautioned that the "capacity of the diaspora to help its homeland beyond current levels is quite limited."

Antoine Coq, a teacher in Brooklyn, New York, who is active in Haitian community organizations, conceded that the economy was sagging, but felt that the diaspora would "rise to the occasion". "We will use all means necessary to help Haiti."

pd/hehttp://www.irinnews.org/report.aspx?ReportId=88397NAIROBI Wednesday, March 10, 2010 (IRIN) - Violet Tinah, 40, a resident of Korogocho slum in the Kenyan capital, Nairobi, is living with HIV and was recently diagnosed with tuberculosis, but her biggest problem today is not disease - but hunger.NAIROBI Wednesday, March 10, 2010 (IRIN) - Violet Tinah, 40, a resident of Korogocho slum in the Kenyan capital, Nairobi, is living with HIV and was recently diagnosed with tuberculosis, but her biggest problem today is not disease - but hunger.

"When I went for the results that informed me that I had TB, I was very hungry; I'd had no breakfast and lunch and could barely walk," she told IRIN/PlusNews. "I had to be supported and put in a wheelchair to collect the drugs.

"Often I go without food and during such times I feel dizzy and nauseous after swallowing the [TB and HIV] drugs," the formerly prosperous carpenter added. "Putting food on the table is like a dream."

On the day she spoke to IRIN/PlusNews, Tinah had had only a cup of black tea for breakfast and no lunch; a concerned neighbour has brought her some porridge "to help me swallow my drugs". Tinah was hoping her unemployed nephew would pass by later with a little food.

Many of the slum's residents live on food salvaged from a nearby rubbish dump and sold on the streets of Korogocho.

According to a 2009 World Bank poverty assessment, the poor in Kenya spend 70 percent of their income on food on average - those in the poorest 20 percent of the population spend 77 percent. Sharp increases in the price of staples in 2008 - maize flour rose by as much as 130 percent between 2008 and 2009 - and a national food crisis in 2009 mean poverty has been on the rise.

The urban poor, most of whom do not farm, have been particularly hard hit.

Korogocho location chief Rebecca Balongo told IRIN/PlusNews that many programmes supporting HIV-affected households had collapsed. "It is not unusual to have a family share only a plate of food in a day," he said.

Little help

The Kenya Network of Women with AIDS, which until 2009 provided food assistance to about 4,000 HIV-positive people in slums in central Kenya, has had to shut down its feeding programme due to lack of funding.

"We are no longer giving food at our drop-in centres in Korogocho, Kiambiu, Soweto and Mathare slums in Nairobi, Kiandutu slums in Thika and Kiawara slums in Nyeri town," said KENWA advocacy programme officer James Ndung'u.

"KENWA is only providing highly nutritious porridge to the very weak and bedridden clients.

"The slums have high HIV prevalence rates and without food there are challenges; our nurse has reported clients failing to collect ARVs on schedule - they say they are busy looking for work to buy food," he added. "ARVs require one to have a proper diet, but on an empty stomach, there is a tendency to default and consequent risk of drug resistance."

A few programmes continue to provide support in the form of food or cash transfers. Concern Worldwide has started a cash transfer programme in Korogocho to provide food subsidies of about US$20 per month to 2,000 extremely vulnerable households, including bed-ridden HIV-positive people.

However, Concern's programme is due to end in June, after which the government is expected to take it over. Slum residents and officials are not optimistic; chief Balongo says the government did not send any food support to her area in 2009.

Employment is scarce for the slum's residents, especially if they are weak. Frederick Egesa works as a watchman, earning about $47 a month. He walks to work, has no days off and is docked two-and-a-half days’ pay for every day he misses work.

"Look at my many dependents - I spend 1,000 shillings [$13] on rent and have 200 shillings [$2.60] daily for food, so we have to skip eating at times," he said. "When I collect my ARVs, I am advised to eat well, but how do I manage a balanced diet?"

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http://www.irinnews.org/report.aspx?ReportId=88373BOSASSO Monday, March 08, 2010 (IRIN) - A long civil war, frequent droughts, unemployment and high food prices have led to an increase in the number of street children in Bosasso, the commercial capital of Somalia’s self-declared autonomous region of Puntland, with NGOs and government officials calling for urgent steps to resolve the problem. BOSASSO Monday, March 08, 2010 (IRIN) - A long civil war, frequent droughts, unemployment and high food prices have led to an increase in the number of street children in Bosasso, the commercial capital of Somalia’s self-declared autonomous region of Puntland, with NGOs and government officials calling for urgent steps to resolve the problem.

"In the past, most of the children on the streets of Bosasso were from south-central Somalia," said Muse Ghele, governor of Bari region. "Now we are noticing more and more locals both from urban and rural areas.”

Between 4,500 and 5,500 children are on Bosasso's streets, according to the governor.

Abdulaziz Mohamed Hamud, child protection consultant with OxfamNovib, told IRIN: “You have to understand that numbers of street children are estimates and could be even higher... There are no exact figures but the numbers seem to be increasing daily."

Young providers

The children, according to Abdihakim Farah Arush, chairman of the Bari Child Protection Network (BCPN), fall into two categories: those who work to help their families, mostly local and internally displaced (IDPs) who go home at night; as well as those who sleep on the street, mostly substance abusers.

The reasons for the children being on the street vary, he said. Many of those from south-central Somalia were separated from their families on their way north while others end up on the streets to help their families, or fend for themselves.

Shoe-shining and car-washing, serving as porters or washing sacks in the market are the jobs of most of the street boys in Bosasso.

Arush said while most street children were boys, more and more girls were joining them, cleaning business premises or people’s homes. Some children as young as two or three were put on the streets to beg by desperate families.

Hamud of OxfamNovib said most of the children suffered abuse and physical violence. "Many of them have the scars as proof. On the street at night they are easy prey with no one to protect them."

Risks

Many have been infected with "all sort of diseases, such as TB, skin diseases; while many others suffer from malnutrition. Most don’t know what they suffer from," Hamud added.

Abdullahi Said, 12, is on the street because he has to help his mother with his three younger siblings. He collects garabo (leftover khat) and sells it to those who cannot afford the good khat or he shines shoes. On average, he takes home 30,000 Somali shillings (about US$1) a day.

"What I make from garabo and shining shoes is what I take home to help my mother feed us,” he told IRIN. Said’s father died in 2009 so the responsibility of helping his mother care for the family fell on him.

“My mother used to go to the market and do any job she could find but now she cannot even do that. She just had the baby,” he said.

There are no agencies that help the street children directly, said Hamud.

Arush’s agency is part of a child protection network in Puntland. "Unfortunately we cannot provide material support but we advocate for them and when we get information that they are in trouble we try to intervene,” Arush said.

Hamud said a lot more was needed to help the children. "First, serious assessments need to be carried out to determine the extent of the problem,” he said. Many of the older children were turning to crime. “They not only pose a security, but also a social, risk. We need to address their needs as a matter of great urgency.”

Legal intervention needed

He said Puntland should have a separate juvenile justice system to deal with child offenders. “Now, children arrested by the police end up in the same cells as adults, where they are vulnerable to abuse.”

He said those involved in child protection were trying to lobby the legislature for a Juvenile Justice Law, aimed at guaranteeing children's rights, so that children would no longer be kept in jail with adults or tried in adult courts.

“Agencies and local authorities should do everything possible to provide them with an alternative to the streets.”

Governor Ghele said the authorities had identified a site to build a home for the children but did not have the financial resources to build and operate it. "We need a lot of support if we are going to put them in safe homes," he said.

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http://www.irinnews.org/report.aspx?ReportId=88351MBABANE Monday, March 08, 2010 (IRIN) - The myriad crises afflicting Swaziland can only be solved with a holistic approach, not a piecemeal one, the World Food Programme (WFP) deputy executive director, Sheila Sisulu, said during a recent tour of the country.MBABANE Monday, March 08, 2010 (IRIN) - The myriad crises afflicting Swaziland can only be solved with a holistic approach, not a piecemeal one, the World Food Programme (WFP) deputy executive director, Sheila Sisulu, said during a recent tour of the country.

