As developed markets worldwide face economic slowdowns, Africa continues to produce above average growth and is seeing increasingly higher levels of investment in infrastructure development.
The Corporate Council on Africa (CCA), in conjunction with its corporate and government partners, today begins its 2008 U.S. – Africa Infrastructure Conference: Connecting the Continent. The conference will be held October 6-8 in Washington, DC, and is expected to attract more than 400 leaders from the private and public sectors in the U.S. and Africa, with specific interests in infrastructure-related industry investments.
“While capital markets around the world tighten, Africa has seen significant increases in flows of funding and economic growth,” said CCA President and CEO Stephen Hayes. “Much of this capital is being earmarked for projects in infrastructure. The conference will provide U.S. companies with the blueprint on how to get the highest return on infrastructure investment in Africa.”
Infrastructure projects on the continent are already underway. South Africa is building the first subway system in sub-Saharan Africa in preparation for the World Cup that is being held there in 2010 and has plans to greatly increase its energy production from such diverse sources as nuclear power, bio fuels, and other alternative energies. South Africa is not alone in taking on ambitious infrastructure projects. Namibia is being highlighted during the conference as a successful destination for investments. Also, opportunities are abound in countries such as Nigeria, Ghana, and Burkina Faso looking to expand their power production. New efforts across the continent are being made to develop, improve, and further secure water resources and transportation, including ports and airports.
The two-day conference, kicked off on Monday evening, with a reception to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the U.S. Department of State’s Bureau of African Affairs. Sessions will feature specific areas of growth and development within infrastructure led by leaders and experts from both the public and private sectors. Central themes include investment opportunities in energy, power, transportation, infrastructure construction, ICT, as well as safety, security, and social responsibility in Africa. Of particular interest is the coming presidential election in the United States and the implications it might have on U.S. policy in Africa.
In an interview marking the publication of the 2008 Ibrahim Index of African Governance, Mary Robinson, a board member of the Mo Ibrahim Foundation, discussed with AllAfrica’s Katy Gabel the correlation between women’s rights and good governance.
Robinson, formerly president of Ireland and United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, spoke from Addis Ababa, where the index was launched.
In broad terms, what does this year’s index show us about governance in Africa?
The index this year covers 2006, and the first covered 2005. The broad outtake on it is actually quite positive. In 31 of the 48 countries, governance improved, and 39 had improvement in participation in elections that were deemed free and fair. Also, with regard to the rights of women, there was some improvement.
Overall, interestingly, in 2006 Liberia was the country, after two decades of instability and civil war, which recorded the highest improvement. I’m sure that when we get to 2007, while it might not be the highest, Liberia will continue to improve. That’s a good message, because we’re seeing a country with good governance and, of course, the first African woman president, [who is] committed to strengthening governance and rule of law and human rights in her country – lo and behold, on the wider indicators, Liberia is improving overall.
Because we now have the comparison including the years leading up to 2005 – and now 2006 – we can really look at how the countries are moving up and down. There’s a lot of interest in the fact that Ethiopia actually went down a place. When you look at the details, it’s because of curtailment of freedom of the press, essentially. So people will be able to read quite a lot into these figures and see what the background is.
How are participation and human rights in a given country measured?
Participation and human rights is participation in elections. Civil rights [include] a section on women’s rights. I would be the first to say that I really hope that next year, when we’re doing 2007 and onwards, with stronger links to African institutions in African countries – which is part of what we’ve announced today – we will have broadly improved the index in the area of gender, which is not just women’s rights – it [means] gender equality.
I hope in future we’ll be drawing on more sources in the assessment of human rights. We have a very clear approach to human rights: that it’s both the core economic and social rights to food and safe water and health, safety, etc., and civil rights, including women’s rights. We will be developing stronger indicators for our gender approach in the future.
Now that there are two indexes, for 2007 and 2008, is it easier to draw links between, for example, women’s rights and the spread of mobile telephony, or transparency of governance and increasing Internet usage?
I think it’s a very interesting question, but it’s probably slightly premature. The foundation has benefited from the work that’s been done at the Kennedy School [of Government, at Harvard University] to produce this second edition, and we are really keen that we have a strong African advisory committee working with the Kennedy School. There will be a workshop next week at the Kennedy School working with the committee to strengthen the capacity and get more reliable data for the index on a whole range of things.
