Aid agencies in Somalia are asking for $11 million to give the hundred of displaced people, due to fighting in the capital, emergency water and sanitation, according to the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA).

Over 200,000 people have left Mogadishu since early May when violence erupted due to tensions between the Government and the opposition Al-Shabab and Hisb-ul-Islam groups.

OCHA reported that more than 600,000 displaced people, settled in the Afgooye corridor outside Mogadishu, desperately needed water, sanitation and hygiene services.

Currently, Aid agencies are only able to supply two to eight liters of water per person per day in that area, while between 7.5 and 15 liters—less than one flush of an average toilet—is considered the bare minimum required for survival.

There is also only one latrine for ever 212 displaced people in the Afgooye corridor.

A primary concern is that the lack of water may have adverse effects on the efforts to prevent the spread of communicable diseases in overcrowded situations.

Source: UN News Centre

Aid agencies in Somalia are asking for $11 million to give the hundred of displaced people, due to fighting in the capital, emergency water and sanitation, according to the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA).

Over 200,000 people have left Mogadishu since early May when violence erupted due to tensions between the Government and the opposition Al-Shabab and Hisb-ul-Islam groups.

OCHA reported that more than 600,000 displaced people, settled in the Afgooye corridor outside Mogadishu, desperately needed water, sanitation and hygiene services.

Currently, Aid agencies are only able to supply two to eight liters of water per person per day in that area, while between 7.5 and 15 liters—less than one flush of an average toilet—is considered the bare minimum required for survival.

There is also only one latrine for ever 212 displaced people in the Afgooye corridor.

A primary concern is that the lack of water may have adverse effects on the efforts to prevent the spread of communicable diseases in overcrowded situations.

Source: UN News Centre

GlaxoSmithKline is a research-based pharmaceutical company that is working to “improve the quality of human life by enabling people to do more, feel better and live longer.” The “Positive Action for Children Fund” will grant up to $80 million over a ten-year period to NGOs and those who work to prevent mother-to-child transmission of HIV/AIDS.

GSK will also contribute $16 million toward a public-private partnership for researching antiretroviral drugs. This fund will help find new beneficial fixed dose combinations for those suffering from HIV/AIDS. In addition, it will help lower the cost of treatment by entering into a voluntary license agreement with the South African abacavir manufacturer, Aspen Pharmacare Ltd.

Since 2001, GSK has agreed to 8 voluntary licenses for antiretroviral manufacturing in Africa. This allowed for more choices and greater security of supply of antiretroviral drugs within Africa, resulting in 279 million tablets of Epivir and Combivir provided to patients during this period. By continuing in this fashion with the development of the “Positive Action for Children Fund,” treatment will be made available to people with HIV/AIDS in the poorest nations.

During U.S. President Obama’s visit to Ghana, the 44^th President spoke in front of Ghana’s Parliament on June 11. In his speech, Obama praised Africa’s achievements, offered warnings and charity as well.

Ghana is one of Africa’s leading economic countries, which has demonstrated impressive rates of growth in its economy alongside countries like Botswana and Mozambique. However, Obama also noted the terrible conditions in countries like Zimbabwe, Sudan, Congo and Liberia where financial collapse is a very real threat and violence is a daily occurrence.

The President committed $63 billion to a comprehensive global strategy excluding the Global Poverty Act, which is another part of the United Nations’ Millennium Development Goals. The bill would commit $854 billion, over the course of eleven years.

In relation to the bill, then Senator Obama stated, “We can – and must – make it a priority of our foreign policy to commit to eliminating extreme poverty and ensuring every child has food, shelter, and clean drinking water. As we strive to rebuild America’s standing in the world, this legislation will not only commit to reducing global poverty, but will also demonstrate our promise and support to those in the developing world."

Read Full Text of Obama's Speech Here.

Source: Digital Journal

President Obama made his first visit to sub-Saharan Africa on July 10-11, 2009, visiting Ghana after attending the G8 Summit in Italy. Obama is the third consecutive U.S. President to stop in Ghana, one of the top African nations that has consistently been reducing poverty and improving lives through economic growth.

Some Ghana stats:

• Ghanaian citizens have participated in five consecutive peaceful transitions of power. (See an overview Ghanaian elections here.)

• In 2004, the Ghanaian government announced the elimination of school fees for primary schools. This coupled with a new school feeding program, increased enrollment rates for primary school boys from 60% in 2004-2005 to 84% in 2007-2008, and girls from 58% to 82%.

