wfn.org | AANA BULLETIN No. 10/03 March 17, 2003 (b)

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AANA BULLETIN No. 10/03 March 17, 2003 (b)

All Africa News Agency
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AANA Bulletin
Acting	Editor -Elly Wamari	

Bulletin APTA
Acting Editor - Silvie Alemba

Charcoal Experts Want Govts To Let Controlled Production

NAIROBI (AANA) March 17 - Environmental experts from the East and Central 
Africa have concluded that streamlining charcoal production within national 
energy policies could be beneficial in terms of achieving environmental 
control and revenue earnings.

They say that a recent visit to Sudan by biomas specialists drawn from the 
region between March 3-5, established that charcoal could profitably be 
run, and could have an added advantage to overall environmental management.

Deputy Executive Director of Regional Lands Management Unit-Africa (RELMA), 
Chin Ong, said at a two day workshop here (March 6-7) that current policy 
of banning of charcoal trade has failed to reduce deforestation.

Most of Africa's population depend on wood energy for cooking and heating. 
Not surprisingly, charcoal is the most affordable fuel for urban 
households. "Contrary to belief in the East African region, charcoal is big 
business worth billions of dollars annually in turnover," he observed.

The workshop had been organised by RELMA, and attracted environmentalists 
and energy experts from Kenya, Uganda, Zambia and Tanzania.

Ong said that while charcoal accounts for 68 percent of energy consumption 
in Kenya, 95 percent in Eritrea, 94 percent in Ethiopia, 70 percent in 
Zambia and 92 percent in Uganda, there was no legal framework that 
supported its use. Where draft policies on wood-fuel existed, there was no 
genuine effort to implement them.

"When a government official in East Africa talks of alternatives to 
petroleum, this does not include charcoal, rather, they refer to liquefied 
petroleum gas (LPG) or solar power," regretted Dominic Walubengo, Executive 
Director of Kenya's Forest Action Network (FAN).

Kenyan energy specialist, Stephen Mutimba, said it was ironical that it was 
perfectly legal to sell charcoal, to buy it and cook with it, yet in most 
of Kenya, it was illegal to produce and transport it.

A Presidential directive in Kenya in 1986 banned the production and 
transportation of charcoal. According to Mutimba, Cap 385 of 1966, which 
was revised in 1982 and 1992, bans commercial production of charcoal in 
government forests.

Thus no charcoal manufacture licenses are currently being issued, but this 
does not mean production is not happening.

In Sudan, charcoal production is a legalised business, with registered 
enterprises trading in it as any other commodity in the market.  It earns 
the exchequer good revenue.

According to Dr. Fridah Mugo, a consultant in tree farming and marketing of 
wood products, "unlike Kenya, Sudan has an elaborate institutional 
infrastructure that is allocated adequate financial and human resources, 
that take full responsibilities on charcoal."

The Forests National Corporation (FNC) in Sudan regulates the charcoal 
industry there.  It controls entry of private investors into the industry, 
and sets rules declaring minimum standards of charcoal produced. It also 
regulates prices and taxation levels.

Reported by Henry Neondo

UNESCO Boss Campaigns For Gender Balancing

OUAGADOUGOU (AANA) March 17 - Gender equality is indispensable for the 
achievement of Millennium Development Goals, UNESCO Director-General, 
Koichiro Matsuura, has said.

The goals, adopted by world leaders at the United Nations Millennium Summit 
in September 2000 in New York, are a set of targets for reducing poverty, 
hunger, diseases, illiteracy, environmental degradation and discrimination 
against women by 2015.

Matsuuru was speaking here, at the International Centre for the Education 
of Girls and Women in Africa (CIEFFA) on March 8, during the International 
Women's Day.

He underlined the importance of primary education for all, saying, "The 
eradication of illiteracy among women is one of the decisive factors in 
reducing child mortality rates and improving conditions of health and 
hygiene."

He went on: "Similarly, the fight against HIV/AIDS is being fought 
primarily on the preventive education front."

On the issue of protecting the environment and ensuring environmental 
sustainability, Matsuuru posed: "Is it not often true that the solution to 
many environmental problems, such as deforestation and desertification, 
sustainable agriculture and water resource management, lies in the hands of 
women, who in many parts of the world, are the main providers of food 
resources?"

Reported by Olwira Betty

Good Governance Is The Way Out For Africa - UN Official

NAIROBI (AANA) March 17 - The cure for Africa's worrying social, economic 
and political issues is good governance.

