The switch by many farmers in Kenya's Rift Valley province from staple cereals to more profitable coffee is likely to increase the country's dependence on grain imports and possibly affect food security, agricultural experts have warned. 'It is unsafe to use our land for crops with the hopes of being fed by other countries,' said James Nyoro, managing director for Africa of the Rockefeller Foundation. Kenya will have to import 2.3 million tonnes of cereal during the 2011-2012 marketing year to meet demand, a year-on-year increase of 37 per cent, according to the UN Food and Agricultural Organisation, which estimated domestic harvests of maize - a staple for 90 per cent of Kenyans - at 2.5 million tonnes, down 18 per cent because of poor weather.

Conflict had been brewing in the village of Fanaye in northern Senegal for months before clashes broke out in late October. The launch of a project by an Italian-Senegalese company to grow crops for biofuels on 20,000 acres of local land had been met with scepticism and anger by some villagers; protesters called it 'a form of slavery'. When work began on the project in September, a young man attacked a plantation worker with a sword. A local council meeting descended into violence, buildings were burned and two people died as villagers fought each other with sticks and machetes.

Kenyan MPs will pocket $13.3 million (Sh2.1 billion) if elections are held in August next year. The payout, described as 'immoral' by the Law Society of Kenya (LSK), will be compensation for having their terms, in the view of some, cut short. Each MP will be paid $88,600 (Sh8 million) for each of the eight months they will be asked to 'forfeit' if the election is held in August as stipulated in the Constitution, as well as the $11,100 (Sh1.5m) 'winding up allowance' they voted themselves.

Kenyan doctors are concerned at the slow pace of talks with the government meant to avert a national strike slated for 5. December. The Kenya Medical Practitioners, Pharmacists and Dentists Union said the government was dragging it’s feet in kick-starting negotiations. The 2,300 doctors in Kenya’s public hospitals have issued a 19-day strike notice.

In this week's edition of the Emerging Powers News Round-Up, read a comprehensive list of news stories and opinion pieces related to China, India and other emerging powers...

The World Bank’s flagship annual publication pushes gender equality up to the Bank’s agenda, but critics express concern about its implementation and unwillingness to consider gender a women’s rights issue. The World Development Report (WDR) 2012: Gender Equality and Development – the first to focus on this issue – was released in September. It documents progress in narrowing gender gaps in education, health and labour in the past 25 years and maintains the Bank’s past approach to gender as an economic issue, stressing that greater gender equality 'can enhance productivity, improve development outcomes for the next generation, and make institutions more representative'. However, the WDR recognises that economic growth does not always lead to gender equality. Female mortality, school enrolment and earnings are some of the areas identified where gender gaps are still most significant.

President Bingu wa Mutharika failed to give a comprehensive answer on the diplomatic stand-off between Malawi and Zambia arising from a 2007 deportation of Zambia’s President Michael Sata when he was opposition leader then. The Head of State accused journalists in the country of concentrating on backbiting and gossiping instead of concentrating on developmental issues. Ruling party functionaries booed journalists at the press conference and some intimidated them.

Governments of the world's richest countries have given up on forging a new treaty on climate change to take effect this decade, with potentially disastrous consequences for the environment through global warming, reports this article on Most of the world's leading economies now privately admit that no new global climate agreement will be reached before 2016 at the earliest, and that even if it were negotiated by then, they would stipulate it could not come into force until 2020.

Hundreds of families who sought refuge from post-election violence in Ivory Coast at a church compound in the western town of Duékoué have started returning to their communities, the International Organisation for Migration (IOM) said in a statement. At the height of the violence in April up to 25,000 people were staying in and around the Catholic Mission in Duékoué, about 400 km west of Abidjan, which aid groups described as overcrowded and lacking the sanitation facilities to host such a population. Security improvements in western Ivory Coast have encouraged many displaced persons to consider returning to villages, with many families excited at the prospect of returning home, IOM said.

'Women’s Land Rights', published by the International Development Research Centre, draws from the outcomes of the three year collaborative project entitled 'Securing Women’s Access to Land: Linking Research and Action', coordinated by the International Land Coalition (ILC), the Makerere Institute for Social Studies (MISR) of Makerere University in Uganda, and the Institute for Poverty, Land and Agrarian Studies (PLAAS) of the University of Western Cape in South Africa, and funded by IDRC. 'Land is an important source of security against poverty across the developing world, but, in many places, unequal rights to land put women at a disadvantage, perpetuates poverty, and entrenches gender inequality. Surprisingly little detailed information exists on women’s relationship to land, and even less is informed by women themselves. This book aims to help fill that gap, drawing on research funded by IDRC over many years.'

