Africa

A mother feeds her malnourished child in the malnutrition ward in a hospital in the town of Kebri Dehar, in the Somali region of Ethiopia. Photo: David Bebber/The Times

Wealthy nations flock to farmland in Ethiopia, locking in food supplies grown half a world away, with alarming implications for hunger in Ethiopia, cr...

by Stephanie McCrummen New York Times November 23, 2009

BAKO, ETHIOPIA -- In recent months, the Ethiopian government began marketing abroad one of the hottest commodities in an increasingly crowded and hungry world: farmland....

Population explosion to stop Africa’s attempt to attain MDGs

by AfriqueJet November 18, 2009

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Africa population tops one billion

by BBC News November 18, 2009

The number of people in Africa has passed the one billion mark, the UN Population Fund says in a report....

A new megafarm in Western Ethiopia, for palm-oil trees, sugar cane, rice and sesame.  All through the Rift Valley region, there are new fence posts signifying the recent rush for Ethiopian land. In the old days, farmers rarely bothered with such formal lines of demarcation, but now the country’s earth is in demand. One fence stretched on for a mile or more, very possibly belonging to Sheik Mohammed Al Amoudi, a Saudi Arabia-based oil-and-construction billionaire who was born in Ethiopia and maintains a close relationship with the Ethiopian Prime Minister Meles Zenawi’s autocratic regime.  Photo: Simon Norfolk/New York Times

Is there such a thing as agro-imperialism?

by Andrew Rice New York Times November 16, 2009

Dr. Robert Zeigler, an eminent American botanist, flew to Saudi Arabia in March for a series of high-level discussions about the future of the kingdom’s food supply. Saudi leaders were frightened: heavily dependent on imports, they had seen the price of rice and wheat, their dietary staples, fluct...

The Ogiek are traditionally forest dwellers, hunting antelope with homemade bows and harvesting honey. In the past 15 years, because of ill-planned settlement schemes (the government essentially handed out chunks of forest to cronies), 25 percent of the trees in the Mau forest have been wiped out. Photo: Tim Freccia/New York Times

Ogiek tribesman may be driven from their ancestral forest home in Kenyan plan

by Jeffrey Gettleman New York Times November 14, 2009

MARASHONI, Kenya — With the stroke of a pen, the last of Kenya’s honey hunters may soon be homeless. Since time immemorial, the Ogiek have been Kenya’s traditional forest dwellers. They have stalked antelope with homemade bows, made medicine from leaves and trapped bees to produce honey, th...

The World Food Program has been feeding people in Lesotho since 1965, yet the tiny mountain kingdom is still not much closer to achieving food self-su...

by IRIN News November 6, 2009

The UN World Food Programme (WFP) has been feeding people in Lesotho since 1965, yet the tiny mountain kingdom is still not much closer to achieving food self-sufficiency. Time to overhaul the approach, aid agencies say. ...

Kenya Wildlife Service rangers inspect the carcass of a baby elephant that died from the prolonged drought. Photo: Thomas Mukoya/Reuters

Four year drought pushes 23 million Africans to brink of starvation

by Tristan McConnell October 22, 2009

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Ethiopia asks for urgent food aid for 6.2 million people

by BBC News October 22, 2009

The Ethiopian government has asked the international community for emergency food aid for 6.2 million people....

Health clinics may be free, but they are also very popular. The implementation of the much-acclaimed scheme has been dogged by lack of preparation – both in medical facilities and personnel. Photo: BBC

Burundi’s struggle to provide free healthcare

by Prime Ndikumageng BBC News September 23, 2009

As international donors announce more funding for a campaign to build free health-care systems in the developing world, the BBC's Prime Ndikumagenge reflects on the experience of Burundi, which has already benefited from the scheme....

China spreads aid in Africa, with some catches (corruption, secrecy and long term indebtedness of the borrowing country)

by Sharon LaFraniere and John Grobler New York Times September 21, 2009

WINDHOEK, Namibia — It is not every day that global leaders set foot in this southern African nation of gravel roads, towering sand dunes and a mere two million people. So when President Hu Jintao of China touched down here in February 2007 with a 130-person delegation in tow, it clearly was not j...

  • World Hunger Education
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  • For the past 50 years, since its founding in 1976, the mission of World Hunger Education Service is to undertake programs, including Hunger Notes, that
    • Educate the general public and target groups about the extent and causes of hunger and malnutrition in the United States and the world
    • Advance comprehension which integrates ethical, religious, social, economic, political, and scientific perspectives on the world food problem
    • Facilitate communication and networking among those who are working for solutions
    • Promote individual and collective commitments to sustainable hunger solutions.