This is according to Special Advisor to the United Nations General 
Secretary, on Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), Professor Jeffrey Sachs.

"My good advice to the African nations is that they must strive to inject 
good and effective governance in their leaderships," said Prof Sachs at a 
press conference here on March 7.

He had just addressed a seminar on the theme How Africa Can Achieve the 
Millennium Development Goals.

Prof. Sachs pointed out that lack of effective governance within African 
leaderships, had led the continent to be corrupt and unable to manage her 
enormous resources.

As a result, he added, the continent was unable to feed, educate and 
shelter people effectively, while the gap between the rich and the poor 
widened.

The UN official saw the new dawn of  "democratisation process" on the 
continent as the panacea for possible good and effective governance, citing 
the new government of Kenya as an example of such promise.

He listed empowerment of people at all levels, availability of education 
for all and riddance of corruption and mismanagement of resources, as 
factors that would provide a way out for Africa.

Prof. Sachs described  as "unfortunate" that African countries were 
currently striving to achieve the Education For All at primary level, while 
the same level of education was turning out to be a non-contributor to the 
social and economic needs of people.

"In other parts of the world, this is no longer the case. People are 
currently striving for secondary and post-secondary education, which in one 
way or the other, is still 'marketable' in terms of social and economic 
needs of people."

He said that UN Millennium Project was a three-year initiative by the UN to 
come up with solutions for achieving the MDGs.

MDGs are a set of targets for reducing illiteracy, poverty, 
hunger,  diseases, environmental degradation and discrimination against 
women by 2015.

The targets were adopted by World leaders at the UN Millennium Summit in 
September 2000 at the UN headquarters in New York, and reaffirmed at the 
World Summit for Sustainable Development in Johannesburg in 2002.

  Reported By Osman Njuguna

Border Dispute Resolved In Favour Of Botswana

GABORONE (AANA) March 17 - A four-year border dispute between Botswana and 
Namibia, over ownership of the deeper side of Chobe, Linyanti, and Kwando 
Rivers, which border the two countries, was on March 5 resolved in favour 
of Botswana.

An eight-man commission drawn from the two states found out that the 
disputed borderline was, in fact, deep in the rivers as per the 1890 
Anglo-German treaty.

The commission handed over the report to Botswana's President, Festus 
Mogae, who met with his Namibian counterpart, Sam Nujoma, at the Namibian 
eastern border town of Ngoma.  The two said they would abide with the
findings.

The dispute between the two countries was sparked by a 1998 disagreement 
over the marshlands of Situngu in the Caprivi Strip in northeaster Namibia, 
along Linyanti River.

The dispute followed reports that Namibian peasant farmers were crossing 
into the eastern side and farming in an area that the Botswana Defence 
Forces said belonged to Botswana.

The incident nearly culminated into an all-out conflict.  But the two 
countries appointed a commission to determine the borderline in accordance 
with the Anglo-German treaty.

Under the terms of the agreement establishing a joint commission, the two 
presidents agreed that the findings of the report would be final and 
binding to the countries.

They further stressed that the report recommended that economic activities 
between the two countries, such as fishing, agriculture and tourism, should 
continue peacefully while observing the international boundary.

But, this is not the first time Botswana and Namibia have been involved in 
a border dispute. About ten years ago, relations between the two countries 
soured due to a dispute over a tiny island of Sidudu, near Botswana 
northern resort town of Kasane.

The island, 6 square kilometres wide, was finally awarded to Botswana by 
the International Court of Justice at The Hague, after many years of 
tension between the two countries.

Reported by Rodrick Mukumbira

OPEC Offers Contribution Towards Food Assistance

NOUAKCHOTT (AANA) March 17 - The international development division of 
Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) has offered US$ 
300,000 in support of World Food Program (WFP) activities in Mauritania, 
where hundreds of thousands of people are affected by famine.

The contribution will be used by WFP to purchase food supplies for 
distribution to the needy.

Mauritania is a West African country in the drought-prone Sahel region.

According to WFP, agricultural communities in Mauritania have suffered poor 
harvests since 2001. Most affected are rural communities, where it is 
feared malnutrition could exacerbate infant mortality rates.

Also affected is the nearby archipelago of Cape Verde. Communities are 
beginning to feel the consequences of last year's bad harvests. Many 
families have finished their grain stock reserves and have nothing for the 
next season.