Swaziland, a small landlocked country with a population of about one million people, is ruled by King Mswati III - sub-Saharan Africa's last absolute monarch - while contending with the world's highest HIV/AIDS prevalence, food insecurity, poor education systems, extreme poverty and a moribund economy.

Miriam Dlamini, a widowed mother of five living in rural Mliba, about 60km north of Swaziland's second city, Manzini, personifies the plight of many Swazis.

"My husband died of AIDS and left me alone to work the fields, but I am HIV positive. I need food for my children, and for myself so my ARVs work properly, but I cannot do the farm work alone, and I have no money to hire helpers or to pay for seeds and fertilizer and a team of oxen to plough," she told IRIN.

In the largely rural economy, where 70 percent of Swazis survive in a state of chronic poverty, her daily burden - like that of many others - is overwhelming. "I don't know where to begin. I wake up tired and when the day is over, so little has been done, and that makes me more tired," Dlamini said. "I receive [WFP food] packages and ARVs from the clinic, but I must travel to both places with no money for transport."

A change for the better could be on the way. On 3 March 2010, Swaziland became a member of the Common Africa Agriculture Development Programme (CAADP) - an initiative by the African Union (AU) and the New Partnership for Africa's Development (NEPAD) to address food security and agricultural production.

At the signing ceremony in the Swazi capital, Mbabane, Sisulu told a round table discussion that the spill-over of one crisis into another compounded the effects of each crisis, and the country would be hard pressed to meet the UN Millennium Development Goals (MDGS).

Interconnectiions

"Agricultural production, HIV and AIDS, food security and poverty are interconnected and cannot be tackled in isolation of each other. We believe a comprehensive approach is key to achieving the underlying objective of CAADP ... meeting Goal One of the Millennium Development Goals of eradicating extreme poverty and hunger ... at current trends, Swaziland is unlikely to achieve [this] by 2015."

Swaziland is no longer a net exporter of foodstuffs: drought and a population that has tripled since independence from Britain in 1968 have forced people to farm marginal lands, while HIV/AIDS has decimated the agricultural workforce. According to UNAIDS, about 26 percent of Swaziland's sexually active population are infected with HIV.

Membership of CAADP paves the way for the establishment of an Agricultural Development Bank of Swaziland, which could be used to provide loans or grants for subsidising agricultural inputs.

Such an eventuality would necessitate a sea change in relations between the government and non-governmental organizations (NGOs), which provide vital support in most of the country's social and agricultural spheres.

"Laudable as this show of support is, the question remains whether government can indeed work with NGOs, the private sector and the beneficiaries," said a director - who declined to be identified - of an NGO affiliated to the Congress of Non-Governmental Organisations (CANGO), an umbrella organization for NGOs.

"The [government] ministries have always worked independently - they are territorial. It will be interesting to see if they can work together, and if the voices of the rural farmers will be heard, or whether solutions will be imposed," he told IRIN.

UNAIDS Country Coordinator Sophia Monico noted that "All the UN agencies are coordinating our work on AIDS. We're setting an example by forging an alliance between specialties."

She said the UN would adopt a comprehensive approach: food security issues would be handled by WFP, AIDS issues would be handled by UNAIDS, the UN Children's agency (UNICEF) would deal with issues concerning children affected by HIV and AIDS, and poverty reduction issues, under the authority of the UN Development Programme, would be strategically coordinated.

"It's like getting relief supplies to areas hit by disaster - it's not enough to put food on the plane, you have to get the delivery infrastructure working, the beneficiaries' needs sorted out, and rebuild the agriculture sector to make food production sustainable again," said Charles Ndwandwe, a food aid distributor in Mliba.

"That's what must be done in Swaziland," he commented. "It's harder when AIDS complicates things, but this is being factored in."

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http://www.irinnews.org/report.aspx?ReportId=88355BOSASSO Tuesday, March 02, 2010 (IRIN) - Prolonged and persistent droughts have drastically changed the fortunes of Hujale Jama, 80. Originally from the village of Has Wanaje, 480km east of Bosasso, commercial capital of the self-declared autonomous state of Puntland, Jama was once considered fairly well-off. Then the drought slowly decimated his livestock. Today, he lives with relatives in Bosasso, without any livestock to his name. BOSASSO Tuesday, March 02, 2010 (IRIN) - Prolonged and persistent droughts have drastically changed the fortunes of Hujale Jama, 80. Originally from the village of Has Wanaje, 480km east of Bosasso, commercial capital of the self-declared autonomous state of Puntland, Jama was once considered fairly well-off. Then the drought slowly decimated his livestock. Today, he lives with relatives in Bosasso, without any livestock to his name.

Jama is one of thousands of people in Bosaso displaced by drought who have moved to urban centres where they depend on relatives. He spoke to IRIN in Bosasso:

“Three years ago I had 600 heads of goats and sheep and more than 30 camels. I was a man of means and would be asked to help those with less. I was one of the leaders of my community and never needed help, I was the one helping.

"Nowadays, I am the one asking people for help. I have seen many people lose all their animals but I never thought I would be one of them. It is not what I expected to be doing at my age. My livestock died one by one until there was nothing left.

"Unfortunately I am not the only one suffering. Many people in this town were once herders but have since lost everything. The droughts are becoming longer and more devastating. When there was no pasture or water in our area we would move to another part of the country but all areas are now the same; no pasture no water.

"If the situation continues like this, there will be no more people left in the countryside. The young ones can adjust and maybe find something to do but what is there for an old man like me? We are almost invisible; nobody is talking about rural people who are destitute.

"Today I am sick but I don’t have the money to go to the doctor. I never thought I would depend on anyone but look at me now. I used to be a respected man but I don’t feel like a man.

"What will I do? I cannot beg at my age."

ah/mw http://www.irinnews.org/report.aspx?ReportId=88274VIENTIANE Tuesday, March 02, 2010 (IRIN) - Thousands of people living in a fertile wetland on the edge of Vientiane may lose their livelihoods and be relocated as part of the capital's urbanization plans, the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) says.VIENTIANE Tuesday, March 02, 2010 (IRIN) - Thousands of people living in a fertile wetland on the edge of Vientiane may lose their livelihoods and be relocated as part of the capital's urbanization plans, the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) says.

Beung That Luang is a 20 sqkm marsh on the eastern edge of Vientiane Municipality. More than 35,000 people live there - 5 percent of the municipal population.

According to FAO, a new urban centre is slated for construction in the wetland area, while many other large-scale development projects have been proposed.

"Many of these projects would result in the relocation of hundreds of families and the destruction of livelihoods for thousands more. It is therefore crucial that Beung That Luang be developed consistent with the needs of the poor households living in and around the wetland," the FAO's Representative to Laos, Serge Verniau, told IRIN.

The 670ha urban centre is to be built by foreign companies under a 49-year land concession in the wetland area, according to the FAO. Local media reports say the centre is being developed at a cost of US$1.1 billion, while compensation for those relocated is estimated at more than $100 million.

Resistance mounting

However, residents in the wetland say they do not want to move. Nine village chiefs have started bringing in relatives and friends to boost the population.

"Villagers are unaware of the development projects. We fear that our villages will be relocated one by one. We hope that if the population rises, the relocation and development process will slow down," Peung Sungala, chief of Konkhornneua Village, said.

To preserve the wetland's economic activities and its ecology, the FAO has proposed an ecological park for the area that advocates sustainable agricultural activities, ecological tourism, reforestation, and a visitor education centre.

Endangered livelihoods

The wetland is considered the most fertile farming land in Vientiane Municipality. The Ministry of Public Works and Transport, FAO and environmental NGO WWF estimate the marsh generates nearly $5 million a year for the local economy, which would be lost to urbanization.

Forty-five percent of the total population on the marsh engages in agriculture and fish farming as their primary source of income.

