Every week, Rural Reporters collate reports on development in rural Africa and its environs. The reports include some of our top picks from recent must-read research, interviews, reports, blogs and in-depth articles which have been carefully selected to help you keep up with global issues. Here are some of the updates you may have missed from the previous week.
Forum on Rural Development in Yaounde: Participants discuss measures to curb rural exodus in Africa
Representatives of 30 African countries have been working this week to map out ways to stop the continent’s mass rural exodus at the Forum on Rural Development in Yaounde.
Emmanuel Afessi works on his desk top at Odja center in Cameroon’s capital, Yaounde, where he is training 30 youths on information technologies at the center he created when he returned from the United States a year ago.
“Africa needs to produce its own knowledge, its own equipment and that is why we want to train people within the continent,” he said. “ICTs help close the gap between the developed and the developing world much faster than any technology including the motor vehicles. It is a large contributor to most African countries GDPs today. Think about just the whole aspects of internet and mobile phone. That is a huge multi-billion dollar market.”
http://cameroon-concord.com/headlines/item/6850-forum-on-rural-development-in-yaounde-participants-discuss-measures-to-curb-rural-exodus-in-africa
Economic growth is not enough to save those threatened daily with starvation and governments need to tailor policies and investments to transform rural areas in developing countries if they want to eliminate poverty – those are some of the key findings from a new report by the United Nations rural poverty agency.
“The Rural Development Report marks a change in perspective,” the President of the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD), Kanayo F. Nwanze, said in a news release on the launch of the report.
“It places the rural sector into the bigger picture of the country’s development. It demonstrates the need for a far more comprehensive and holistic approach to the economy to ensure prosperity for millions of rural people,” Mr. Nwanze added. “It reinforces IFAD’s view, based on 40 years of experience, that investing in agricultural and rural development means investing in the whole economy.”
Rural District Plans Build Service Station To Boost Revenue
Rural District Council in Zvishavane has proposed the building of a fuel station to enhance its revenue base.
In the plan is approved, it will become the first local authority to embark on such a project.
The rural council intends to have the service station to be constructed at Siboza business centre, 20 kilometres along the Zvishavane-Gweru road.
“The committee (finance) has noted that council can generate income for itself by building a filling station at Siboza,” reads part of minutes of a recent full council meeting.
With 10 New Stations, Radio reach Expands in Rural Guinea
Last month, following a week of inaugurations in Leloma, Koubia, Dubreka, and Fria, along with the Ministry of Communications who is supporting these stations moving forward, the final rural radio station on the island of Kassa. The station is designed to reach all of the people living on the five islands off of the coast of Conakry. Broadcasting to the island villages in their own language is essential. Past cholera outbreaks often begin off of the coast.
When you see the stations themselves they aren’t very impressive just a small building with a few meeting rooms. In the back there is a tiny studio with a few microphones and two computers. But they punch above their weight. They play local traditional music and tell old stories of their village history. People from Conakry can call in and greet their whole family in a village far away. The radios are not just for one-way communication. There are radio clubs and call-in shows allowing the community to work with the DJs and influence the programming. Most importantly, the radios provide information that can protect the villages.
USAID Introduces Solar-Powered Irrigation Systems In Northern Ghana
The United States Agency for International Development (USAID) has introduced solar-powered irrigation schemes in northern Ghana to safeguard farmers the trouble of relying on erratic rains for farming activities in the country’s poorest regions.
“USAID is introducing solar-powered irrigation systems in northern Ghana, the US Ambassador, Mr Robert Jackson said, “farmers will no longer have to rely on unpredictable rains to grow their crops.”
The Triple Vulnerability of Being Poor and Disabled in Rural South Africa
Global studies show that the top three barriers stopping people with disabilities from using health facilities are cost, lack of services near to where they live and transportation.
Our study found that these three barriers were particularly acute for poor people with disabilities living in rural South Africa. This is because they experience a “triple vulnerability”: poverty, disability and rurality. They see themselves as less healthy compared to able bodied people and they have less access to health care.
Micro-grids open door to rural electrification across sub-Saharan Africa
The growth of micro-grid solutions for power supply is gaining momentum across the globe, with both developed and undeveloped regions increasingly realising the value of energy solutions that do not depend on a centralised power grid. In the coming years, the most significant opportunities for micro-grids will be for rural electrification across sub-Saharan Africa.
This is according to Mark Makanda, regional sales director for APR Energy, who says in a region where approximately 600 million people lack access to electricity, micro-grids are beginning to provide energy to areas long perceived as too difficult or uneconomic to connect to a national grid.
Mozambique will ban export of timber logs from 2017
Mozambique’s parliament is expected in the coming months to approve a government proposal to ban the export of all kinds of wooden logs from 2017.
The National Director of Forestry at the Ministry of Land, Environment and Rural Development, Xavier Sakambuera, said the ban is intended not only to boost local processing of wood but also reduce illegal logging, maintenance of forest species and improvement of environmental quality. The new rules will also create new jobs in wood processing in Mozambique.