But I believe that over time, exactly what you’ve said – more mobile phones, for example – will also show more participation by women, and that can in itself be an indicator of fast economic development. We know that every development expert is now clear that participation of women in society is essential, and I think will be really dramatically indicated by the degree by which Liberia might be performing in [the future]. It will be a really good test case, but Liberia is not the only country which is involving women. Rwanda has the highest number of women members of parliament in the world, and we’ve been able to see dramatic improvements in recent years.
When her friends go out to play with skipping rope during break, 12 year old Noncedo Masina takes her watering can and goes to work on her plot at the school vegetable garden.
The grade seven pupil at Boyane Primary School, in the western part of Swaziland’s administrative capital of Mbabane, is part of the Food and Agriculture Organisation’s (FAO) Junior Farmer Field and Life Skills (JFFLS) initiative where children are groomed to be farmers at a young age.
“I enjoy working in the garden because I know I will get food once the vegetables are ready,” discloses Masina shyly. “I always join my friends to play after school only after I’ve finished working on my plot.”
Masina lost both her parents after they fell sick and died in 2003, leaving her in the care and guidance of her grandmother. Food security was a big challenge in this household until Masina was put in this JFFLS project. Now she often brings home cabbages, spinach, onions or carrots and donated food hampers.
Twenty-six orphans and vulnerable children (OVCs) at this primary school are able to put food on the table through the garden where they have individual and communal plots. JFFLS started in 2005 as a year-long training for school-going OVCs who afterwards are expected to develop their own gardens at home and pass on the skills to their families and communities.
“From the individual plots the children cultivate vegetables that they take home, while vegetables from the communal plots are sold to the community to generate income for further agricultural projects,” says Joyce Mkhaliphi, the school’s project facilitator.
Having earned about $93 from selling vegetables from the garden since April, Mkhaliphi says they are planning to carry out a suggestion made by FAO director general Jacques Diouf when he visited one of the project’s 21 sites during a three-day visit to the Kingdom in September. Diouf observed that additional skills could be passed on to these children by including more agricultural initiatives such as horticulture, dairy, poultry, and fish ponds.
“Food sovereignty is the right of peoples to healthy and culturally appropriate food produced through ecologically sound and sustainable methods, and their right to define their own food and agriculture systems. It puts the aspirations and needs of those who produce, distribute and consume food at the heart of food systems and policies rather than the demands of markets and corporations. It ensures that the rights to use and manage lands, territories, waters, seeds, livestock and biodiversity are in the hands of those of us who produce food” - Declaration of the Forum for Food Sovereignty, Nyeleni , February 2007
From November 25th to December 2nd African farmer-, agricultural-, and pastoralist organizations from over 25 countries gathered at the Nyeleni Center in Selengue, Mali to, amongst other things, discuss the pitfalls of the Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa (AGRA) — the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and Rockefeller Foundation initiative now chaired by former United Nations Secretary General Kofi Annan. With around 100 organizations present, thousands of Africans concerned with social justice and agriculture were represented.
Now, the theme of the conference might at first glance seem outrageous. After all, we are talking about Bill Gates here - a man who has become the poster child of good philanthropy. But this is precisely my point: because AGRA is a Bill Gates initiative with widely respected Kofi Annan as the chair, most of us are not going beyond the first glance. But it is important that we send a second glance AGRA’s way because what is at stake here is the very future of the continent’s agricultural practices - what is grown, how it is grown, who gets to grow it, who processes it, who sells it and where and how much the African consumer will pay. Simply put, if food is the basis of life, what is at stake is the very sustenance of the continent.
But in order to fully appreciate the role the sweet sounding Alliance for a Green Revolution is playing in Africa, we need to take a step back and situate AGRA in the context of other international and national forces that are undermining the well-being and sovereignty of African nations - forces that are in fact part of the problem, even as they present themselves as part of the solution.
Amongst the international forces undermining Africa’s well being is an overt US foreign policy whose goal is to consolidate a growing Empire through the pipeline of the war on terror - under the guise of spreading democracy. We have seen how well this is working in Iraq, Afghanistan and Somalia. But even more insidious is the arm-twisting of African governments to pass anti-terror bills that tie African domestic policies to US foreign policy goals.
Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon has urged Zimbabwe to immediately lift the restrictions it has imposed on aid agencies since June, warning that not doing so could worsen the already dire humanitarian situation in the southern African nation.
“I call on the Government of Zimbabwe to fully respect humanitarian principles and the impartiality and neutrality of voluntary and non-governmental organizations, allowing them to operate freely and with unrestricted access to those in need,” Mr. Ban said in a statement issued today.
The Secretary-General said he remains deeply concerned about the humanitarian situation in Zimbabwe where, despite requests made by the UN Country Team and other humanitarian partners, operations of voluntary and non-governmental organizations remain restricted.