"We have all been asked to sell and move off our farm land, but we are uncertain of when they will force us to leave," said Bountieng Keomanyvong, a farmer from Nonwai Village Xaysettha District, in the wetland.

"It is rumoured that we will be moved to apartment blocks and will no longer be able to farm. We are all uncertain of what we will do if this happens, because at the moment we farm rice for a living," he said.

The marsh also works as a natural water purification and waste treatment system. Besides jeopardizing livelihoods, the FAO says urbanization plans may cause severe flooding, since the marsh acts as a floodwater retention system for Vientiane Municipality.

"Our marsh will soon become a concrete urbanization project," Vieng Keow, director of the Culture and Heritage Department at the Ministry of Information and Culture, told IRIN. "The farmers will lose a primary source of income and their cultural heritage [which is] attached to the marsh's history."

Uncertain future

Villagers say many questions regarding their resettlement are still unanswered, including the location of their new homes, what the houses will be like, and how they will be compensated.

Land titling is one of the most sensitive areas of debate in Laos, where many people can be moved off their land because they do not hold titles.

"Most villagers have no land owner certificate and some new buildings will occupy the protected areas," said Keow.

Those with land titles will be compensated by the government, but there is little guarantee that their livelihoods are protected.

"We are afraid that farmers will not be able to recover their livelihoods. There is no guarantee that farmers' resettlement compensations will secure a better life," said chief Sungala.

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http://www.irinnews.org/report.aspx?ReportId=88281GAZA CITY Tuesday, March 02, 2010 (IRIN) - More than 4,036 houses in the Gaza Strip were totally destroyed or beyond repair in the aftermath of Israel’s 23-day conflict with Hamas from 27 December 2008 to 17 January 2009, according to an April 2009 UNRWA and UN Development Programme assessment. GAZA CITY Tuesday, March 02, 2010 (IRIN) - More than 4,036 houses in the Gaza Strip were totally destroyed or beyond repair in the aftermath of Israel’s 23-day conflict with Hamas from 27 December 2008 to 17 January 2009, according to an April 2009 UNRWA and UN Development Programme assessment.

Rebuilding these homes has been almost impossible because Israel has not allowed cement and building materials into Gaza since June 2007, saying they could be seized by Hamas for military purposes.

The UN has repeatedly called for the lifting of the blockade on humanitarian grounds. 

See Gaza mud brick houses slideshow: http://www.irinnews.org/photogallery/Gaza_mud_brick_houses_Mar2010/index.html

International donors pledged US$4.5 billion in aid for the Palestinian Authority, much of it specifically for Gaza, at a conference in Egypt in March 2009, but little has reached the Strip because of the continuing blockade and bitter divisions between political parties Hamas and Fatah.

Those made homeless in last year’s war have squeezed in with relatives, rented apartments or made do in their damaged homes, aid workers said.

A new project by the UN agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA) aims to build around 120 mud brick houses for dozens of homeless families in the next few months. Each house costs about US$10,000 and takes three months to build.

While the houses offer better conditions than tents and can stand for 100 years, they are not meant as a long-term solution, UNRWA said.

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http://www.irinnews.org/report.aspx?ReportId=88284JOHANNESBURG Tuesday, March 02, 2010 (IRIN) - Long dry spells in parts of Africa and erratic rainfall in Asia have cast uncertain clouds over crop yields for 2010 in the world's poorest countries. Food prices in most developing countries are down from their 2008 crisis levels, but still higher than they were in 2007. JOHANNESBURG Tuesday, March 02, 2010 (IRIN) - Long dry spells in parts of Africa and erratic rainfall in Asia have cast uncertain clouds over crop yields for 2010 in the world's poorest countries. Food prices in most developing countries are down from their 2008 crisis levels, but still higher than they were in 2007.

In the first of a four-part series on food security in some of the world's most vulnerable countries, IRIN asks, "Are we heading for another crisis?"

It would take "two consecutive bad years" for a repeat of the 2008 food and fuel crisis to arise, said Abdolreza Abbassian, economist and secretary of the Intergovernmental Group on Grains at the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO). Unlike the situation in 2008, global cereal stocks are at comfortable levels.

But there were "many factors at play" in food prices. "In fact, we're projecting prices to stay firm, even in the medium term (the next 10 years), although they may not exceed the highs witnessed in 2008," Abbassian commented.

It is still a matter of adequate supply to meet growing demand, and the supply of food cereals has been declining. The gradual reduction in subsidies and support for the world's biggest producers in the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) countries - the US and the European Union (EU) in particular - has meant smaller surpluses.

"On the other hand, population growth and economic prosperity fuel demand - as in Asia, especially in China and India - therefore, we are moving into a situation whereby supply expansion could decelerate, while demand will continue to grow - sometimes even faster than in the past," said Abbassian. 

A paper by the OECD suggested that food prices would start rising again, "(albeit not to 2008 peaks) once economies come out of the recession, as the basic structural demand and supply-side determinants are still very much present ... [with] demand growing faster than supply. Food prices should therefore no longer be seen as a 'shock' or short-term 'crisis', but rather as a longer-term structural issue."

Biofuels still a threat

Some of the structural changes that brought about the 2008 food price crisis, such as diverting agricultural land from producing food cereals to grains for biofuel, had yet to be addressed, Abbassian said.

ActionAid, an international NGO, calculated in its new report, Meals per gallon: the impact of industrial biofuels on people and global hunger, that by 2020 biofuel consumption in the European Union (EU) would jump nearly four-fold, and that two-thirds would be imported, mainly from the developing world.

"Biofuels are conservatively estimated to have been responsible for at least 30 percent of the global food price spike in 2008," said ActionAid, which warned that a repeat of crisis could be in the offing, with the supply of food cereals likely to be compromised by a demand for biofuels in the EU.

"Up to 100 million more people could go hungry if Europe commits itself to a huge increase in biofuels consumption in order to meet new European Union legislation," said the report.

The legislation dates back to an agreement between the EU states in 2008 to meet 10 percent of their transport fuel needs from renewable sources, including biofuels, hydrogen and green electricity, by 2020.

In a scenario that takes into account a planned and predictable biofuel expansion in some countries, the US-based International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI), projected maize prices rising by more than 20 percent by 2020, and by more than 71 percent in a drastic expansion scenario.

C. Ford Runge and Benjamin Senauer, academics at the University of Minnesota, wrote in an article published in 2007 in Foreign Affairs, an American magazine, that if the prices of staple foods continued to increase as per the IFPRI projections, the number of food-insecure people in the world would rise by over 16 million for every percentage increase in the real prices of staple foods.

ActionAid noted that "If all global biofuel targets are met, it is predicted that food prices could rise by up to an additional 76 percent by 2020." The NGO said it found that EU companies had already acquired, or were negotiating for, at least five million hectares in developing countries, which could threaten food supplies of some of the most vulnerable populations.

According to FAO, one in six people in the world are now hungry, with the 2008 crisis having pushed another 100 million into poverty and food insecurity.

There could be a solution. The global stock of cereals, which has relied on countries in the western hemisphere, has begun to look towards the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS), a regional organization comprising the Russian Federation, Belarus, Ukraine, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Moldova, Turkmenistan, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan and Georgia.

Abbassian pointed out that Russia has become the world's second largest exporter of wheat after the US. "Unfortunately, they [the CIS] are located in a part of the world which is extremely vulnerable to environmental shocks."

Weaker international prices for sugar, dairy and cereals have caused FAO's Food Price Index, released on 2 March, to register a decline: "The index is down 21 percent from its peak in June 2008, but up 22 percent from the corresponding period a year ago," said Abbassian.

There was always a chance that prices might spike "as a result of market imbalances but, overall, high prices will encourage more investment in agriculture, which in turn will help in closing the gap between supply and demand", he noted.

Liliana Balbi, a senior economist at the FAO Global Information and Early Warning System, said she thought speculation was contributing to price volatility. "The fact is, prices go up quickly but don't come down fast."

