Reduced Inequalities

Photo: A H/mong hill tribe woman in a village of Sin Chai, Sapa, Viet Nam. Women’s labour accounts for the two-thirds of subsistence agriculture in developing countries, yet they often have no rights over the land. Credit: UN Photo/Kibae Park

Indigenous Women Still Face Huge Rights Challenges

By Phil Harris

ROME (IDN) – Almost ten years have come and gone since the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples was adopted by the UN General Assembly on September 13, 2007, but indigenous people continue to face discrimination, marginalisation and major challenges in enjoying their basic rights.

“The Declaration, which took more than twenty years to negotiate, stands today as a beacon of progress, a framework for reconciliation and a benchmark of rights,” according to a joint statement on the occasion of International Day of the World’s Indigenous Peoples on August 9 issued by Victoria Tauli-Corpuz, Special Rapporteur on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, Mariam Wallet Aboubakrine, Chairperson of the UN Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues, and the Expert Mechanism on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples.

: Phil Harris; UN INSIDER; 16 August 2017

Photo: A group of young farmers manage their own tomato business in El Salvador. Rapidly evolving agriculture and food systems have a huge potential for creating employment opportunities for rural youth. ©IFAD/Carla Francescutti.

The "Youth Bulge" Calls for Creating Jobs in Rural Areas

By Ronald Joshua

ROME (IDN) - "Rural areas are failing to provide opportunity and are losing their young people. This has major consequences at the local, national and global level. It can erode national economies, political stability, and food security," warned Gilbert F. Houngbo, president of the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD) at a recent conference hosted by the African Union Commission, the European Commission and the Estonian Presidency of the EU in Rome, Italy.

The conference on July 2, 2017 focused on Making Sustainable Agriculture a Future for Youth in Africa – against the backdrop that an estimated 440 million young people will enter the rural labour market by 2030 in Africa alone.

: Ronald Joshua; UN INSIDER; 12 August 2017

Photo: Alicia Bárcena, Executive Secretary of the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean, who believes that the region “must equalise to grow and grow to equalise, fostering investment and gender equality”. Credit: ECLAC Public Information Unit

Caribbean Must Equalise to Grow and Grow to Equalise - ECLAC

By Desmond Brown

KINGSTON | NEW YORK (ACP-IDN) – If they are to meet commitments agreed under the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and its sustainable development goals (SDGs), the countries of the Caribbean must focus on closing the structural gaps they still have – particularly with regard to gender equality and financial and fiscal sustainability (due to their high debt level) – and mitigating the effects of climate change, .

Alicia Bárcena, Executive Secretary for the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC), spoke in this regard during the 'African-Caribbean Cross-Regional Exchange' at the High-Level Political Forum (HLPF) which ended July 19 at United Nations headquarters in New York.

: Desmond L. Brown; THE WORLD; Latin America & the Caribbean; 23 July 2017

Photo: Quran Roundabout in Sharjah, which has been named World Book Capital 2019. Credit: TripAdvisor

Sharjah Named World Book Capital 2019 by UNESCO

By Phil Harris

ROME | PARIS (IDN) – Signalling a major achievement for the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and the Arab world, Sharjah has been named World Book Capital 2019 by the UN Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO).

The honour is recognition of the emirate's pioneering role in supporting and expanding the local and regional publishing industries, promoting reading to become an intrinsic cultural practice, as well as embracing intercultural, knowledge-based dialogue.

: Phil Harris; UN INSIDER; 30 June 2017

Photo: Daniel Osiemo, acting NEPAD Kenya Secretariat Chief Executive Officer (left) and Estherine Fotabong, Director of Programmes (right), NEPAD agency addressing the press during the launch of the Skills Initiative for Africa consultative Workshop held in Nairobi, Kenya. Credit: Wanzala Justus | IDN-INPS

Access of African Youth to Labour Market Receives Boost

By Justus Wanzala

NAIROBI (IDN) – The African Union (AU) in collaboration with the government of Germany has established an initiative to help young Africans acquire practical skills for meeting the needs of labour markets.

The aim is to strengthen their occupational prospects in view of the continent’s unemployment crisis.

Most hit are young people, with around 60 percent of the unemployed under the age of 25. Key players in implementation of the initiative are the New Partnership for Africa's Development (NEPAD) and the German government’s Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation, as well as the German KfW Development Bank. NEPAD is a socio-economic development flagship programme of the AU.

