Every week, RuralReporters.com collate reports on development issues in rural Africa and its environs.
This report includes some of our top picks from recent must-read research, interviews, blogs, and in-depth articles, carefully selected to help you keep up with global issues.
Here are some of the updates you may have missed from the previous week:
Tech alone ‘won’t raise farm yields’
Technological innovations such as use of mobile phones to aid farming are unlikely to increase yields unless strong institutions exist, an academician says.
According to the FAO, a renewed focus on technological innovation is needed to promote sustainable agriculture. But some experts say that despite a big focus on technological innovation such as smartphone apps in agriculture, the expected returns are not enough.
“If smallholders in Africa are going to be empowered and really thrive as a business, innovation is not just going to happen in technology but also in institutions,” says Tom Jayne, a professor of food and resource economics at the US-based Michigan State University, citing institutions such as those that provide agricultural extension services. Jayne adds that the strength of rural agricultural institutions, research and development, and the rate of farm technology advancements will influence African agriculture.
Certainty and support needed to create rural jobs
According to Jahni de Villiers, head of Labour and Development at Agri SA, average unemployment in South Africa’s rural areas currently stands at 41%, and job creation here has to be prioritised.
Agri SA believed that the sector could still provide solutions for rural job creation, but certainty and support were needed, she said.
“If we don’t have policy certainty and consistent support from government, we won’t be in a position to do what’s needed in the rural areas,” she said.
30percent of rural Uganda has no access to clean water report
A new report on the state of access to safe water in rural areas shows that 30 percent of the rural population does not have access to clean drinking water.
The report also shows that in urban areas only 26 percent of the population have access to clean safe drinking water while 21 percent of the population do not have access to basic sanitation meaning the defecate outside.
Girls living in rural areas break virginity earlier than those in towns – Ministry of Health study
A Ministry of Health study has revealed girls living in villages break their virginity much earlier compared to those in urban areas. The study results released on Wednesday, October 31, in the just concluded second International Conference on Maternal, New-born and Child Health revealed village girls have their first sexual experience at mostly 16 years.
The study was conducted by the Performance Monitoring and Accountability 2020 (PMA2020), which is an independent project that has been tracking trends in contraceptive use and family planning in Kenya
Addressing Mental Health in Rural India
India is home to an estimated 56 million people suffering from depression and 38 million more from anxiety disorders, according to the World Health Organisation (WHO). But while 20 percent of the country’s population suffer from mental illness, only 12 percent at most seek aid for their mental health concerns.
Those who do are more likely to be located in urban areas, perched on top of the socioeconomic ladder, and have access to qualified psychologists, psychiatrists, appropriate medicines and both online and offline social networks that greatly destigmatise mental health disorders. These privileges aren’t readily accessible in India’s rural villages.
“In many of the villages we work in, people consult faith healers for epileptic attacks,” said Amul Joshi, Country Director of the MINDS Foundation, an international organisation based in the United States that works primarily in the western Indian state of Gujarat.
Since 2016, it has taken its operations to 92 villages in the state to conduct mental health awareness and educational workshops. Nearly 19,000 villagers have participated in these workshops and 193 patients requiring mental health treatment have been taken to city hospitals in Vadodara and Bhavnagar.
China to step up policy support for rural economy
China will step up monetary policy support for rural areas and encourage local firms to raise funds in the capital markets, said a Central Bank Vice Governor, Zhu Hexin.
Hexin pledged that Beijing would help facilitate funds to reach the rural economy.
China’s rural economy – comprising small farm holdings and low-end industries – is in particular need of policy support, with local populations rapidly greying, productivity slumping and few growth engines in sight.