Over the past decade there has been rapid growth in mobile phone penetration worldwide, making the mobile phone the most ubiquitous communications device in the world. This commercial growth has also opened up a tremendous opportunity for organisations seeking to provide life-changing services and provide useful information to citizens even in low-income and remote communities. One particular area that has seen a number of innovations, specifically in leveraging mobile social media, is HIV/AIDS awareness, public education and counseling.

Although 70 per cent of Madagascar’s 20 million people are peasants, the country depends on imports for 20 per cent of its staple food, rice. Also, 30 percent of Madagascar’s land can be used for agriculture, but only 4 percent of the land is actually farmed. The government has neither the budget nor any effective strategies to address these problems. “All we do is hope for investments and technology transfers from overseas,” says Rakotoson Philibert, secretary-general of the Ministry of Agriculture.

Four months ago, Google unveiled a tool that allows users to monitor the requests received from governments to take down material or report data on the users of their search engine and other services. This month, it released another tool that will expose less overt attempts by governments to curtail its various services, including YouTube and Gmail.

The Google Public Data Explorer makes large datasets easy to explore, visualize and communicate. Students, journalists, policy makers and everyone else can play with the tool to create visualizations of public data, link to them, or embed them in their own webpages.

Zimbabwe must show greater respect for human rights and political freedoms before the US sanctions on the impoverished African nation can be removed, the U.S. State Department said on Sunday. The State Department said its top diplomat for Africa and other US officials met three Zimbabwean ministers and had praised the economic advances but raised concerns 'that political progress has not been as successful'.

The Optional protocol to the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (OP-ICESCR) adopted by the General Assembly of the UN on 10 December of 2008 and opened to signatures and ratifications on 24 September 2009 enables new channels for the justiciability of the right to food at international level. The OP will enter in to force three months after its 10th ratification. On the first anniversary of the opening to signature and ratification, the NGO Coalition working for the ratification of the OP has launched a statement promoting the 10 first ratifications until 10 December.

Big investment banks are making a killing out of reckless speculation, with disastrous consequences for the lives of poor people around the world. Come and find out how, and what we’re going to do to stop them.

The Mutambara Peace Village is a unique effort to reconcile Hutus and Tutsis by giving them homes to live together in the same village. Today, some 1,600 Hutus and Tutsis live as neighbours in 300 identical two-room homes constructed of concrete with tin roofs.

Forced expulsions, violent recriminations, mass exodus, peaceful co-existence - just some of the possible outcomes for hundreds of thousands of Southern Sudanese living in the North, and to a lesser extent, vice versa, after a January referendum when the South is likely to vote to transform its semi-autonomy into full independence. 'We are worried for the future, of what happens after the referendum,' said James Jok, a vegetable seller who has lived in the Northern capital Khartoum since fleeing violence in the Southern state of Jonglei over two decades ago. 'I am frightened that if there is independence, we will just be told, "go home",' he added.

Uganda joined the rest of the world to celebrate Access to Information Day with a call on the government to show commitment and implement the Access to Information Act, passed by Parliament five years ago. The activists were also asking the government to either repeal or amend existing laws that are a draw-back on the right of access to information. The say the negative laws include the Oath of Secrecy Act and the Official Secrets Act, whose provisions are at variance with the Access to Information Act and Article 41 of the Constitution.

Nigeria's former corruption fighter Nuhu Ribadu has said no-one will be safe from prosecution if he is elected president next year. The elections have been set for January but may be postponed. Election officials, who have asked for a delay, however insist that the new president will be inaugurated in May, as planned. Mr Ribadu came to prominence as head of Nigeria's anti-corruption agency before being sidelined in 2007. He returned from exile in June, after saying he had fled because attempts had been made on his life.

At the age of 13, Chantal Kifungo* is mother to a ten-month-old baby girl. It wasn’t her choice. Almost two years ago, she was raped by her stepfather – and fell pregnant with his child. "My mother was in hospital because she had complications with her own pregnancy. I was left alone with my stepfather. One night, he came home and raped me. I tried to shout for help but nobody heard me," Chantal says while nervously playing with her hands in her lap.

Culminating a global summit on the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon and Heads of State and Government, along with the private sector, foundations, international organizations, civil society and research organizations, kicked off a concerted world-wide effort to save the lives of more than 16 million women and children. At a special UN event to launch the “Global Strategy for Women’s and Children’s Health”, stakeholders pledged over $40 billion in resources for women’s and children’ health.

Around 73 WOZA activists arrested Monday, following a demonstration at the Parliament Building in Harare, were eventually released on free bail on Wednesday. The activists marched to commemorate International Peace Day and police arrested them at the end of the march, first charging them with ‘obstructing traffic’ before later changing this to ‘criminal nuisance’.

All sides in the conflict - Congolese and foreign armies and an alphabet soup of armed groups - have committed appalling abuses. Their killings, rape, burning, pillaging and forced labour have forced at least 1.2 million people from their homes in 2009 and early 2010 alone, bringing the number of displaced civilians in eastern Congo to almost 2 million.

While the implementation of the Ouagadougou Peace Accord saw some progress in mid-2010, in particular with the announcement of a new date for the elections and agreement on the voter list, fears of renewed violence and further displacement remain. At the same time, internally displaced people (IDPs) continue to struggle for durable solutions.

African leaders and global health experts rallied at the United Nations today to boost access to life-saving bednets and medicines as part of the fight against malaria, aiming to reach the goal of near-zero deaths by 2015. “We have made solid advances in recent years both in reducing deaths and increasing the use of life-saving nets. The goal of ending malaria deaths is within reach, and I urge all partners to sustain the momentum,” said Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon.

Reports of corruption and confusion have already started surfacing in South Africa, as the process to legalise undocumented Zimbabweans in the country gets underway. The exercise began on Monday, a few weeks after South Africa announced it was ending its moratorium on Zimbabwean deportations at the end of the year. But by Wednesday there were already indications that the December 31st deadline for Zimbabweans to regularise their stay in South Africa will be hard to meet

Although the majority of Kenyans are agricultural producers, only 3.6 percent of the country’s national budget goes towards the sector. This falls severely short of government’s promise to spend at least ten percent on agriculture. About five million out of Kenya’s eight million households are directly involved in agricultural production, according to Vision 2030, a government strategy document geared towards the country’s growth and development. And yet, ten million out of 38 million Kenyans face starvation and will require food aid this year, a recent census showed.

Doctors are working 12-16 hour shifts to cope with the increasing demand at Malakal teaching hospital in Upper Nile State of Southern Sudan, say officials.
"We are trying to encourage more doctors to come work here," Upper Nile State health minister Steven Lor said. The relatively poor living conditions in Malakal, however, made it difficult to convince Southern Sudanese doctors working in the capital Khartoum to move.