Nevertheless, Abbassian was optimistic. "Technological progress and changing diets will help in maintaining a stable global food situation, even though developments at country/local level may not always be as rosy!"

The percentage hike in food prices varies between countries, as do the causes. Balbi's unit identified 33 countries that were the world's most food insecure in its Crop Prospects and Food Situation report for February - the first in 2010. Many were going hungry because they could not afford food.

Most countries on the February list have been there before; new entries are rain-poor Niger, conflict-torn Yemen and earthquake-hit Haiti.

The ActionAid report found that "each 10 percent increase in the prices of cereals (including rice) adds nearly US$4.5 billion to the aggregate cereals import cost of those developing nations that are net importers."

In the next three parts of the series, IRIN will provide a snapshot view of food vulnerability in the 33 countries spread across Africa, Asia and the Caribbean.

jk/he http://www.irinnews.org/report.aspx?ReportId=88287QUETTA Monday, March 01, 2010 (IRIN) - Significant development and poverty challenges in Balochistan Province, southwestern Pakistan, are being exacerbated by growing security concerns, according to aid workers. Decades of nationalist unrest, underdevelopment and the scaling down of UN and NGO activity have left residents feeling neglected and fearful for their safety, they say. QUETTA Monday, March 01, 2010 (IRIN) - Significant development and poverty challenges in Balochistan Province, southwestern Pakistan, are being exacerbated by growing security concerns, according to aid workers.

Decades of nationalist unrest, underdevelopment and the scaling down of UN and NGO activity have left residents feeling neglected and fearful for their safety, they say.

President Asif Zardari on a recent visit to the province, which is nearly as big as Germany but has a population of only 10 million, said he was aware of the problems but urged people not to resort to violence.

In April 2009 ethnic violence led to a wave of killings and riots.

“We know there is a feeling of sadness in Balochistan. The people here do not sob, and prefer to pick up guns,” he said in a statement on 25 February. He called for patience: “I have good knowledge of the problems of Balochistan. I need some time to solve these problems… There might not be any immediate relief, but over a period of time, you will witness significant change in your lives.”

Abductions

In recent years, there have been a number of abductions of aid workers, causing the UN and many NGOs to scale down operations, making life even harder for the most vulnerable. There have also been recent media reports of Taliban militants operating in the province.

“A few years ago, many NGOs were active here, running schools or offering aid. Now many have pulled out,” said Naimat Khan, 60, a resident of a village a few miles outside Quetta, the provincial capital. “This has also led to unemployment, because some NGOs have let local staff go.”

The head of the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR) office in Quetta, John Solecki, was kidnapped in February 2009 and released a few months later. Because of concerns over the safety of its staff, the UN scaled back operations in Balochistan in July 2009, and in October the World Food Programme (WFP) closed 20 food hubs, though Amjad Jamal, a spokesman for WFP in Pakistan, told IRIN WFP projects in the province were continuing “as usual”.

The reported abduction on 18 February 2010 of four Pakistani employees of US-based NGO Mercy Corps while visiting projects in Balochistan has added to concerns.

“Our programmes in Balochistan have been temporarily interrupted as we determine the nature of this incident,” Joy Portella, director of communications for Mercy Corps in Seattle, told IRIN.

Impact on health care

Access to health care is limited in Balochistan and officials in Islamabad and Quetta accept there is a need to improve the situation.

“There was good work going on for us here. Doctors came in to take care of women, but now after this latest incident where people have been abducted, we are worried no one will come,” local resident Azmatullah Jalal told IRIN from the town of Zhob, some 300km north of Quetta.

“Security concerns further handicap people, since few volunteers or NGO activists are now willing to travel in Balochistan,“ said Robina Mughul, who runs a voluntary clinic in Quetta.

Meanwhile, I.A. Rehman, secretary-general of the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan, told IRIN: “The problem in Balochistan is the perception of injustice as well as the reality of deprivation that people suffer.”

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http://www.irinnews.org/report.aspx?ReportId=88267BANGKOK Friday, February 26, 2010 (IRIN) - Thousands of migrant workers from Laos, Cambodia and Myanmar face possible deportation from Thailand unless they register their nationality this weekend.BANGKOK Friday, February 26, 2010 (IRIN) - Thousands of migrant workers from Laos, Cambodia and Myanmar face possible deportation from Thailand unless they register their nationality this weekend.

Under a nationality verification (NV) scheme, migrants must register by 28 February for their work permits to be extended.

Thailand is a magnet for migrants seeking economic opportunities and the government says the process will give migrant workers legal status and better protect them from exploitative labour practices, including human trafficking and other rights violations.

However officials admit that just 500,000 people have applied to take part in the NV process so far.

And with threats of immediate deportation for those who do not comply, rights activists are worried.

“We support the policy as a concept, but the way in which that concept has been applied is simply terrible,” Andy Hall, director of the Migrant Justice Programme at the Human Rights and Development Foundation, said during a public discussion on the issue on 24 February in Bangkok.

“We have to give credit to the government for trying to sort out the illegal migration problem in Thailand, but we think the nationality verification policy has failed and is failing.”

Humanitarian “consequences”

According to the Thai Department of Employment, there are some 1.3 million legal migrant workers in the kingdom.

In addition, an estimated two million are irregular migrants, according to the International Organization for Migration (IOM), mainly from Myanmar.

Jackie Pollock, director of the MAP Foundation, a Thai NGO that assists migrants, warned that mass deportations of Burmese could have serious humanitarian consequences.

“There is a high likelihood the Burmese regime would close the border to stop them, so the migrants would be stuck in no man’s land because Thailand doesn’t want them either,” Pollock told IRIN.

“That’s when they start hiding out in fields and jungles,” she said, citing previous mass deportations in the late 1990s where NGOs were left to assist Burmese migrants stranded along the border.

Verification process questioned

Under the NV process, applicants are required to submit information, including their name, age and place of birth, both to the Thai government and to their home country, to confirm their identity.

So far, most of those who have complied come from Cambodia and Laos, whose governments have been sending representatives to areas where their citizens live and work in Thailand to help register them.

But the process is proving problematic for Burmese migrants, whose government only agreed late last year to set up three areas near the border with Myanmar where Burmese workers in Thailand could have their documents processed.

Before then, they were expected to travel back to their home provinces.

However, according to NGOs working with Burmese migrants, many are reluctant to provide details to the Myanmar authorities for fear their families back home could be forced to pay additional taxes and subject to other forms of pressure.

“Even if the Burmese government doesn’t have a policy to do bad things with that information now, they are worried that might change in the future,” said Hall.

The process is also expensive, with NGOs claiming each worker has to pay up to US$300 to brokers to help with the paperwork - the equivalent of several months’ wages.

According to a Human Rights Watch (HRW) report [see: http://www.hrw.org/en/reports/2010/02/23/tiger-crocodile-0] on migrant worker abuses launched this week, workers are already forced to pay up to $150 annually to brokers to renew their work permits, visas and health insurance.

The report also outlined the abuses that migrant workers allegedly suffer, including extortion, beatings and even extra-judicial killing, at the hands of Thai police and their employers.

Increasing vulnerability

The prospect of mass deportations was criticized by the UN Special Rapporteur on Migrants, Jorge Bustamante, who said the NV process would increase the vulnerability of irregular migrants in Thailand.

"Among the groups who may potentially be deported, there may be some who may be in need of international protection and should not be returned to the country of origin,” warned Bustamante in an 18 February statement [http://www.reliefweb.int/rw/rwb.nsf/db900sid/SKEA-82SCY7?OpenDocument&rc=3&cc=tha].

"If pursued, the threats of mass expulsion will result in unprecedented human suffering and will definitely breach fundamental human rights obligations," he warned.

The Bangkok-based Global Alliance Against Traffic in Women also warned that the threat of mass deportations would increase the risk of trafficking.

