ACP

Photo: Development minerals in Zambia. Credit: developmentminerals.org

A global conference in Zambia aims at the improvement of the miners' productivity and its cumulative impact on poverty reduction at local and national levels.

By Dr. Patrick I. Gomes

The author is Secretary General of the African Caribbean and Pacific (ACP) Group of States comprising 79 member countries – 48 from sub-Saharan Africa, 16 in the Caribbean and 15 in the Pacific. ACP countries are endowed with enormous mineral resources. yet are characterised by chronic poverty, low human development and overall under-development; causing the categorisation of 39 ACP Member States as Least Developed Countries. – The Editor

OPINION

Photo: Now Media earns enough to feed her five children. Credit: Kizito Makoye | IDN-INPS

By Kizito Makoye

BOYNA, Ethiopia (ACP-IDN) – A long spell of drought three years ago made life extremely challenging for 48-year-old Medina Igahle, a mother of five living in Boyna village in the Bubta Wodera region, when some of her goats, cattle and camels starved.

“When disaster hit, I had to bundle up what little I owned and together with my family head out to meet an uncertain future,” she says.

In many parts of Africa, changing weather patterns and environmental degradation are putting small-scale farmers at risk of extreme poverty, hunger and displacement.

NEWS

Photo credit: Seychelles News Agency

By Robert Johnson

BRUSSELS (ACP-IDN) – The Secretariat of African, Caribbean and Pacific (ACP) Group of States and the government of 115-island Seychelles east of mainland East Africa are organizing a joint event at the margins of the UN General Assembly in New York on September 25, 2018 – enabling Small Island Developing States (SIDS) share experiences in harnessing the blue economy and to identify areas of further development.

The event will be taking place one year after Ministers in charge of Fisheries and Aquaculture in ACP countries concluded two days of comprehensive talks in Nassau, the Bahamas on September 21, 2017. They renewed commitment to developing the fisheries and aquaculture sectors in their countries, as well as unlocking the potential of the 'blue economy' through a new 'ACP Blue Growth Initiative'.

NEWS

Photo: Space science and earth observation can help institutions in sub-Saharan Africa face many challenges in integrating climate information to inform policy making in the management of natural resources, and reducing disaster risks. Credit: RCMD

By Justus Wanzala

NAIROBI (ACP-IDN) – Space science and earth observation are some of the key pillars in the attainment of most of the 17 United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), according to experts participating in an international conference, organized by the Regional Centre for Mapping Resources for Development (RCMRD) in Kenya's capital city.

The central theme of the RCMRD International Conference (RIC 2018) was 'Space Science for Sustainable Development' with particular focus on agriculture and food security, weather and climate, water and hydro-climatic disasters, land use land cover and ecosystems, land management and surveying, and cross cutting themes.

NEWS

Photo: Seaweed farmers. Credit: Mwinyi Sadallah

By Kizito Makoye

PAJE, Zanzibar (ACP-IDN) – As the morning breeze sweeps Mwanamkasi Jumbe wade through knee-deep water, her gown flapping in the wind as she drags a pile of seaweed seedlings to her farm before it is too hot.

Armed with a bundle of sticks, she hangs pieces of fresh seaweed haphazardly hooked on a yellow polyethylene rope.

"It's a tough job, but I love doing it. I get something to support my family," she says. "The seedling takes six weeks to mature," she adds.

NEWS

Photo: Uniformed children in class in Ha Nqabeni primary school, Lesotho. CC BY-SA 2.0

By Ntsoaki Nkoe

MASERU (ACP-IDN) – Lesotho has launched a landmark project with the European Union willing to provide Euros 12.5 million (approx. USD14.4 million) and the United Nations USD 2 million. Known as the Lesotho National Dialogue and Stabilization Project (LNDSP), the initiative aims to stimulate a comprehensive national reforms process the southern African country is undertaking.

Explaining the genesis of the project, UN Resident Coordinator Salvator Niyonzima said the launch of the project was the result of several months of consultations, project formulation and fund raising going back to September 2017 when Prime Minister Thomas Thabane wrote to the UN Secretary-General requesting UN support to Lesotho’s long-anticipated national reforms.

