The impact of COVID-19 has been devastating around the world. In response, countries have put in place emergency measures to help their citizens and private firms weather the pandemic and recovery programs to boost the economy once the lockdown restrictions can ease.

Most developing economies do not have the fiscal space to implement broad recovery programs, as the revenues from key economic sectors have collapsed, expenditures to respond to the pandemic have escalated rapidly, and capital outflows have increased.

By Istiakh Ahmed

Originally found at: https://www.urbanet.info/exploring-perceptions-of-liveability-in-bangladesh/

I am Dolene Miller, an Afro-descendant from the Caribbean (Atlantic) Coast of Nicaragua and for me it is important and very necessary to support any initiative to protect my community from COVID19. As ethnic minorities, we are facing a health crisis in precarious conditions because the national government itself has not wanted to assume its responsibility to protect the population from infection, has not issued a quarantine and, on the contrary, is promoting massive activities according to its thesis of contagion of the herd.

Last week the world observed the International Day of Indigenous Peoples on Sunday, Aug. 9, amid a global pandemic that UN Secretary-General António Guterres noted has had a “devastating impact” on the world’s Indigenous communities.

From Mali to Iraq, people in conflict zones are proving especially vulnerable to climate extremes

An estimated 100,000 people died and livestock were decimated when a long drought hit West Africa in the 1970s.

Isa, a 61-year-old community leader from northern Mali, recalled: “At that time, we only had to search for food. We could move freely with our animals. Now, we can’t even search for food. We are forced to stay in place or move to cities because of the insecurity.”

Supporting women’s ability to own, manage and control land will help accelerate gender equality globally

It is depressing, discouraging, infuriating – pick your word – to see the scale and scope of abuse and discrimination aimed at women and girls worldwide.

The increasing number of salmon in the Skjern River in Denmark is a positive sign, as the Danish salmon is the only strain of wild salmon left in Danish rivers. Before the Skjern River Nature Restoration Project, the salmon had almost gone extinct owing to the state of the environment. The project area now offers ideal conditions for flora and fauna and has already acquired great natural value. In fact, it has already grown into a bird site of national importance.

This blog recapitulates the interventions made by the panelists of a recently held GODAN Action webinar on “Empowering Women for Open Data Mapping in Agriculture: Implications for Land Rights and the SDGs in Africa”, Victor Sunday, Dr. Toyin Ojo, Nathalie Sidibe and Uchechi Shirley Anaduaka.  

By Catherine Benson Wahlén, Thematic Expert for Human Development, Human Settlements and Sustainable Development (US)

In 2014, the African Union (AU) member states adopted the Malabo Declaration on Accelerated Agricultural Growth and Transformation for Shared Prosperity and Improved Livelihoods (the Malabo Declaration). This Declaration provides direction to transform the agricultural sector in Africa for the period 2015-2025 within the wider framework of the Comprehensive Africa Agriculture Development Programme (CAADP). It is an essential document that assists AU member states to achieve agriculture-led growth, and end poverty and hunger.

I write this blog as our project team embarks on a fifth year of work on women’s land tenure security (WOLTS) with pastoral communities in mining-affected areas of Mongolia and Tanzania. Just before Christmas 2019, we were in Mundarara village in northern Tanzania. Exceptionally heavy rains made getting around much more challenging than usual. Locals travelling on foot had to make wide detours to avoid getting bogged down in waterlogged grazing land, and it took everyone much longer to get to the village primary school for our long-planned training day.