Understandable concern exists over the state of hunger in Africa: almost one third of the population are estimated to be hungry, while more than a quarter of infants are underweight in the countries to the south of the Sahara. Moreover, parts of Africa are all too often hit by sharp increases in hunger when harvests fail or strife breaks out. Can Africa feed itself? And what needs to be done? This report reviews the evidence and opinions drawing on available statistics, the considerable literature and interviews by telephone and email with key informants.

The world’s first solar-powered netbook, Samsung Electronics’ NC215S laptop, is the ideal product for a continent where electricity access can be limited, but sunlight is never in short supply. The solar-charging capability means that it is also the first genuine environment-friendly product of its kind, with a lower carbon footprint than any other laptop on the market.

Liberian voters rejected plans to move the presidential election to November. The the poll will thus take place on its original date of October 11. Liberian lawmakers had proposed changing the date so that the vote missed the rainy season.

Remittances from Africans abroad are booming, growing fourfold in the past 20 years and shrugging off the global financial crisis, to total $40 billion a year. 'Tapping into this money with so-called diaspora bonds could help provide Africa with the equipment and services it needs for long-term growth and poverty reduction,' World Bank policymakers Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala and Dilip Ratha wrote in an op-ed in the New York Times.

A new application called Bribespot helps ordinary people report on instances of corruption they witness in their daily lives. According to this piece, users can download a mobile app for Android, which they can then use to submit specific instances of bribes. (Users can also submit through a website). A central office checks the submission and removes identifying information before posting to a database.

By next year ‘palm oil is forecast to be the world’s most produced and internationally traded edible oil.’ But as foreign investors descend on Africa to develop large-scale palm oil plantations, the survival of local people is being threatened as they lose control of the land and water on which they depend for their food production and livelihoods, warns Joan Baxter.

‘Amidst all the media furore about the fall of Tripoli from the grasp of the Libyan government, it's not easy to get a clear picture of what things look like under the new rulers,’ writes Lizzie Phelan.

Under Gaddafi, Dan Glazebrook contends, Libya was rising as a socialist, anti-imperialist and pan-Africanist nation spearheading African unity and independence. This threatened the West’s long imperialist interests in the continent, hence the NATO-led war.

Camalita Naicker is convinced that racism is not yet dead, as can be seen from supposedly harmless everyday encounters. It is baggage from the past that should be thrown off to create new, inclusive identities.

http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/547/gay_wedding1_tmb.jpg[/img">http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/547/gay_wedding2_tmb.jpg[/img">http://www.pambazuka.org/images/articles/547/gay_wedding3_tmb.jpgOn 24 July 2011, New York State legalised same-sex marriage. Masotho Kelebohile Nkhereanye and her African-American wife Renee Boyd were among the couples that made US history by marrying that day. A few months later Nick Mwaluko spoke to them about their decision and what same-sex marriage might mean to Africans on the continent and in the diaspora.

The Angolan authorities should immediately drop politically motivated charges against 18 people who were convicted after unfair trials for their participation in an anti-government demonstration in Luanda, Human Rights Watch said.

Troy Anthony Davis is on death row for the 1989 murder of police officer Mark MacPhail in Savannah, GA in the US. Troy has always maintained his innocence, and there was never any physical evidence linking him to the crime. On March 28, the US Supreme Court denied Troy's final appeal, clearing the way for Georgia to set the execution date. The state of Georgia has now set Troy Davis's execution date for midnight on 21 September. As part of the campaign to save Davis’s life, Naji Mujahid calls on readers to view and share the following documentary.

As the Ivorian government works on security, reconciliation and economic recovery in the country, the issue of the youth is crucial. Myriam Wedraogo looks at the roles youths played in the post-election crisis and explores windows of opportunity for their empowerment.

This recently published collection of essays, edited by Daniela Körppen, Norbert Ropers and Hans J. Giessmann, aims to link the most recent debates in the peacebuilding field with various systemic discourses. It is the 'first comprehensive volume analysing the value added by integrating systemic thinking into peacebuilding theory and practice.'

‘If there was any uncertainty about the real mission of the United States, France, Britain and other members of NATO in Libya, these doubts were clarified with the nature of the military campaign against the people of Libya,’ writes Horace Campell.

Child labour is a problem in many countries, Botswana included. With poverty increasing in these harsh economic times many communities are putting their children to work. The Media Officer of Ditshwanelo, the Botswana Centre for Human Rights, Thuso Galeitsewe has revealed that according to research, the agricultural sector is where many young children are subjected to work in the fields and large farms.

The Federation of International Football Associations (FIFA) say they have opened an investigation into homophobic comments made by Nigerian football coach Eucharia Uche.

An opinion piece in the New York Times looks at the sophisticated electronic equipment that powered Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi’s extensive spying apparatus, which the Libyan transitional government uncovered.

Through the annual Prince Claus Award, the Fund honours eleven cultural pioneers, for their outstanding achievements in the field of culture and development.

is honoured to receive the Prince Claus Fund’s 2011 Principal Award, and congratulates the 2011 laureates. We thank the Prince Clause Fund for their recognition of our work over the past nine years, and are proud to join the list of previous winners. Most of all, this award honours Chimurenga’s contributors and readers.

Congratulations Chimurenga People.

A U.S Department of Defense release on its website says that Libya was the first major combat operation for U.S. Africa Command, and its men and women 'responded well', the unit’s commander said. 'Still, Africom - the military’s newest combatant command - is assessing the lessons learned from Libya and will make necessary changes,' said Army Gen. Carter F. Ham.