• Ghana currently receives funding from the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis, and Malaria and is one of the 15 focus countries in the President's Malaria Initiative (PMI). PMI's work in Ghana aims to distribute more than one million bed nets, spray 100,000 houses with pesticides that kill mosquitoes carrying malaria, and to provide 1.2 million doses of malaria medicine to treat children under five.

• Ghana has a 5-year, $547 million compact with the Millennium Challenge Corporation (MCC), focused on agriculture, rural development and infrastructure improvement. During President George W. Bush's visit to Ghana in 2008, then President Kafuor renamed a main highway in Accra (a project of the MCC) the "George W. Bush Highway."

• Ghana has experienced 4-5% annual growth over the past 20 years, and has nearly halved its poverty rate since 1992, putting it on track to achieve the first Millennium Development Goal by 2015.

• In 2007, Ghana was the United States' tenth largest trading partner in sub-Saharan Africa and the sixth largest exporter to the U.S. (Compare even more key development stats between Ghana, Sub-Saharan Africa and the U.S. here).

President Obama’s recent trip to Ghana showcases the country’s success story as a concrete example of how targeted smart aid, joined with good governance, can lead to noticeable, positive change.

Source: ONE

African representatives at the recently ended World Trade Organization Aid for Trade conference in Geneva expressed their satisfaction with the outcome.

Mohamed Ibn Chambas, the executive secretary of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWA attended the conference and said that trade can be a powerful tool for economic growth and poverty reduction in Africa.

The Aid for Trade initiative was launched by WTO in 2005 to promote the participation of developing nations in global trade on a win-win basis. Unfortunately, Chambas notes that Africa’s participation in global trade still remains incredibly low.

The Aid for Trade conference did, however, propose specific initiatives designed to address infrastructural constraints, energy, roads, etc. that could be improved to give African nations a more competitive edge in participating in world trade.

Source: VOA News

Senators Dick Durbin, Patty Murray and Bob Corker introduced the Water for the World Act of 2009 (S. 624) that will enable 100 million people to gain access to safe, clean drinking water and sanitation by 2015.

“Access to safe drinking water is a right that everyone in the world ought to enjoy but too few are able to realize,” Durbin said. “Water access is no longer simply a global health and development issue; it is a mortal and long-term threat that is increasingly becoming a national security issue. The United States needs to do much more to ensure that global water access is protected and expanded.”

Approximately one billion people in the world do not have access to safe drinking water and two out of every five people live without basic sanitation services. Pressure on global water supplies, particularly in developing nations, will continue as global warming, rapid industrialization and population and economic growth rise.

The need to combat the global water crises is important because water issues contribute to regional tensions, global health, child and maternal mortality and economic growth.

To goal of the bill would:

• Target underdeveloped countries with focused initiatives to improve access to clean water and sanitation;
• Foster global cooperation on research and technology development, including regional partnerships among experts on clean water;
• Provide technical assistance and capacity-building to develop expertise within countries facing water and sanitation challenges;
• Provide seed money for the deployment of clean water and sanitation technologies; and
• Strengthen the human infrastructure at USAID and the State Department to implement clean water and sanitation programs effectively and to ensure that water receives priority attention in our foreign policy efforts.

Source: durbin.senate.gov

Although 980 million people live on less than a dollar a day, poverty is not unbeatable. By bringing U.S. political attention to the issue, we can make a big impact to improve the living standards of those who do not have access to enough food, basic education, sanitation and health facilities. In the past 20 years, the number of the world’s chronically undernourished fell by 50 percent. By making one phone call to our representatives, we can continue to make the situation better. Encouraging our senators to cosponsor legislation, such as the Global Food Security Act, makes funds available to USAID for providing food in countries suffering food crises and allows them to make plans to bring an end to the poverty cycle in developing countries. Between 1999 and 2004, an estimated 135 million people were lifted out of severe poverty in low-income countries. With your support, we can improve the lives of millions by ensuring they have the means to survive. Please call or email your senators today and ask them to cosponsor the Global Food Security Act.

Howard Buffet is a down-to-earth Illinois soybean and corn farmer with an ambitious agenda to end world hunger.

The middle child of billionaire Warren Buffett, Howard, has spent a small part of his father’s fortune for philanthropy. For the past four years, Howard has spent a decent amount of time traveling through Africa, coming up with ideas to help poor farmers increase crop yield to feed their families as well as reducing the world’s food shortage. His foundation has allocated about $38 million this year to developing a disease-resistant sweet potato, encouraging poachers to switch to farming, provide micro credits, and helping farmers market their crops to United Nations’ hunger-relief programs. Howard is also working on a project to give African corn breeders access to Monsanto’s biotechnology for drought-tolerant corn.

Source: Wall Street Journal