“Restrictive migration policies are one of the main causes of trafficking,” it said in a 23 February statement. “If working-class migrants are not able to access legal or safe migration and labour channels, third party agents become one of their only options to access opportunities abroad.”

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http://www.irinnews.org/report.aspx?ReportId=88244MBABANE Thursday, February 25, 2010 (IRIN) - The High Court of Swaziland ruled on 23 February 2010 that some married women will be allowed to register property in their own name. It has been five years since the new Constitution granted women equal status, after centuries of being classified and treated as minors.MBABANE Thursday, February 25, 2010 (IRIN) - The High Court of Swaziland ruled on 23 February 2010 that some married women will be allowed to register property in their own name. It has been five years since the new Constitution granted women equal status, after centuries of being classified and treated as minors.

Gender activists greeted the ruling as a small victory; despite the 2005 enactment of the Constitution, the second-class status of women in the country ruled by sub-Sahara's last absolute monarch, King Mswati III, has largely remained intact, denying women their inheritance rights and hobbling their progress as entrepreneurs and traders.

"I went to apply for a bank loan, and I was shocked to find that nothing has changed for women in this country. The loan was approved for my business, the bank was in support of my project, but the bank manager asked me, 'Where is your husband? He must sign the loan forms,'" Thabsile Masuku told IRIN.

"The bank did not recognize me as an adult who can enter into a contract. Legally, I am just a minor who is dependant on my husband. He is a good man but the situation is galling - I am not dependant on my husband, I am an independent person, but in Swaziland I don't exist," she said.

A woman who declined to be identified told IRIN that a house she had built from the proceeds of her chicken-breeding business was sold by her husband without her knowledge. In Swaziland the husband remains the legal administrator of the marriage estate, to use as he likes - with or without his wife's knowledge or consent.

Lack of political will

Although the Constitution has granted women equal rights with men, in practice old laws still on the statute books continue to define gender relations. Observers blame a lack of political will for the slow progress in replacing laws that conflict with the Constitution.

Lomcebo Dlamini, director of the Swaziland branch of Women in Law in Southern Africa - one of the legal bodies advising the Mswati-appointed Constitutional Review Commission during the 10 years it took to create the Constitution - told IRIN that gender equality could be partly achieved with a new law that defined modern marriages.

"The Marriage Act No. 47 of 1964 dates from the colonial era before Swaziland's independence [in 1968] and was really written with European residents in mind. Under the law, Swazis are assumed to be wed according to the traditional practice, which falls under the rules of Swazi Law and Custom that Swazis have always lived by," said Lomcebo Dlamini.

When the Constitution took effect, it stated that all laws counter to the Constitution were null and void, yet a recent ruling by the High Court of Swaziland said government must be given time to revise or repeal all non-compliant laws, but failed to provide a timeframe.

Activism has contributed to eroding gender-prejudiced legislation, and this week the High Court amended the 1968 Deeds Registry Act by making it possible for a Swazi woman to register immovable property, like a home or business, in her own name.

Justice Qinisile Dlamini, the High Court's sole female judge, ruled that "Section 151 (2) of the Constitution states that the High Court has jurisdiction to enforce fundamental human rights and freedoms guaranteed by (the Constitution). This includes the right to equality, which is guaranteed by section 20 and 28 of the Constitution."

However, the ruling only applies to women married in a civil ceremony, and with a community of property agreement. About 80 percent of Swaziland's one million people live on communal Swazi Nation Land under customary law administered by chiefs.

"The marriage law must be changed because it assumes that all Swazi women are married the traditional way, which is really arranged marriages that unite two families. A woman is a minor under her parent's homestead until she goes to her husband's homestead, where she is also a minor. The law considers the husband the administrator of the marital property," said Lomcebo Dlamini.

Polygamy

Social historian Anita Magongo told IRIN: "Traditional marriages are polygamous, which is one reason why a man is given administrative control. How do you divide administration of family property amongst any number of wives? ... A traditional homestead is a communal affair, without any real property."

The question of land ownership was also problematic. "The land belongs to the King, and Swazis reside on a piece of land at the pleasure of their chief. There was no wage-earning or commerce, no material objects beyond blankets and pots, and no need for loans or savings - but that was then."

With increasing numbers of women widowed by HIV/AIDS and in need of family property on which to live and raise their children, AIDS activists object to Swazi Law and Custom that results in the family of the deceased husband inheriting all marital property.

Widows are often left destitute, but custom dictates that a widow must mourn for at least six months, during which she is forbidden to leave the home, preventing her from working to support her children and compounding the vulnerability of the family.

"A new Marriage Act is essential," said Lomcebo Dlamini. "Fewer women are entering into traditional marriages, and it is wrong for the law to assume that 21st century Swazi women live as the Colonial-era lawmakers assumed they did long ago."

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http://www.irinnews.org/report.aspx?ReportId=88230ANTANANARIVO Wednesday, February 24, 2010 (IRIN) - Tensions between street traders and the city authorities in Madagascar's capital, Antananarivo, are mounting as hundreds of recently unemployed textile industry workers compete with established informal traders; textile factories have been closing since the country was suspended from a preferential trade agreement with the US.ANTANANARIVO Wednesday, February 24, 2010 (IRIN) - Tensions between street traders and the city authorities in Madagascar's capital, Antananarivo, are mounting as hundreds of recently unemployed textile industry workers compete with established informal traders; textile factories have been closing since the country was suspended from a preferential trade agreement with the US.

"Before, there were just a few stalls here - now there is someone selling something, every step you take," Naina Ravaoarinirina, a cosmetics vendor, told IRIN, hiding her goods from sight as a municipal patrol passed by. "But there is not enough room now for everyone in the official street market."

Factories operating under the African Growth and Opportunities Act (AGOA) - an agreement permitting some African states to export duty free goods to the US - employed about 50,000 people and provided work to a further 100,000 indirectly, according to the government. Madagascar was suspended from AGOA on 31 December 2009.

Preferential access to US markets is determined by democratic practices and good governance, among other things. Madagascar was deemed ineligible after Andry Rajoelina assumed power in March 2009 with the backing of the army, a move widely condemned as a coup.

"The March 2009 undemocratic transfer of power and the inability to establish a return to democracy have violated one of the vital criteria for Madagascar's continued eligibility for these trade preferences," said a statement released by the US State Department in December 2009.

The collapse of a multi-million dollar industry

Madagascar's textile industry accounts for about US$600 million annually; more than half its income is derived from exports to the US, according to industry observers. Contracts placed in 2009 have kept the factories running in one of the world's poorest countries.

"As lead times [expire] on orders placed before the agreement [came to an end], factories are laying off workers and we are facing an explosion in the numbers of unemployed," Jessie Andriamampianina, a director of the Antananarivo-based Association of Free Trade Businesses, told IRIN. "The impact of the loss of the AGOA agreement is very negative for Madagascar."

Robert Strauss, head of the American Chamber of Commerce in Madagascar, told IRIN that a quarter of the jobs in the formal economy were dependent on AGOA, and the reintroduction of US import duties of up to 34 percent had made keeping factories open unprofitable.

The rapid decline of the textile industry was also having a knock-on effect in other countries in the region, including Mauritius, Swaziland, Lesotho and South Africa, where many of the materials used in Madagascar's textile factories, such as zips, were produced, Strauss said.

Unemployed compete with informal traders

The flood of unemployed textile workers now operating as informal traders has forced the city's authorities to turn one of Antananarivo busiest thoroughfares into a pedestrian walkway and designate new areas for markets, but the demand for informal markets is outpacing supply.

"I used to be able to earn 20,000 ariary ($9.30) a day," said Soloniaina Rasoarimanana, who has been selling clothes from a pavement stall for 10 years. "Now, with the political crisis and more competition, I earn around 5,000 ariary ($2.30) a day."

Fabien Rakotonirina, a textile factory machinist who lost his job in December 2010, told IRIN: "Here on the street there is not enough profit. In the factory I earned 10,000 ariary ($4.65) a day, now I earn 6,000 ($2.80)."

