World Water Day 2014
World Water Day (WWD) is held annually on 22 March as a means of focussing attention on the importance of freshwater and advocating for the sustainable management of freshwater resources. This year’s theme for WWD on Saturday is “water and energy”, to collectively bring attention to the water-energy relationship, highlighting the 768 million people that…
Malaria can climb mountains when temperatures rise
A study in Science by Siraj and colleagues this week showed malaria occurs at higher altitudes in warmer years. Their modelling predicts that a one degree Celsius temperature rise in the Ethiopian highlands could lead to 2.8 million more cases in children each year in current malaria areas and over 400,000 cases in new areas.…
To win a soccer match, wear red and play at home
Last Saturday I watched my hometown team, Sheffield United, win through to an FA Cup semifinal for the first time since 2003. For a team in the third tier of English professional soccer (the illogically named League 1), a great achievement given the number of larger, richer and more successful clubs that went out in…
International Women’s Day 2014: Women in agriculture
by Rachel Hill with contributions from Abigail Rumsey, Claire Curry, Emily Palmer and Léna Durocher-Granger. For over a century countries globally have celebrated International Women’s Day as a day to reflect on the role of women in society. In honor of International Women’s Day 2014 we are giving a special focus to women in agriculture.…
BBC launches Woman’s Hour Power List 2014: highlights FGM in time for International Woman’s Day
BBC Radio 4 launched the Woman’s Hour Power List 2014 to identify the top 10 female ‘game changers’; changing the rules in culture, society and business in the United Kingdom today. Woman’s Hour Power List 2013 had 100 names, average age over 50, and many well-known. This year’s judges want the 2014 list to be younger and have unexpected names! Fahma Mohamed, the teenage female genital mutilation (FGM) campaigner was suggested as an ideal candidate: supported by the Guardian newspaper, she recently ran a petition to lobby the government to address FGM in the UK.
How mobile phones could make a difference to maternal health
Mobile technology is revolutionising health and health care in developing countries enabling health promotion campaigns, reminders about therapy and data collecting. To women it could provide a lifeline for them during pregnancy and birth. But what evidence is there that mobile messages are accessible to women in these situations and that they could change women’s…
World NGO Day – 27 February
February 27th 2014 was World NGO Day. It was marked by an international conference held in Helsinki, Finland, across the 27th-28th February entitled ‘Your NGO day: a generation of new NGOs’. The conference agenda reflected some of the roles and values of non-governmental organizations (NGOs) with speakers covering health, education, social welfare and the empowerment…
Illegal wildlife trade – Focus of first ever World Wildlife Day
At the sixteenth meeting of the Conference of Parties to CITES in March 2013, the Thai Government recommended the adoption of a resolution to declare March 3 as World Wildlife Day, which was later agreed at the United Nations General Assembly in December. The date marks the anniversary of the adoption of the Convention on…
2014: the International Year of Family Farming
Did you know that there are 1.5 billion people worldwide who are estimated to be involved in family farming? The United Nations has declared 2014 as the International Year of Family Farming (IYFF) to recognize the importance of family farming in reducing poverty and improving global food security. So what is family farming?
IPPC and Plantwise lead successful workshop for coordinated plant protection in East Africa
From Rwanda, Uganda, Kenya and Tanzania, key representatives of agricultural institutions gathered in Nairobi last week for the first ever joint workshop led by CABI’s Plantwise programme and the International Plant Protection Convention (IPPC) Secretariat. The workshop was convened in an effort to exchange national experiences in plant protection and pave the way for renewed…