: Phil Harris; THE WORLD; Africa; 10 May 2017

Ensuring EU Development Cooperation Is Sustainable

By Seamus Jeffreson

Following is a slightly abridged text of the presentation by Seamus Jeffreson, Director of Brussels-based CONCORD, at the high-level Conference – titled 'Sixty Years and Beyond: Contributing to Development Cooperation' – in Rome on 27 April 2017 to mark the 60th anniversary of the Treaties of Rome. CONCORD is the European Association of NGOs for relief and development, advocating sustainable development based on human rights, justice and gender equality.

ROME (IDN-INPS) - Before looking to the future, it is instructive to recall the origins of EU cooperation – enshrined unexpectedly and at the last minute in the Treaty of Rome.

Reading the memoires of Dieter Frisch – one of the doyens of EU cooperation over the years – it is striking how the concept of working together characterized the relationship between the African Caribbean and Pacific partners and the European Community from the beginning.

: Ramesh Jaura; OPINION; 04 May 2017

Photo: Second Chittagong Hill Tracts Rural Development Project in Bangladesh. Credit. Asian Development Bank.

The Asian Poor Should Not Be Neglected

By Jonathan Power*

LUND, Sweden (IDN-INPS) - The Asian economies are picking up speed again. After the big hit from Wall Street when the bank, Lehman Brothers, collapsed in a heap in 2008, sending shock waves everywhere, a recovery is now in the works.

How many child deaths in the Third World did these bankers cause? Another question is will future growth be like the past – fast but severely inequitable? The same growth before 2008 that reduced absolute poverty created a widening gulf between the haves and have-nots.

But isn’t that sufficient for the day, many ask? Absolute poverty must be the key mark of progress – raising incomes, giving people more money to seek education for their children or medical care or filling the coffers for the state so that it can fund bore holes in the countryside and sewers in the urban slums.

: Jonathan Power; OPINION; 28 March 2017

Photo: UN Women Executive Director Phumzile Mlambo-Ngcuka and actress Patricia Arquette join the campaign for equal pay. Credit: UN Women/Ryan Brown

Women Still Trail Behind Men in All Aspects of Life, Says UN

By Shanta Roy

Women make 77 cents for every dollar men earn. Up to 90 percent of women workers are informally employed. Advancing women’s equality in total could bring a potential boost of 28 trillion dollars to global annual gross domestic product (GDP) by 2025.

NEW YORK (IDN) – The statistics unveiled at an annual meeting of women at the UN were disturbingly revealing: On a global average, women only make 77 cents for every dollar men earn.

There is still a “myriad of laws” in over 150 countries which openly discriminate against women, affecting more than three billion worldwide – and relating to virtually every aspect of women’s lives.

: IDN-INPS UN Bureau; UN INSIDER; 19 March 2017

Photo: Madina Abylkassymova, Vice-Minister for National Economy of the Republic of Kazakhstan, addressing Security Council in an open debate on March 15 on human trafficking, modern slavery and forced labour. Behind her is Ambassador Kairat Umarov, Permanent Representative of the Republic of Kazakhstan to the United Nations. Credit: Kazakh Permanent Mission to the UN in New York.

Security Council Stresses Need to Fight Human Trafficking

By Santo D. Banerjee

NEW YORK (IDN) – With conflicts driving the desperation and disorder that enables human traffickers to thrive, Security Council has held an open debate on human trafficking, modern slavery and forced labour and highlighted the need for three P's: Prevention, Protection, Prosecution.

The dimensions of the challenge are huge. The United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) suspects victims in 106 countries. The International Labour Organization (ILO) reports that 21 million people around the world are victims of forced labour and extreme exploitation. The perpetrators of such crimes cash profits of some $150 billion annually.

: Santo D. Banerjee; UN INSIDER; 18 March 2017

Photo (from left to right): Kate Gilmore, UN Deputy High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR); Manfred Nowak, Secretary General of the European Inter-University Centre for Human Rights and Democratisation (EIUC) and Professor of International Law and Human Rights at the University of Vienna; and Benjamin Ward, Deputy Director of the Europe and Central Asia Division of Human Rights Watch. Credit: Ayham G Youssef/Globale Verantwortung.

The Erosion of International Law – Who Cares?

By Julia Rainer

VIENNA (IDN) – “In Syria we have an attack on hospitals every 17 hours, in fact we say the most dangerous place in the country to be in is a hospital. So I ask you, does anyone still believe there is something like international humanitarian law?"

With these sobering words, Zedoun Al-Zoubi, CEO of the Union of Medical Care and Relief Organisations (UOSSM International) which operates in Syria, addressed the audience during a panel discussion at the fourth Humanitarian Congress held on March 3 in the Austrian capital.