The Minister of Economy and Industry, Richard Fienena, told IRIN: "There are projects for those who will be made redundant. There is a project for agribusiness, a project to create high-intensity labour forces for demolition work, a project for public works - all these options are waiting for when people are made redundant."

Andriamampianina dismissed this as "unrealistic". Few states recognize Rajoelina's government, including the Southern African Development Community, the regional body of which Madagascar and 13 other states are members.

Factory owners and workers have called on Rajoelina to reach an agreement with his political opponents so as to bring about a return to legitimate governance in Madagascar that would allow the AGOA suspension to be lifted, but many fear the textile industry may never recover from the effects of the coup-style change of government.

cc/go/he http://www.irinnews.org/report.aspx?ReportId=88224CAIRO Tuesday, February 23, 2010 (IRIN) - A new report by the UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF) and the Egyptian government says the number of children living in income-poor households is increasing, causing poorer living conditions and a greater deprivation of their rights as children. CAIRO Tuesday, February 23, 2010 (IRIN) - A new report by the UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF) and the Egyptian government says the number of children living in income-poor households is increasing, causing poorer living conditions and a greater deprivation of their rights as children.

Entitled Child Poverty and Disparities in Egypt, and released on 16 February in Cairo, the report said Egypt’s economic growth in the years leading up to the 2009 financial crisis had not adequately benefited the nation’s estimated 28 million children.

“This growth has not led to a proportionate reduction in income poverty or deprivation,” said the study, which is part of a global series of UNICEF studies on child poverty and disparities.

Economic growth is often seen by commentators as failing to keep up with Egypt’s rapidly rising population.

The report said 23 percent of children under 15 were living in poverty (on less than US$1 a day) and that income poverty was highly correlated with shelter deprivation.

It said more than a quarter of Egyptian children (seven million) were deprived of one or more of their rights under the 1989 Convention on the Rights of the Child, ratified by Egypt. Around five million children were deprived of appropriate housing, including shelter, water and sanitation standards; and 1.6 million under fives experienced health and food deprivation.

“It’s important to look at how poverty affects children’s lives and how we can address it,” Sigrid Kaag, UNICEF regional director for the Middle East and North Africa, said at a gathering to discuss the new study. “A child who lives in poverty rarely gets a second chance at education or a healthy start in life.”

Mushira Khatab, Egypt’s family and population state minister, said at the gathering: “The government must take children into consideration when it comes to formulating policies aimed at ending poverty. Investing in the nation’s children can produce good results. Education will get these children out of poverty.”

She called on the government to introduce special laws for the protection of children.

Rural areas worse

The poverty rate among children in rural areas was more than double that in urban areas, and much higher in the south than in the north, according to the study. The south, known as Upper Egypt, had the highest incidence of poverty among children - 45.3 percent.

Girls and boys were equally vulnerable to poverty and deprivation of rights, but girls in rural areas were the least likely to attend school or complete their education, thus increasing the likelihood of them being poor in adulthood.

The study recommended that policies be directly aimed at children to alleviate their poverty.

“If we’re to break the cycle of poverty, it’s key that children are at the heart of development policies,” Kaag said.

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http://www.irinnews.org/report.aspx?ReportId=88203NAIROBI Sunday, February 21, 2010 (IRIN) - With eight natural disasters in Haiti since 1994, January’s earthquake is likely to see hundreds of thousands more Haitians emigrate, not only to escape the impact of the latest disaster but also to avoid the next one - as well as political strife and poverty. NAIROBI Sunday, February 21, 2010 (IRIN) - With eight natural disasters in Haiti since 1994, January’s earthquake is likely to see hundreds of thousands more Haitians emigrate, not only to escape the impact of the latest disaster but also to avoid the next one - as well as political strife and poverty.

The cost of rebuilding Haiti after the earthquake on 12 January, which killed 217,000 people and displaced 511,405, could reach US$14 billion, according to a new study by the Inter-American Development Bank. http://www.iadb.org/features-and-web-stories/2010-02/english/haiti-reconstruction-cost-may-near-14-billion-idb-study-shows-6528.html

An exodus of Haitians fleeing legally or otherwise has begun; in addition, there are more than 500,000 internally displaced, according to the UN.

Mark Turner, an official of the International Organization for Migration (IOM) in Haiti, said: “Large numbers of Haitians migrated abroad in the past 10 years but we knew that the diaspora will grow faster after January’s earthquake.”

According to Kathleen Newland and Elizabeth Grieco of the Migration Policy Institute, the principal destinations are the US and Dominican Republic. Others historically include Guadeloupe, France, French Guyana, the Bahamas and Martinique.

Statistics compiled by the World Bank in 2009 http://go.worldbank.org/QGUCPJTOR0 show about a million Haitians were living overseas in 2009, about half of them in the US.

According to the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR), a few days after the January earthquake, foreign governments started tightening border controls and putting in place more secure procedures in anticipation of the expected influx from Port-au-Prince http://www.unhcr.org/40324c474.html .

Media reports say a million Haitians were living in the neighbouring Dominican Republic before 12 January. After the earthquake, the country suspended repatriation of illegal Haitians and opened its borders to let in the injured. The country also processed documents for Haitians seeking to legalize their stay so they could visit family in Haiti.

Media reports estimate that 30,000-50,000 Haitians could have entered Dominican territory in the past month, including 15,000-20,000 injured.

Strength of remittances

World Bank economists say that allowing a larger number of Haitians to reside abroad would actually help the nation’s economic development as a strong diaspora would send remittances home while decreasing domestic pressures on the Haitian government.

According to Dilip Ratha, lead economist at the World Bank http://blogs.worldbank.org/peoplemove/node/1233 , Haiti receives $1.5-$1.8 billion in remittances each year. With a 20 percent increase in the average remittance per migrant, another 200,000 migrants could remit an extra $360 million in 2010.

According to the US Census Bureau's American Community Survey, the US hosted 535,000 migrants from Haiti in 2008, of whom only 230,000 were lawful permanent residents.

The survey indicated that in 2008, Haitians comprised the fourth-largest immigrant group (in the US) from the Caribbean, after Cuba (975,000), the Dominican Republic (771,910) and Jamaica (636,589).

Special measures in the US

On 15 January, the US Department of Homeland Security http://www.uscis.gov/portal/site/uscis/menuitem.eb1d4c2a3e5b9ac89243c6a7543f6d1a/?vgnextoid=e54e60f64f336210VgnVCM100000082ca60aRCRD&vgnextchannel=e54e60f64f336210VgnVCM100000082ca60aRCRD announced that Haitian nationals residing in the US before 12 January could apply for Temporary Protected Status (TPS). Another 200,000 Haitians immigrants are expected.

So far, TPS is granted to qualifying citizens of Haiti, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua, Somalia, and Sudan.

Haitians applying for TPS would receive a work permit for 18 months, on the basis that their personal safety would be endangered by returning to Port-au-Prince.

According to the US Bureau of Citizenship and Immigration Services http://www.uscis.gov/, as of 12 February, 12,000 Haitians had applied for TPS status. Another 50,000 have been approved to reunite with family in the US but are in Haiti awaiting a visa.

Not refugees

Although there are no official figures for the total number of people who have fled Haiti since January, in the past 10 days alone, the US Coast Guard is reported to have stopped two large boats with 78 and 88 Haitians respectively http://coastguardnews.com/coast-guard-rescues-and-repatriates-88-haitians/2010/02/17/ .

The two groups were immediately repatriated to Cap Haitien, amid international criticism because of a lack of asylum screening. This led to an appeal by UNHCR on 12 February, urging governments to suspend all involuntary returns and grant interim protection to Haitians regardless of their legal status on the basis of the emergency.

According to UNHCR http://www.unhcr.org/40324c474.html some countries neighbouring Haiti were planning to force Haitians to return home despite the fact that with over 1.2 million still homeless, the conditions are not conducive.

