By René Wadlow, President, Association of World Citizens

GENEVA, 28 March 2023 (IDN) — On 20 March 2023, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) published a Synthesis Report based on its three previous reports covering eight years of work. The IPCC is a panel of 93 scientists co-chaired by Hoesung Lee of South Korea and Valerie Masson-Delmotte of France. The Synthesis Report stressed that “Prioritizing equity, climate justice, social justice, and just transition actions are needed for climate-resilient development.”…

Plea for Radical Reduction in Global Emissions

By Rita Joshi

BONN, 21 March 2023 (IDN) — “We’re running out of time but not out of options to address climate change,” declared Simon Stiell, UN Climate Change Executive Secretary, commenting on the IPCC’s Synthesis Report of the Sixth Assessment Report, released on 20 March.

“We are not doing enough, and the poor and vulnerable are bearing the brunt of our collective failure to act,” said Madeleine Diouf Sarr, Chair of the Least Developed Countries (LDC) Group commenting on the Synthesis Report. “The world cannot ignore the human cost of inaction,” she maintained.…

By Caroline Mwanga

NEW YORK, 18 March 2023 (IDN) — The UN’s largest annual gathering on gender equality, the empowerment of all women and girls and their human rights closed its two-week-long session on 17 March, acknowledging the critical role of technology and innovation in achieving gender equality.…

By Lisa Vives, Global Information Network

NEW YORK, 7 March 2023 (IDN) — Once on the decline, global hunger has reversed course over the last ten years, as multinational food companies increasingly replace domestic production and leave populations “food insecure.”

According to a recent Greenpeace International report, food imports from factory farms have jumped 650 per cent in Kenya alone, making huge profits for a handful of corporations and generous dividends for their shareholders.…

By Farai Shawn Matiashe

MUTARE, Zimbabwe, 5 March 2023 (IDN) — Every morning, Mercy Mubatsa fetches water from a tap outside her home in Penhalonga, a mining area 263 kilometres (163 miles) outside the Zimbabwean capital Harare, her anxiety is heightened.

In March last year, mercury and cyanide deposits from artisanal gold mines in Penhalonga were detected in Lake Alexander, about 32 kilometres from the mines, that supply water to her home.…

By Kalinga Seneviratne

SYDNEY, 04 March 2023 (IDN) — Education contributes to many of the Sustainable Development Goals. It reduces poverty, drives sustainable economic growth, prevents inequality and injustice, leads to better health —particularly for women and children—and helps to protect the planet.

The COVID-19 pandemic has, more than ever, put the education of children, adolescents and young people at risk and has caused the largest education disruption ever in history. The pandemic is exacerbating pre-existing challenges in access to education and quality learning and skills, and the impacts of the crisis continue to disrupt the education of millions of children and adolescents across the globe.…

By Jaya Ramachandran

GENEVA, 4 March 2023 (IDN) — Multiple crises including the COVID-19 pandemic, climate crisis, growing inequalities, rising debt burdens and economic shocks are strongly affecting world’s 46 Least Developed Countries (LDCs).

They face the challenge of high debt costs because they do not have sufficient cash to provide essential services. In the last decade, debt service costs in LDCs have increased from around 5% in 2011 to over 20% today.…

By Jeffrey Moyo

CAPETOWN, South Africa, 01 March 2023 (IDN) — Thirty-seven-year-old Lwandile Zwane of Khayelitsha and her two daughters have their super by 4 pm to beat the six-hour electricity outage across Capetown.

Characterized by slum settlements, Khayelitsha is a township in South Africa’s Cape Town where power outages have not spared many poor South Africans as the African country contends with energy shortages.…