Ethiopians are on the move. Not only are more rural people relocating to towns and cities, but the number of Ethiopians leaving the country has also ballooned in the last few years. Many are trying to reach Saudi Arabia via Yemen, while thousands of others head for South Africa, Israel and Europe, crossing deserts and seas and placing their lives in the hands of smugglers who often have little regard for their well-being.

As UN climate talks loom, the Bank is lobbying G20 countries to resuscitate shrinking carbon markets through controversial measures, including using public climate finance to stimulate demand and creating markets for soil and forest carbon.The Bank will use the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) summit in Durban, South Africa, in late November to launch the Carbon Initiative for Development fund. This aims to provide up front finance for carbon-credit-generating projects in least developed countries. The Bank is also expected to continue to lobby for international agreements to support the viability of carbon markets, which allow countries and companies to claim a reduction in carbon emissions by purchasing credits generated by emissions reductions from other sources.

People ferry the wounded to hospital by motorcycle; a man in riot gear beats a crowd with what looks like a chair; a lifeless body is dragged out of the middle of a road; a morgue is filled with bodies. This amateur footage from pulsemedia.org shows protests between 19-22 November.

On 9 November 2011, local authorities in Benguela suddenly withdrew their support and disrupted an arts and culture event organised by the NGO OMUNGA that was scheduled to start the following day. OMUNGA is a human rights group based in the province of Benguela that promotes street children rights, children and youth protagonism, community and civil education. Furthermore, on 11 and 12 November, the police intervened again and forcibly interrupted two OKUPAKALA events that were taking place in different parts of the city, namely Damba Maria and Catumbela. The organisers then transferred the event supposed to take place in Catumbela to another location, but the police contacted them and ordered not to continue with the event.

This briefing note offers a preliminary assessment of the compatibility between the WTO and efforts to protect the human right to adequate food as part of the post-crisis food security agenda. Existing WTO rules do include certain flexibilities for States to pursue food security-related measures. From a right to food perspective, certain elements of the draft modalities in agriculture are an improvement on the Agreement on Agriculture (AoA), most notably proposed changes to the green box criteria on public stockholding for food security. However, many of these modifications to the AoA are relatively modest and even these are by no means assured with the outcome of the Doha Round highly uncertain.

'At UN Women we are working with five governments in the sub-region in a pilot programme to see exactly what women are doing to get out of poverty. Most of these women are in what is called the informal sector, and their work is not recognised. The women who kept the Zimbabwe economy going at the lowest point in its history are not recognised even today. Yet they ensured the survival of their families and the economy,' says the head of UN Women in Southern Africa, Nomcebo Manzini, in this interview with Business Report.

Zambian miners ended a two week old strike for better pay in early November, winning back their jobs and a pay hike from a Chinese firm. Union officials said it was a sign that Chinese-owned companies in Zambia are starting to bow to government pressure over worker rights. Management at the Non-Ferrous China Africa locked out the workers who had gone on strike for a 100 percent raise from their base pay of $200 monthly. Zambia has seen a rash of strikes at Chinese and Indian-owned plants after newly-elected President Michael Sata proposed raising the minimum wage from the current rate of $84 a month.

Use these maps and graphics to explore the DRC as it prepares for just its second general elections in four decades.

Nigeria's secret police have said Boko Haram Islamic militants are receiving funding from certain politicians in the north. The intelligence agency said it had arrested an alleged spokesman for the group, who told them he was sponsored by a politician in Borno state. Boko Haram is blamed for a growing number of deadly attacks in Nigeria. These include the UN headquarters bombing in Abuja in August, which killed 24 people.

An Ethiopian man has died from his injuries after he set himself on fire in a protest against the government following mass arrests of youths from his local area. Residents of Dawro area in south west Ethiopia said 29-year-old school teacher Yenesew Gebre poured flammable petroleum distillate Benzine on his body in front of the local government building in Waka town on 11 November, dying three days later in hospital.