The Ibrahim Index of African Governance was published today. It ranks African governments in five dimensions (safety and security, rule of law & transparency, participation & human rights, sustainable economic opportunity, and human development) and then puts these together to arrive at an overall ranking.
Mauritius comes top again this year; and the top 5 countries [...]
About 12-13 million Ethiopians need food relief or emergency assistance as a result of the failure of the short rains in southern Ethiopia, according to AFP:
The lack of rain in the main February to April wet season has left at least 75,000 Ethiopian children under age five at risk from malnutrition, OCHA said. …
The United [...]
Via Chris, from Scarlett Lion.
This is scarily accurate.
CNN’s “Inside Africa” show this week covers three stories: the migration of wildebeest in the Masai Mara, gorillas in northern Congo, and a white man kayaking around Madagascar.
This is the entrance to a tiny 13th Century Rock Church in Tigray, called Abuna Yemata Guh. And yes, that’s a narrow ledge you have to walk along, with a 200 metre vertical drop to your left, at the end of a terrifying ascent up the side of a cliff to get there.
The dangerous [...]
Paul Collier savages Prince Charles for advocating medieval peasant farming, and points out that it is not a solution for hunger in Africa.
The GM ban has three adverse effects. It has retarded productivity in European agriculture; grain production could be increased by about 15% were the ban lifted. More subtly, because Europe is out of [...]
In a slightly whimsical account of Bill Clinton’s trip to Ethiopia in The Guardian, we find this:
Awke Tiruneh and his wife Emaye Beyene are not the only couple who are faintly bemused. They are pleased with their two lightbulbs, one in the main room and a second in the kitchen annexe of their pristine [...]
In Le Monde, David Martin has a rather intelligent piece about aid to Ethiopia:
Major operators such as Difid, the British government arm, and USAid play a cat-and-mouse game with the government (GoE) because Meles is sensitive about external pressures in an environment in which domestic critics are almost silenced and expatriate websites blocked. Yet donor [...]
Google has
launched Google News in English for Nigeria, Kenya, Ethiopia, Tanzania, Zimbabwe,
Namibia, Ghana, Uganda and Botswana allowing users to search and view news in
localized editions, and helping dozens of African news sites make their stories
available to users worldwide.
Google News Ethiopia is here: http://news.google.com.et/
The Los Angeles Times reckons it knows the causes of Ethiopia’s famines:
Simply put, the nation, in which 85% of people toil as small farmers, has reached a point where it can’t easily grow enough food to meet its needs. Although agricultural production has increased overall, it has declined per capita, according to the World Bank.
This [...]
This is without doubt the best out of office reply I’ve ever received.
I’ll be in Africa until the end of August, with irregular access to e-mail. No doubt I will still neurotically check my messages, but I may only be able to respond to pressing issues. I’ll try to get back to all as soon [...]