The technical definition of refugees, according to the 1951 Refugee Convention, includes people feeling persecution but not those fleeing natural disasters; hence, Haitians moving because of the earthquake are not considered refugees.

Loren B Landau, director of Forced Migration Studies Programme at the University of the Witwatersrand, in Johannesburg, told IRIN: “While some Haitians are clearly not victims of political persecution and fled only as a result of the earthquake, there are both moral and political imperatives to ensure that people are protected either within the country or elsewhere. Even if this is not an example of climate change-related displacement, the world’s response to this crisis may set the stage for how wealthy countries that border poor or island states will respond when those homelands are no longer able to sustain their populations.”

cp/bp/mwhttp://www.irinnews.org/report.aspx?ReportId=88176DAKAR Friday, February 19, 2010 (IRIN) - Opposition parties, Niger’s largest union and members of civil society announced their support on 19 February for a military ruling council that abducted President Mamadou Tandja the day before and suspended a contested constitution.DAKAR Friday, February 19, 2010 (IRIN) - Opposition parties, Niger’s largest union and members of civil society announced their support on 19 February for a military ruling council that abducted President Mamadou Tandja the day before and suspended a contested constitution, while others in the country are suspicious of coup leader intentions.

While the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) has condemned the coup as an unconstitutional “ascension to power”, Chris Fomunyoh, the regional director of West and Central Africa for the US-based NGO, National Democratic Institute, said President Tandja had been hanging on to power illegally.

“I would never say a coup is a good thing, but Tandja had so wronged the people of Niger that if his wrongs can be righted then democracy may have a chance to regain its cause in Niger.”

In the past year, President Tandja dissolved the parliament and constitutional court, organized a contested and boycotted referendum last August that removed presidential term limits – and would have allowed him to stay in power until at least 2013 – and proceeded with legislative elections in October that led to the country’s suspension from the regional trade bloc, ECOWAS.

Aid

The European Union then suspended more than US$600 million in annual budgetary support and development aid. The US frozen an estimated $50 million of non-humanitarian support.

“Niger was saved today [18 February],” animal trader Habibou El Hadj Manzo told IRIN in the northern desert town Agadez. “Even if there were some deaths, it [the coup] is forgivable because if nothing is done, it is the entire population that will die of hunger and thirst.”

More than half of the 11-million person population has only two months of food stock to last until the 2010 harvest – nine months away, according to United Nations.

The coup potentially saved the country from violence, Oumarou Keïta with the national human rights commission told IRIN. “The coup happened in the context of political tension; faltering negotiations exposed Niger to a potential conflict. The choice of Tandja and those close to him to isolate the country from the international community weighed heavily on its citizens.”

A Finance Ministry worker who preferred to remain anonymous told IRIN he was relieved by the takeover. “The president kept repeating the country has resources, but things were heating up with the famine that no one dares mention. Donors were leaving us. We were worried that things would get to the point where we would no longer receive salaries.”

“Rob the robber”

The coup may not be justified, but it was inevitable, Nigerien sociologist Issouf Bayard told IRIN from the capital, Niamey. “We tried to use our political institutions to get him to respect the constitution. Tandja dissolved them. We tried dialogue, which reached a stalemate. The likely outcomes were therefore a popular uprising, strikes that would have paralyzed the country or a military coup.”

Bayard said the 4 August 2009 constitution-changing vote was an act of theft. “Tandja was taking what did not rightfully belong to him by stealing that vote. We were then faced with a situation in which we had to rob the robber – even if in principle theft is wrong.”

Military rule

The country’s largest union has called for a quick return to civilian democratic rule.

Coup leader Djibrilla Hima Hamidou – who took part in the 1999 coup that killed President Ibrahim Maïnassara Baré – told IRIN the military council wants to stabilize the country, find a way out of the constitutional crisis and to protect Nigeriens from any further harm.

The government finance worker told IRIN he trusted the military was acting in good faith. “We do not want a [Guinean coup leader] Dadis on our hands who refuses to leave power, but it is too early to have those fears. We have been in a political crisis for the last six months. This may be our road out.”

Calls for Guinea’s 2008 coup leader Moussa Dadis Camara to step down from power steadily increased, culminating in an assassination attempt on his life last December.

When asked whether there was a risk that military rulers would move the country further from constitutionality, democracy analyst Fomunyoh replied: “There is little incentive for them. The Niger military has learned its lessons from the [1999] assassination of autocrat Ibrahim Maïnassara Baré and from the overthrow of Tanjda who could not dismantle democracy with impunity.”

pt/al/ci http://www.irinnews.org/report.aspx?ReportId=88174SAVANNAKHET Thursday, February 18, 2010 (IRIN) - Small towns in Laos are experiencing an influx of migrants in search of better living conditions, increasing the strain on infrastructure and services such as water and sanitation, the UN and government officials say.SAVANNAKHET Thursday, February 18, 2010 (IRIN) - Small towns in Laos are experiencing an influx of migrants in search of better living conditions, increasing the strain on infrastructure and services such as water and sanitation, the UN and government officials say.

Laos is experiencing a high urbanization rate of 4-5 percent per annum, adding to pressure on local authorities to provide basic infrastructure, according to the UN Human Settlements Programme (UN-HABITAT).

There are an estimated 139 small towns in Laos, and many of those along economic corridors – bordering Cambodia, China, Thailand and Vietnam – are seeing influxes from rural areas.  

“Many of these small towns experience high population growth, and increased pressure on the local environment. Small towns are now becoming increasingly polluted because of a lack of adequate infrastructure,” said Buahom Sengkhamyong, chief technical adviser for UN-HABITAT in Laos.

As part of its regional Mekong water and sanitation programme, the agency is providing improved services in small towns, especially along the economic corridors.

The lure of basic services

Water and sanitation has been identified as a development priority by the Lao government, which has floated an urban water sector investment plan estimated at US$266 million from 2005 to 2020.

But as the government improves services in small towns, they are proving a draw to migrants and creating unmanageable population growth in certain areas, including southern Savannakhet Province, according to UN-HABITAT and the government's Nam Papa State-Owned Water Supply Enterprise.

“In Savannakhet Province, water and sanitation services are a serious issue for many districts,” Phandola Khouanemeuangchane, director of Nam Papa Savannakhet, told IRIN.

“Yet, we have a more complicated problem: the districts with improved water and sanitation services are flooded with ‘resource migrants’. In the end, our services often do not meet the demands of these growing small towns,” he said.

For Kung, a 95-year-old woman from a village outside of Sounvouli District in Savannakhet Province, migration for her family to a small town is a dream.

“Of course I would like to be able to move my family to a small town for better services,” said Kung.

“Three times a day, I travel to the well to collect water for my family to drink. It’s a laborious and time-consuming chore. In April and May, our village well dries up and then we compete with our neighbours to reach the well first. There’s simply not enough water to go around,” she said.

Planning challenges

In Laos, insufficient data on small-town population growth means development programmes are planned according to the national population growth rate of 2.8 percent, rather than the local rate, which is unknown.

According to Nam Papa, the number of small towns, and the percentage of the country’s population of some 5.86 million living in small towns by 2015, will exceed the government’s own estimates.

“Our investments in the sector disregard the true impact of resource migrants. Funding will not be adequate and will not meet the demands of our small towns along the economic corridors of Savannakhet Province,” said Phandola.

The Lao government, in its 2004 National Growth and Poverty Eradication Strategy (NGPES), aims to improve services for an additional 1.95 million urban population.

But with rapid small-town growth, the NGPES will not be able to meet the demands for all the inhabitants needing improved water and sanitation services, officials say.

Meanwhile, small-town populations face the problem of the high cost of water, especially where local authorities lack the ability to supply it.

In the mountainous small town of Houn in Oudom Xai Province in northern Laos, one cubic meter of water is sold by private vendors for the equivalent of $3 - 26 times more than the average cost charged by Nam Papa.

“Unless improved services are provided, the people in small towns will get into the vicious cycle of poverty which they were trying to get away from in the first place,” said UN-HABITAT’s Sengkhamyong.