He stressed that these groups have a vital role in the delivery of humanitarian aid, including much needed food assistance.
Due to the inability of these agencies to operate, only 280,000 people of the 1.5 million in need of food assistance are being reached with distributions.
“This ban must be lifted immediately so that aid organizations can carry out their relief work and avert a catastrophic humanitarian crisis,” Mr. Ban stated.
Prior to the imposition of the ban, many Zimbabweans were already suffering from food shortages and rampant inflation, a situation made worse by the violence that plagued the country ahead of the June presidential run-off election.
During the last two weeks we met with the Agricultural and Rural Development Association (ARA) and had the pleasure of being entertained by students at the orphanage they support. The singing and dancing impressed us, but what is more is that the district leader was there and invited the students to dance in the upcoming festival where the President of Ghana will be in attendance. The students gave great shouts as they were invited.
Tuesday also marked our first meeting with a village chief. Tradition dictates that in order to start any kind of project in a community you must first speak with the chief to obtain his permission. The meeting is quite formal. You stand to greet the chief and you are not to speak directly to him, but, rather, through his “speaker”. We were required to stand each time we spoke and were advised not to cross our legs in front of the chief, as this was a sign of informality. We were received warmly and the community seemed excited by the prospect of starting a microfinance project.
Wednesday we met with Integrated Development in Focus (IDF) and were entertained once again by students at their cultural center. They taught us some “moves” and, trust us, it is a lot harder than it looks.
We are getting close to finalizing our projects, so stay tuned!
Ever wanted to learn how to batik? This week we had the opportunity to learn through the Friends of Women Foundation as we visited some of their clients in the field. It looks pretty simple, but it takes a steady hand and a creative flare. Just follow the steps below and you too can be a batik master (or at least novice) and see our demonstration video.
Step 1: Die the fabric in your base color. This will be the color that will be exposed only in the part that is waxed. Then let the fabric dry.
Step 2: Carve a design in a large sponge. This will be your wax pattern.
Step 3: Melt the wax. Notice in our video that the traditional way to do this is in a large metal bowl over a coal fire. It somehow will not feel the same in a sauce pan over an electric stove, but these are acceptable substitutes. However, be sure to not use your favorite sauce pan…you probably will not appreciate the taste of wax in your spaghetti!
Step 4: Use the sponge to soak up the wax and then gently (and precisely) stamp the pattern on the fabric. If you are too soft, then the pattern will not be fully printed. If you are too hard, then the pattern will bleed and you will end up with a glob of wax.
Step 5: Re-dye the fabric a different color. This will be the color that most of the fabric will take. Let the fabric dry and the color set.
Step 6: Boil the fabric so that all of the wax melts off. Now you know the basics of batik!
We thank the Friends of Women Foundation for letting us watch and learn about this local art.
We have spent the last few days with the Friends of Women Foundation.
The foundation helps women build their businesses, offering business/bookkeeping training and computer classes. They also run an apprenticeship program targeting street children, orphans and child laborers. We met with some of the women taking part in the program. The women are mostly seamstresses, however there are also women who make handbags, batik, make beads, and do hairstyling. Women who are experienced in their occupation may take on as many as six apprentices. The Friends of Women Foundation is an excellent example of the important work many of our potential partners are doing. Africa Aid has a unique opportunity to assist the growth of their clients through microlending. For the Foundation for Women this seed money can be used by apprentices to purchase their first sewing machine or set of batiking materials.
Stay tuned for the next chapter of our adventures as we continue exploring potential partners in Ghana.
Our team in Ghana has concluded a busy week of meetings with potential partner organizations for the upcoming Africa Aid Microfinance Program. The lending organizations in Ghana have been quite impressive and all are doing very important work in providing small-business loans to very deserving clients. The organizations serve target populations that range from small farmers to tailors to street children, and most of the organizations provide a variety of supporting programs for their clients, such as HIV/AIDS education, small business training, and computer training.