The work of Bishop Christopher Senyonjo, a retired Anglican Bishop from the Diocese of Western Uganda, has become increasingly vital over time, heightened by the intensifying persecution of homosexuals in his country. Taking the courageous step of ministering to LGBT people in his country, the Bishop is calling on America to 'stop exporting hatred' as he continues to advocate for the global decriminalisation of homosexuality.

Sub-Saharan African countries should scale up innovations that utilise internet, cell phones and other modern communication gadgets to national level, to benefit a critical mass of women and children in need of quality healthcare. Tore Godal, the Special Advisor to the Norwegian Prime Minister and co-author of a landmark report 'Innovating for Every Woman, Every Child', says that healthcare innovations can flourish in Africa in the light of greater political will, financing and policy support from central governments.

Angola's state secretary for Human Rights António Bento Bembe has said in an interview with ANGOP that the country is working to respect human rights with the experience of other countries. 'We have been working... with other countries such as England, Norway, Spain, Brazil and others with which we have very good relations,' he said.

Cameroon’s long-time president, Paul Biya, stands a good chance of re-election this October against what analysts say is a weak and divided opposition. Election officials in Cameroon are reviewing applications from 51 presidential candidates, including Biya, who filed his papers just before the deadline.

Two prominent Ethiopian opposition politicians have been detained, at least one of them on terrorism-related charges. But opposition leaders are questioning the charges, saying the detentions appear politically motivated.

Zarina Patel a historian and activist provides here a well-researched work on Manilal Desai, one of the foremost political leaders of Kenya. She provides kaleidoscopic images of Manilal Desai's life in South Gujarat and eventual migration to Kenya in 1915 where he went on to become a vibrant journalist, politician and institution builder.

Subscribe to Highway Africa’s Email Alerts or RSS feed for regular updates. Sustainable development in the face of climate change is the theme of the 15th annual Highway Africa conference currently underway in South Africa.

The Afri-Tech Johannesburg summit is bound to unravel new areas of research and collaboration – with unlimited possibilities of enriching human lives in Africa and around the globe. The framework of this conference is intended to create cross-functional solutions in the areas of health care, education, banking & finance, networking solutions, digital marketing and science & technology.

Resistances and alternatives are the key words chosen by the Liaison Committee, established during the World Assembly of Inhabitants (WAI) in order to unify the Global Campaign for the right to housing and to land from the 15th september until the 31st october this year. The central focus is the struggle against expulsions, evictions, the land grabbing and the persecution of activists. This year, these matters involve not only the organisations that have long been committed to the World Zero Evictions Days and other campaigns, but the entire world.

Discover the ins and outs of Sodom and Gomorrah slum in this documentary. Close to 80,000 people live in Sodom and Gomorrah, a slum on the edge of the polluted Korle Lagoon. The processing of electronic waste near the lagoon leaches toxic substances like lead into the soil. The place sprang up in the 1980s when thousands of people fleeing bloody ethnic clashes between the Kokomba and Nanumba in the north poured into the capital.

The water supply crisis in Ghana is being exploited by all manner of pro-market corporate bodies ranging from the World Bank to Coca-Cola. While the World Bank is licking its wounds from failed private water management initiatives, such as the Aqua Vitens Rand Limited management contract in Ghana, the International Finance Corporation (IFC), its private sector arm, is investing in small-scale private water ventures via WaterHeath International (WHI).

An Afrographique infographic depicting the percentage share of formal firms that are owned by women in Africa.

The death toll from the suicide bombing at the UN headquarters in the Nigerian capital stands at 21, with 73 injured, the deputy United Nations chief announced, reducing a previous toll of 23.

Institutions such as United Nations’ Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) and pan-African rice research organisation AfricaRice are promoting the adoption of national seed policies that will support sustainable growth and development of the seed sector in West Africa.

'Two Worlds' is a documentary film which looks to address inequality in post-Apartheid South Africa, a country described as both a 'first' and a 'third' world in one. The film features interviews from 18 people including students, researchers and activists, searching for answers to some of the crucial issues affecting the country today. The documentary questions why South Africa has one of the greatest divides between rich and poor in the world, and ultimately attempts to use South Africa as an example of global inequality.

According to a new report released by the Water and Sanitation Program (WSP) at the World Bank, African countries that transition to taking a leadership role in safe water and sanitation service delivery to the millions of people without access have an unprecedented opportunity to drastically reduce these numbers by 2015.

A high-level ECOWAS delegation led by the President of the Commission, Ambassador James Victor Gbeho, arrived in Abidjan on Monday, 22nd August 2011 for talks with officials of the Government of Cote d’Ivoire on how the regional organisation can support the country’s post-conflict reconstruction.

New media platforms are changing how people communicate with each other around the world. However, there is great variation in both the kind of communication platforms people make use of as well as in how they access these platforms. Computer ownership and internet access are still the prerogative of the wealthy few in wide swathes of the African continent. All the same, mobile internet access is on the rise and if current growth rates continue, African mobile phone penetration will reach 100 per cent by 2014.

After 30 years and over 20 million deaths in Africa alone, US researchers report that early treatment of people infected with the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) that leads to AIDS cuts transmission of the disease by over 96 per cent. Announced by the US National Institutes of Health on 12 May after a six-year, nine-country clinical trial that cost $73 million, the discovery that anti-retroviral drugs (ARVs) can make people living with HIV far less infectious means that humanity finally has the tools to reverse the epidemic.