“Lack of water and sanitation infrastructure has a direct adverse impact on the quality of life of the communities, especially the poor,” he said.

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http://www.irinnews.org/report.aspx?ReportId=88153NIAMEY Thursday, February 18, 2010 (IRIN) - Small vendors abandoned their stalls as the typical lunch hour break opened with gunfire at the presidential palace shortly after 1pm local time in Niger’s capital, Niamey. Firing continued intermittently with the military blocking all roads leading to the palace. Government helicopters were circling the city and fired in the afternoon, according to residents.NIAMEY Thursday, February 18, 2010 (IRIN) - Small vendors abandoned their stalls as the typical lunch hour break opened with gunfire at the presidential palace shortly after 1pm local time in Niger’s capital, Niamey. Firing continued intermittently with the military blocking all roads leading to the palace. Government helicopters were circling the city and fired in the afternoon, according to residents.

“I left my bookstore rather than risk getting hit by stray fire,” Ismaël Issaka told IRIN from his home in Niamey. He told IRIN he heard gunfire near the hospital after 3pm, which is across from a military base.

A private clinic doctor in the capital, Amadou Boureima, told IRIN he had treated five patients with light gunshot wounds.

Elsewhere in the country, traffic and markets continued uninterrupted.

Military music

Former government information minister, Mariama Gamatié, told IRIN that state television and radio were still active as of 3pm. “We hear gunshots still, but if there has been a coup attempt and someone has taken over, the first thing that happens in Africa is that news goes off the air.” Shortly before 6pm local time, military music replaced news broadcasts on national radio.

Gamatié was the information minister at the time of the assassination of President Ibrahim Baré Mainassara in 1999 and is now a civil society member contesting President Tandja’s rule.

“We are paying the price for President Tandja’s power grab…We cannot afford his ego. We are in the middle of a famine. No one wants to use that word here because of the controversy in 2005. It is not a hunger crisis as government operators may call it. It is a famine.”

Admissions of malnourished children to feeding centres were 60 percent higher in January than at the same time last year, according to the US early warning network, FEWSNET.

The European Union, the largest bilateral donor supporting Niger government spending, has frozen its non-humanitarian aid until there is a return to “constitutional order” in Niger; the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) has suspended Niger’s membership.

Vice president of the opposition Democratic and Social Convention party (CDS) and government minister until he exceeded the term limit for holding ministerial positions in 2007, Abdou Labo, told IRIN he would not comment on presidential palace violence. “These are just rumours now and nothing has been confirmed. There is no use speculating.”

IRIN could not reach members of government or the ruling party.

Negotiations?

A contested 4 August 2009 referendum changed the constitution to extend presidential terms indefinitely, allowing President Tandja to stay in power after his allotted step-down date of 22 December last year.

The president assumed emergency powers after he dissolved parliament last May, followed by the constitutional court in June, which had twice ruled the referendum to be unconstitutional.

A twice-postponed ECOWAS meeting to consider the constitutional impasse in Niger – among other regional crises – took place in Abuja, Nigeria on 16 February.

In that meeting, ECOWAS appointed Senegal’s President Abdoulaye Wade as mediator, who was to join former Nigerian President Abdusalami Abubakar and an African Union representative in negotiating the stand-off between President Tandja and the opposition.

When asked how he felt about the recently revived negotiations with the government, opposition leader Labo told IRIN the opposition has made concessions and remains hopeful Niger can find a peaceful way out of crisis. “We welcome the mediators’ help and await the government’s counterproposals.”

Civil society member Gamatié was less optimistic President Tandja will cede any power.

“I am opposed to using military force to unseat President Tandja and will continue fighting democratically no matter what happened at the palace today. But this coup attempt was inevitable. If you tighten a noose long enough, the choked will cut it loose.”

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http://www.irinnews.org/report.aspx?ReportId=88160N'DJAMENA Wednesday, February 17, 2010 (IRIN) - Teachers demanding more pay to face higher food prices entered the third day of a nationwide strike. The government has called their demands "illegal" and "unjustified", because the "high cost of living is a general problem that does not concern only [the teachers' union]", said Employment Minister Fatimé Tchombi. N'DJAMENA Wednesday, February 17, 2010 (IRIN) - Teachers demanding more pay to face higher food prices entered the third day of a nationwide strike. The government has called their demands "illegal" and "unjustified", because the "high cost of living is a general problem that does not concern only [the teachers' union]", said Employment Minister Fatimé Tchombi.

Primary school teacher Aubin Golmbaye told IRIN his US$200 monthly salary was not enough to feed his family. "In addition to food I need to pay for the house, medical care, school fees - even if I spend $4 a day on food, what would I have left for our other needs, and transport to get to work?"

Government has estimated that poor rainfall in 2009 reduced cereal production by 31 percent reduction compared to previous years. The shortage could keep cereal prices, which are higher than they have been for five years, at current levels through March, according to the US-funded early warning group, FEWS NET.

Poor families, who often barter livestock for other foodstuffs, find that their animals are buying them less. High prices and below-normal pastoral income due to disease and animal malnutrition are depleting what little food stock families saved from the last growing season, and "steep" food price hikes, starting in April, were predicted in FEWS NET's most recent report on food security in Chad.

Final exams are scheduled to begin in late May but secondary school student Clarisse Koularambaye feared the academic year could be lost. "We are not in class. Teachers plan to strike until a solution is found - I just hope the government will do something for us," she told IRIN.

Education Minister Khadidja Hassaballah said the government would not negotiate salaries with the teacher union when all public sector employees faced the same cost of living.

Among primary school-age children, 30 percent of girls are enrolled and 40 percent of boys; by the time they reach secondary school, only five percent of girls and 13 percent of boys in that age group still attend school.

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http://www.irinnews.org/report.aspx?ReportId=88144JOHANNESBURG Tuesday, February 16, 2010 (IRIN) - The European Union's decision to extend sanctions against Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe and senior members of the ruling ZANU-PF party was endorsed by a leading human rights organization. JOHANNESBURG Tuesday, February 16, 2010 (IRIN) - The European Union's decision to extend sanctions against Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe and senior members of the ruling ZANU-PF party was endorsed by a leading human rights organization.

"In view of the situation in Zimbabwe, in particular the lack of progress in the implementation of the Global Political Agreement (GPA) signed in September 2008, the restrictive measures ... should be extended for a further period of 12 months," the Official Journal of the European Union reportedly said on 16 February 2010.

The EU first imposed sanctions on 18 February 2002, including travel bans and freezing bank accounts; the list has since grown to more than 200 targeted individuals and 40-odd companies linked to Mugabe and his party.

"These targeted sanctions are aimed solely at those whom the EU judges to be responsible for the violence, for the violations of human rights, and for preventing the holding of free and fair elections in Zimbabwe," the EU said in a previous statement.

The EU resisted calls by bodies such as the Southern African Development Community to lift sanctions when Zimbabwe's unity government was formed on 11 February 2009, and, along with the US - which has also imposed targeted sanctions - adopted a "wait-and-see" approach.

Mugabe and ZANU-PF have argued that Zimbabwe's dire economic situation, near collapse of social services, and prolonged food insecurity are the consequence of these sanctions; Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai, leader of the opposition Movement for Democratic Change, has blamed it on decades of misrule by Mugabe, who has held power since 1980.

The decision not to lift sanctions "shows that the EU is well aware that there have been no improvements of the human rights situation ... [since the unity government was formed]. All [ZANU-PF's] apparatus of oppression remain in place and I see no movement [towards democracy] as along as the status quo remains," Tiseke Kasambala, a senior Africa researcher at Human Rights Watch, told IRIN.

She scoffed at fears that extending sanctions might make ZANU-PF adopt a more hardline stance. "In our view it will not make much of a difference as ZANU-PF has not complied at all with the GPA ... Lifting sanctions would have been a tacit approval by the EU of ZANU-PF's actions."

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