Reported by Claire Mbombo

SPECIAL  REPORT

NAIROBI:  From March 3 to 5, Kenya played host to public debates on 
pertinent issues affecting Africa.  Titled Another Africa is Possible, the 
discussions, co-organised by ActionAid	and Heinrich Boll Foundation, 
raised key concerns on the relationship between the continent and the 
developed West.   AANA Correspondent Joseph K'Amolo reports.

Critics Of The West Say Africa Can Be Self Reliant

Developed countries will never mean well for Africa and will always 
endeavour to gag the continent, the director of Southern and Eastern 
African Trade Information and Negotiation Initiative (SEATINI), Zimbabwe, 
Prof. Yashpal Tandon, and Chairperson of NGO Council of Kenya, Mr. Oduor 
Ong'wen, contend.

While acknowledging that some of Africa's woes	were internal, the two are 
convinced that most of the continent's problems are accelerated by external 
forces arising from institutions such as the WTO, International Monetary 
Fund (IMF), among others.

Prof. Tandon, a Ugandan academician, criticises World Trade Organisation 
(WTO) for its imperialist tendency toward Africa and other developing 
countries.

According to him, WTO is ever bent on a conspiracy to suppress the 
continent through policies and treaties that are not in favour of the 
continent. He considers WTO as the most undemocratic body.

He explains that the West, through WTO, has never been keen on allowing 
Africa to acquire technology.  Whenever Africa added value to its products, 
they (the products) would be subjected to high tariffs.

Prof. Tandon maintains that the "food security for Africa" so much talked 
of should not be the case, but rather, food sovereignty, which is "the 
ability to grow our own food as opposed to food security, in which one can 
import food and still become dependent on others".

Prof. Tandon is convinced the notion that Africa can not survive without 
aid and investments from the developed world is a myth.

The reality of the matter, he argues, is that the West is the one in need 
of "our resources and markets since their economies have been in crisis, 
with stock markets and prices falling".

On privatisation policy currently spreading across the continent, the 
professor asserts that the move is a strategy by the corporate West to tap 
high profit rates in Africa after realising they cannot get the same in 
their own countries.

Mr. Oduor Ong'wen shares Prof. Tandon's sentiments that African governments 
have let their people down by signing treaties that bind them to perpetual 
hardships.

Scholars Raise Questions Over Authenticity Of NEPAD

The New Partnerships for Africa's Development (NEPAD), which has been 
touted as Africa's escape root from underdevelopment, has elicited critical 
observations that raise some pertinent questions about its authenticity.

Renowned Ugandan scholar, Prof. Yashpal Tandon, together with a Kenyan 
political scientist, Prof. Maria Nzomo, have poured concerns sending 
signals that suggest NEPAD could be another yoke to stifle the continent.

Yet the civil society in Africa is just beginning to wake up to this 
initiative, whose agenda, as laid out by its proponents, is to foster 
development in the continent.

The keynote in NEPAD is that, as an avenue for Africa's development, it 
advocates for self-reliance, and that Africans must be masters of their own 
destiny.

But there is a contradicting paragraph in NEPAD's document, which says 
Africa needs to secure more aid and more credit.  It further says the bulk 
of Africa's capital needs, up to the year 2015, will have to come from 
outside Africa.

Thus, for Africa to secure these funds from Western partners, NEPAD 
promises to put itself in best behaviour in economic and political
governance.

Not many people comprehend what NEPAD is all about. Much as it is claimed 
to have been an initiative by leaders of South Africa, Nigeria, Senegal, 
and Algeria, its origin has remained a mystery to the common man in Africa.

Prof. Tandon, who is also the director of Zimbabwe-based Southern and 
Eastern African Trade Information and Negotiation Initiative (SEATINI), 
maintains that most civil society organisations in Africa first learnt 
about NEPAD from their northern colleagues. Many African governments too, 
learnt about the initiative from Western media.

Initially, Organisation of African Unity (now Africa Union) had endorsed 
the idea of a New African Initiative at a Lusaka 2001 summit, which meant 
that it was Africans collectively thinking through their strategy.

There was no mention of partnership. It is therefore not known how the 
"partnership" was forged and between which groups.

Prof. Nzomo alleges that African scholars were left out in the drafting of 
the NEPAD document. For her, Africans cannot share in a project that is for 
the entire continent, without clear strategy for self-reliance.

She observes that the only way out is for Africa is to move collectively as 
a continent, something that calls for political will among leaders.

Obtaining money from the West to fund NEPAD should be a last resort after 
all avenues within Africa have been exhausted.