NEWS

Image Credit: European Commission

By Phil Pascal

The writer is a Caribbean journalist and Commentator on development issues. This is the second article in a two-part Series on the next stage of ACP-EU relations in the Post-Cotonou Agreement with the EU. In the earlier commentary the writer explained the principles and processes by which the ACP Group has set about establishing the inclusive and participatory inter-governmental framework for negotiations of a Post-Cotonou Partnership Agreement (PCPA).

BRIDGETOWN (ACP-IDN) –The single undertaking of the new Agreement builds on the successes of the present one signed in Cotonou, Benin in West Africa for a 20-year period. But it also shows evidence of being ready to critique weaknesses and adapt seriously to the changing circumstances – political, economic and cultural – of the 21st century.

OPINION

Image source: caribbeannewsnow.com

By Phil Pascal

The writer is a Caribbean journalist and Commentator on development issues. This is the first article in a two-part Series on the next stage of ACP-EU relations in the Post-Cotonou Agreement with the EU.

BRIDGETOWN (ACP-IDN) – The historic partnership agreement between 107 industrialized and developing nations – known as the Cotonou Partnership Agreement between the 79 African, Caribbean and Pacific countries (ACP) and the European Union – will expire on February 29, 2020. Negotiations on a successor agreement impacting more than 1.5 billion people of states constituting more than half of the UN membership are set to officially begin on October 1, 2018, according to reliable EU sources.

OPINION

Photo: Regional Coordination meeting in March 2018. Credit: ACP Press.

By ACP Press

BRUSSELS (ACP-IDN) – The Intra-ACP Global Climate Change Alliance Plus (GCCA+) Programme is a €70 million initiative of the African, Caribbean and Pacific (ACP) Group of States funded by the 11th European Development Fund (EDF) to strengthen dialogue and cooperation on climate change with the most vulnerable developing countries.

The programme was launched in the margins of the UN Climate Change Conference (COP 23) in Bonn in November 2017. The Programme conducted its first Regional Coordination Meeting on March 26-28, 2018 at the ACP House in Brussels.

NEWS

Image credit: UN

By Reinhard Jacobsen

BRUSSELS (ACP-IDN) – The Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development adopted by world leaders in September 2015 at an historic UN Summit opens a new era for a repositioned African, Caribbean and Pacific Group (ACP Group) to continue and deepen its decisive role in supporting all 79 member states "to achieve the 17 SDGs as the basis for the Sustainable Development of their societies and our only home we have for humanity".

The basis and raison d'étre of the ACP is development and this implies "ending poverty in all its forms everywhere" (SDG 1). The unity and solidarity on which the ACP is founded provides a unifying force in adopting measures to end poverty, says a policy paper.

NEWS

  1. African Experts Decry Information Gap on Climate Change
  2. Namibia Supports ACP States For Post 2020 Cotonou Agreement
  3. ACP Cultures Programme Presented to CARICOM in Georgetown
  4. The ACP Celebrates Nelson Mandela's Birth Centenary
  5. Trafficking in Human Beings and Smuggling of Mgrants in ACP Countries

ACP-IDN

This website is a joint project of the Secretariat of the ACP Group of States and IDN, a flagship agency of the International Press Syndicate (INPS) and its partner, the Global Cooperation Council. It serves as a source for development news and monitoring Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) in African, Caribbean and Pacific countries.

The ACP Group comprises: Sub-Saharan Africa (48), The Caribbean (16), The Pacific (15).

The ACP Group´s main objectives are:

Sustainable development of its Member-States and their gradual integration into the global economy, which entails making poverty reduction a matter of priority and establishing a new, fairer, and more equitable world order;

Coordination of the activities of the ACP Group in the framework of the implementation of ACP-EC Partnership Agreements;

Consolidation of unity and solidarity among ACP States, as well as understanding among their peoples;

Establishment and consolidation of peace and stability in a free and democratic society.

 

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This website – launched on July 1, 2016 – is a joint project of the Secretariat of the ACP Group of States and IDN, a flagship agency of the International Press Syndicate (INPS) and its partner, the Global Cooperation Council. It serves as a source for development news and monitoring Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) in African, Caribbean and Pacific countries.

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