By Kristin Palitza
 
NOUAKCHOTT, Feb 10 (IPS) – Mariem Mint Ahmedou sits cross-legged on a worn-out carpet in a basic tent built with mud bricks and layers of sewn-together fabric. Her eight-month-old twins, Hussein and Hassan, lie weakly against her body. Both of them have been malnourished since birth, because Beydar, undernourished herself, cannot produce enough [...]

By Kristin Palitza

A Moringa tree in fruit, near Sprokieswoud in Namiba. Moringa leaves are dubbed a "super food". / Hans Hillewaert/Wikkicommons

CAPE TOWN, Jan 25 (IPS) – When a food crisis hits the continent, African countries tend to look to the international donor community to mobilise aid. But a fast-growing, drought- resistant tree with [...]

By Mantoe Phakathi

A multi-million dollar iron-ore reprocessing plant in northern Swaziland is threatening water security. / Mantoe Phakathi/IPS

MBABANE, Dec 26 (IPS) – A multi-million dollar iron-ore reprocessing plant in the northern part of Swaziland, owned by Indian mining company Salgaocar, is threatening the water security of local communities and even the country’s capital city, [...]

By Meena Bhandari
 

The Gola Forest is bisected by several of Sierra Leone's major rivers. / Courtesy of David Zeller/Gola Programme

FREETOWN, Dec 22 (IPS) – Sierra Leone’s Gola Rainforest remains a centre of contention as the local community here plan to take their chief to court next week over a controversial 50-year land lease to [...]

By Ignatius Banda

More than 70 percent of Africans – the majority of whom are women –rely on farming for survival. / Ignatius Banda/IPS

BULAWAYO, Zimbabwe, Dec 20 (IPS) – Duduzile Sibanda takes a break from preparing her long stretch of land for her maize crop in rural Mberengwa, in Zimbabwe’s Midlands province. She wipes [...]

By Sam Olukoya

In Ajegunle, a low-lying slum in Lagos, flooding is also disrupting the economic activities of women / Sam Olukoya/IPS

LAGOS, Nigeria, Dec 15 (IPS) – The women of Makoko, a low-lying slum close to the Lagos Lagoon along Nigeria’s Atlantic coast, always sleep with one eye open. Many live in fear that when [...]

By Lee Middleton

South Africa's first eco-friendly and energy efficient low-income housing development in Atlantis. / Lee Middleton/IPS

ATLANTIS, South Africa, Dec 14 (IPS) – Something unusual is happening in Atlantis. Created in the 1970s to fulfill the apartheid government's agenda to evict "coloured" South Africans from Cape Town, Atlantis has always been best known [...]

By Lee Middleton
 
OCEAN VIEW, South Africa, Dec 13 (IPS) – Having observed changes in the sea and the life cycles of the rock lobsters that their livelihoods depend on, a group of fisherwomen from the Western Cape, South Africa are calling on government to adjust fishing seasons to adapt to what they claim are climate [...]

By Isaiah Esipisu*

Peter Nyaga surveys his four-year-old eucalyptus woodlot. / Isaiah Esipisu/IPS

NAIROBI, Dec 12 (IPS) – On a steep slope of land in Thangathi village in Central Province, Kenya, Peter Nyaga surveys his four-year-old eucalyptus woodlot. He calculates the value of every tree on his two-hectare piece of land at maturity in three years.

At [...]

By Stephen Leahy
 

The United Nations climate negotiations ended with the world’s nations still to agree on a new global treaty to reduce carbon emissions. / Tinus de Jager/IPS

DURBAN, South Africa, Dec 11 (IPS) – The world is increasingly committed to dangerous levels of global warming with yet another failure by nations of the world to [...]

Kristin Palitza spoke to REGINE GÜNTHER, climate protection and energy policy chief at the World Wide Fund for Nature.
 

WWF climate scientist Regina Guenther. / Kristin Palitza/IPS

DURBAN, South Africa, Dec 9 (IPS) – Despite the high risk, it remains difficult to convince politicians to take immediate action to prevent further climate change and make available the [...]

By Isaiah Esipisu*
 
DURBAN, South Africa, Dec 9 (IPS) – For the Laibon community, a sub-tribe of Kenya’s Maasai ethnic group, the 33,000-hectare Loita Forest in the country’s Rift Valley Province is more than just a forest. It is a shrine.

Olonana Ole Pulei’s community is a sub-tribe of Kenya’s Maasai ethnic group. Credit: Isaiah Esipisu/IPS

“It [...]

By Kristin Palitza

Almost nobody believes that a second, comprehensive commitment period of the Kyoto Protocol is still possible. / Zukiswa Zimela/IPS

DURBAN, South Africa, Dec 8 (IPS) – The last hours of the 17th United Nations climate change summit in Durban have begun. Since the arrival of almost 150 ministers and heads of state on [...]

By Stephen Leahy

Reducing carbon emissions will not result in limiting global warming to less than two degrees Celsius. / Zukiswa Zimela

DURBAN, South Africa, Dec 8 (IPS) – Countries at the United Nations climate change negotiations have publicly acknowledged their current pledges to reduce carbon emissions will not result in limiting global warming to [...]

By Kristin Palitza

U.N. secretary-general Ban Ki-moon said there is a pool of possible financing options for the Green Climate Fund. / Kristin Palitza/IPS

DURBAN, South Africa, Dec 7 (IPS) – Carbon pricing will be the core mechanism to finance the Green Climate Fund and with it climate change adaptation projects in developing countries.

"If you can [...]