We hope to briefly showcase a few of the organizations that have shown significant promise for future collaboration with Africa Aid. Earlier this week we traveled by tro-tro (the local transportation where you are packed like sardines into a minivan, hoping for a window seat to catch a bit of breeze and praying that the vehicle makes it to your final destination without breaking down) to Kumasi, about 4 hours from Accra, to meet with Cedi Finance Foundation (CFF). CFF is a fairly expansive microfinance institution that currently serves 6,000 clients in the Kumasi area in the central region of Ghana. We had the pleasure of observing the daily operations of the CFF office, spending the day with the organization’s Executive Director, Joe Agama, as well as a CFF board member. We were also able to accompany two credit officers (those who disperse loans and collect payments) to a solidarity group meeting to witness the disbursement of a second loan to a number of small-business owners. Under the microfinance model, a typical solidarity group is comprised of 4-6 members, each of whom is responsible for missed payments by other group members. The idea is that we are replacing physical collateral with social collateral. Because each member is responsible for the other, trust is a very important component when forming solidarity groups. Groups are therefore most often formed through some type of social network. In the group we visited the individuals all belonged to the same church. Some of the business conducted by this particular group included selling ice blocks (where the first loan was used to buy a freezer), hardware, used clothing, and produce.
This week we will be visiting potential partner organizations at their sites. This will require quite a bit of traveling, so wish us luck on the tro-tros.
Below is Jenny and Summer with a madam (a master seamstress) and her apprentices.
Hey everyone. It’s been about a week since we have all been here. Just to give you an idea of who is here in Ghana, let me introduce Eric (Executive Director and Founder of Africa Aid), Summer (Africa Aid Microfinance Fellow), Jenny (Program Analyst) and myself, Craig (Executive Vice President). We are all healthy and positive after a solid week of meetings, program assessments, and traveling around southern Ghana.
In Buduburam, the Liberian Refugee Camp in Ghana, we wrapped up a week of meetings with members and affiliates of SHIFSD, our partner organization on camp.
We certainly have some news to share. The decision has come after months of negotiations and protests, but the Government of Ghana has recently officially decided to end the operations of the Buduburam Refugee Camp. The government has called for the repatriation of all refugees back to Liberia by October 2008. Ghana’s Minister of Interior has said the legitimacy of the camp to continue operating is over, and that the refugees must return home. So, with that, the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) has just recently begun repatriating individuals and families, over a hundred at a time, on flights that operate 3 days per week out of Accra.
Liberian refugees in Ghana are heading home. Back to Monrovia.
This obviously has a great impact on our operations and programs in Ghana. After a week of meetings and discussion, Africa Aid has decided to end both our currently operating School Lunch Program (SLP) and our upcoming Microfinance for Agricultural Production (MAP) program. For the SLP, although we will be ending the program, we are happy with what it was able to accomplish during operations through motivating students to attend school while they remained on camp. As for MAP, although we will not be running the program in Ghana, we are traveling to Liberia in order to assess the potential of extending a microfinance program for repatriating refugees to Liberia. So, in all we are excited about the potential of extending our programs to Liberia as well as looking into new regions of Ghana where we feel our operations are needed.
For the Liberians still living in Budubram, this decision by the Government of Ghana places most of them in a rather uncertain situation. Some refugees have been living in Ghana since 1990: a long time to live in a foreign country and suddenly have to return back to Liberia, especially when they are only allowed to carry a maximum of 50 kilos. Some children who were born in Ghana have never been to their “native” country. It seems an impossible task to fit your life into only 50 kilos and head back home, to a country that many have not known for over a decade. This is one of the primary problems for most, including many Liberian-run organizations on camp who are trying to figure out ways to secure funds to ship their goods back to Liberia, and rebuild what they have established at Buduburam.
But overall, it seems that the Liberian refugees are predominantly optimistic and have received the decision from the government of Ghana relatively well. Most don’t really have a choice.
We will keep in touch as the week continues with meetings and discussions about Buduburams’ closing and our potential operations in Liberia in the future.
This startling debut by a young American-Nigerian writer follows the fortunes of Agu, a child soldier fighting in the civil war of an unnamed African country. Read on..
We know what Bob Geldof and Tony Blair think about Africa - as the continent that most needs salvation. But what do the people of Africa feel, in their diverse cultures and classes and nations? Read on..
This book is aimed initially at students who want to study the history of the AIDS epidemic but who currently have no starting point from which to enter the vast and often technical literature. Read on..
Konono No. 1, a streetcorner band that hails from the Congolese capital, Kinshasa, makes hypnotic, beautiful, heavily rhythmic dance music with an often heavily-distorted electric thumb piano as the lead instrument. Read on..
Savane, the great African guitarist and bluesman Ali Farka Touré's final solo studio album, was recorded in his native Mali toward the end of his life, when the artist knew his days were numbered. Read on..
Fela Kuti's twitchy, stomping rhythms are up in your face, his brass section sounds ready to skirmish with the JB Horns, and his confrontational, politically charged lyrics make modern punk or hip-hop sound like parlor chatter. Read on..
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