The negative effects of climate change are already evident for many of the 25 million coffee farmers across the tropics and the 90 billion dollar (US) coffee industry. The coffee berry borer (Hypothenemus hampei), the most important pest of coffee worldwide, has already benefited from the temperature rise in East Africa: increased damage to coffee crops and expansion in its distribution range have been reported. In order to anticipate threats and prioritize management actions for H. hampei we present here, maps on future distributions of H.
Over the past 15 years, performance-based financing has been implemented in an increasing number of developing countries,
particularly in Africa, as a means of improving health worker performance. Scaling up to national implementation in Burundi and
Rwanda has encouraged proponents of performance-based financing to view it as more than a financing mechanism, but increasingly
as a strategic tool to reform the health sector. We resist such a notion on the grounds that results-based and economically driven
Performance-based financing is generating a heated debate. Some suggest that it may be a donor fad with limited potential to improve service delivery. Most of its critics view it solely as a provider payment mechanism.
In the energy-poor country of Rwanda only 10% of households have an electricity connection. But scientists have now discovered a renewable energy source in the depths of Lake Kivu: methane gas. Rwanda aims to soon be generating so much electricity from this that it will be able to export to neighbouring countries too.
In Madina village, outside Accra, Ghana, children tease each other about whose urine has a redder color. Apart from being strikingly thin, they look healthy. Yet they could be affected by Schistosoma haematobium, a parasitic disease common in Africa, where local prevalence rates can exceed 50%. Early diagnosis ensures inexpensive and effective treatment and prevents stunted growth and developmental disabilities in children and bladder cancer or other organ damage in adults (3).
A global clamour for cuts in emissions, growing investor appetite for energy sector projects and sound government policies could help Africa make strides in green energy generation in the next few years.
Some governments, like Kenya, plan to raise the amount of energy generated from renewable sources like wind and solar, to cut overreliance on expensive sources and stabilize power supplies.
The United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) on Tuesday awarded an appreciation to two institutions that managed to produce environmental-friendly products while at the same time having capability to improve livelihood for poor people.
In 1994, thousands of people from the Tutsi community were slaughtered by their Hutu neighbours across Rwanda. Nine years later the killers came home from prison to live side by side again with their victims. The complexities of this homecoming are explored in director Anne Aghion
Zimbabwe's once promising coffee industry faces total collapse due to upheavals linked to President Robert Mugabe's controversial land redistribution policy, a farmers union said on Wednesday.
The coffee industry was growing steadily until 2000, when Mugabe embarked on a drive to resettle landless but inexperienced black farmers on white-owned commercial farms.
