World Water Week kicked off on Monday and the shortage of water across the world is being highlighted. In the world, one in ten people lack access to safe drinking water and one in three people lack access to improved sanitation facilities. The astounding number of people without access to safe water and sanitation prompted
Since 2011, August 30th has been memorized as International Day of the Victims of Enforced Disappearances to raise attention of family members and friends of the disappeared. Under international human rights law, enforced disappearance occurs when a person is secretly abducted or imprisoned by a state or political organization or by a third party with the authorization, support, or
While a majority of the western world focuses on the ravages of Zika, another deadly virus is threatening to make the move towards a global epidemic. Yellow fever, a virus transmitted by the Aedes aegypti mosquito, has been around for over 3,000 years. It is incurable, and although most people only face flu-like symptoms, 15 percent
(Photographer: Munshi Ahmed/Bloomberg) Just two days ago on Wednesday August 24th, Singapore signed bilateral agreements with Ethiopia, Mozambique, and Nigeria at the Africa-Singapore Business Forum (ASBF) as Singapore looks for opportunities to strengthen economic relations with Africa. These agreements include the signing of the Avoidance of Double Taxation (DTA) with Ethiopia, a Bilateral Investment Treaty
(UN: Tuenjai Chuabsamai/ ESCAP) There has been reported phenomenal growth in information and communication technology (ICT) in the Asia Pacific region, with over 52.3 percent of global fixed broadband subscribers coming from United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (ESCAP) member states in 2015 as compared to the 38.1 percent in
Today marks International Day for the Remembrance of the Slave Trade and its Abolition to commemorate those who fought for freedom and to never forget the battle they fought to ensure dignity for all. In the night of 22 to 23 August 1791, men and women, torn from Africa and sold into slavery, revolted against
Today marks World Humanitarian Day, an annual reminder of the need to mobilize action to mitigate suffering throughout the world. This day is designated by the United Nations (UN) General Assembly and also marks the day for remembering Special Representative of the Secretary-General to Iraq, Sergio Vieira de Mello and 21 of his colleagues who
The transparent information and open communication that make for better business has upended industries of all sorts. Those same principles can be applied to one of the world’s oldest and most important livelihoods: Agriculture. It has been proven that digital tools can have tangible business benefits for the agricultural sector as a whole. Information disseminated
(Image: REUTERS/ Akintunde Akinleve) In a recent report, the United Nations World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) has shown that a middle-income country, China, has joined developed economies as a global leader of innovation. China, however, is an aberration. A large “innovation divide” still persists between developed and developing countries. For instance, the most innovative countries,
UN Women, in collaboration with the UN Inter-Agency Network on Youth Development, hosted an event in celebration of the International Youth Day – “Investing in young women’s leadership is key to implementing the SDGs”. Currently there is a global youth bulge of some 1.8 billion young people, mostly in developing countries in Africa and Asia.
Poliomyelitis, more commonly known as polio, is an illness that is almost pre-historic. Spread through fecal matter, it has devastated millions of children’s lives by paralyzing their legs and forcing them to live crippled throughout their adulthood. The World Health Organization (WHO) estimates that there are 10 to 20 million-polio survivors worldwide. After the discovery
Today marks International Youth Day, an awareness day officially designated by the United Nations (UN) after the UN General Assembly endorsed the recommendation made by the World Conference of Ministers Responsible for Youth. The theme of the 2016 International Youth Day is “The Road to 2030: Eradicateting Poverty and Achieving Sustainable Consumption and Production”. In
(Source: Jonathan Kalan, UN Photo) A new UN report found that e-government is an effective tool for facilitating integrated policies and public services. E-government is define as the “use of information and communication technologies to offer citizens and businesses the opportunity to interact and conduct business with government by using different electronic media, including telephone
International Day of the World’s Indigenous Peoples, celebrated each year on August 9 since 1994, marks the day of the first meeting of the UN Working Group on Indigenous Population in 1982. This year’s theme focuses on the right to education. The right of indigenous peoples to education has been mentioned in several international documents.
Earlier this week experts and development workers gathered in Rio to tackle the mammoth issue of malnutrition. Last week’s blog posts shed light on how much food we waste, food resilience, and even cholera; all small pieces of the puzzle that prevents us from solving the malnutrition crisis. At the 2013 Nutrition for Growth (N4G)
(42.4 kg of avoidable food waste found in New Zealand household rubbish bins in 2014, excerpted from Wikipedia.org, original work by Love Food Hate Waste NZ) Do you remember how much did you eat today? Do you remember how much food you threw into a trash can? According to the report from Food and Agriculture
Floods are now causing more economic, social and humanitarian losses worldwide than any other type of natural hazard. According to the U.N. Office for Disaster Risk Reduction, 250 million people each year on average are affected. According to Luca Alinovi’s article ‘Solutions not Band-Aids: Building flood resilience with the world’s most vulnerable people’, the economic losses
(UN Photo/ Logan Abassi) Since the introduction of cholera to Haiti in 2010, the UN has used more than $59 million out of the allocated $307 million to reduce the number of cholera case fatalities. The implemented 291 initiatives have led to more than a 90 percent reduction in cholera cases since peaking in 2011
Agreement Creates Framework for Collaboration in Global Trade and Trade Finance across South America, Sub-Saharan Africa and ASEAN New York, NY – August 03, 2016 – The Bassiouni Group / TBG (www.bassiounigroup.com), a leading Global Development firm specializing in International Consulting, Trade & Investment solutions for emerging/frontier markets, today announced that it has signed a Memorandum of
UN always has a “zero tolerance” attitude towards sexual abuse by anyone working under the blue flag. Earlier this year, Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon appointed Jane Holl Lute as the Special Coordinator on improving the UN response to sexual exploitation and abuse. However, the situation in South Sudan is far from sufficient. Today, the United Nations in
When international attention first came to the AIDS epidemic in sub-Saharan Africa, it was at the Durban conference of 2000. Leading up to that day, celebrities, politicians, and humanitarians were pushing for more resources to fight a disease that was killing as many as 1 in 5 in some villages. AIDS had left thousands orphaned,
