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:
Fairtrade Benefits Rural Workers in Africa, But not the Poorest of the Poor
A new study from the University of Göttingen and international partners have analyzed the effects of Fairtrade certification on poor rural workers in Africa. The results show that Fairtrade improves the situation of employees in agricultural cooperatives, but not of workers in the smallholder farm sector, who are often particularly disadvantaged. The study was published in “Nature Sustainability”.
Benin: Digital Rural Transformation Project Promises a New Dawn
A newly approved $100 million credit by the World Bank will support the government of Benin’s efforts to improve access to broadband services in rural communities. The funds will also be used to promote the use of digital solutions to improve efficiency of selected value-chains, financial inclusion and access to markets.
Expect Budget to Be Rural-Centric, Focus On Delivery to Beneficiaries
The interim Budget was presented in February 2019. The full Budget for 2019-20 will be presented by the newly-appointed Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman in the Lok Sabha on July 5.
“None of the schemes declared in the interim budget and around that time would be scrapped or refurbished,” the offcials added.
If this is the principle behind the current budget, it’s likely to be rural like the interim budget. Also, going by major public pronouncements by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, it will be a rural budget.
While tabling budget 2019 in Parliament, Nirmala Sitharaman, Finance Minister, Government of India said, “By 2022, every single rural family except those who are unwilling to take the connection, will have electricity and a clean cooking facility.” She also informed the house that earlier it used to take 314 days to construct a house under Pradhan Mantri Aawas Yojna (PMSY) which has now come down to 114 days, a third of the time taken for constructing a PMAY house.
Tanzania Lags Behind Target on Electricity Connectivity
Tanzania still lags behind its grid electricity connection targets, despite government’s deliberate initiatives to reach more people, a new report shows.
The connectivity of power supplied by the Tanzania Electricity Company (Tanesco) increased from 18 per cent in 2011/12 to 29 per cent in 2017/18, according to the latest Household Budget Survey released by the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS).
However, the increase has not matched the government’s ambitions. The government planned to increase connection levels to 30 per cent by 2015, 50 per cent by 2025 and at least 75 per cent by 2033, according to the Electricity Supply Industry Reform Strategy and Roadmap for 2014 – 2025.
Malawi Bemoans Low Number of Rural Mobile Money Agents
The Consumer Association of Malawi (CAMA) is concerned over the low number of mobile money agents in rural areas. CAMA executive director John Kapito said the situation impacts negatively on the country’s financial inclusion agenda.
He added that mobile money agents could be frustrated because of the low transaction volume in rural areas compared to urban areas.