The IMF’s April 2025 Regional Economic Outlook for Sub-Saharan Africa presents a clear warning: regional growth is slowing, debt pressures are mounting, and donor assistance is declining. Yet the report outlines critical opportunities particularly in domestic revenue mobilization, structural reform, and private sector activation that can shape a more resilient …
Too many elephants in Africa have generated a considerable debate and controversy among the various countries of the continent. It has also encouraged poachers and circus owners to capture elephants to make a quick-buck. Recently, 30 baby white elephants were captured from the Tuli private reserve in Botswana and bought …
ONE peek at genetic behaviour and the microscopic world of cellular biology seems no less dramatic than the larger socio-political ethos of human societies. A team of two researchers has recently come up with some eye-opening findings following research on ants. The findings indicate that the interplay of cooperation and …
ACTUALLY it cannot. It does very badly. An economy which is largely dependent upon agriculture and where production in the rural sector grabs a sizeable chunk of the GDP is itself dependent to a great extent upon good weather. Good weather in the Indian context means timely rains. There is …
The lone South Asian who has attracted world attention more than anybody else, particularly for his highly acclaimed micro-credit system through a bank called the Grameen Bank, is Prof. Mohammad Yunus of Bangladesh. He was recently awarded the prestigious Indira Gandhi Prize for Peace. Disarmament and Development for 1998. Prof. …
The Centre has tied up with the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) "to ensure adequate extension of reforms in the industrial and financial services to the whole field of rural development". According to senior officials in the Ministry of Rural Areas and Employment, this ambitious project, recently cleared by the …
In an ominous portent for the already floundering state economy, the World Bank has removed Maharashtra from its position of top priority state in the country. Citing flouting of norms, the Bank reportedly announced this to the government when it was approached to clear funding for half-a-dozen mega projets worth …
Garbage dumps are the only source of livelihood for hundreds of poor children living in Phnom Penh. Scores of children can be seen atop heaps of foul-smelling wastes, competing with the municipal bulldozer to collect cans, glass, plastic and paper, which they sell for a living. Injuries and infections are …
IN THE sparse jungles on the fringe of the Thar in western Rajasthan, the battle is between celluloid heroes and real-life heroes. At stake are the endangered Blackbucks and Chinkaras. The protagonist, Bollywood actor Salman Khan - accompanied by Saif Ali Khan, Tabu, Neelam, and Sonali Bendre - thought he …
The Andhra Pradesh Government finds itself pitted against a small village which is holding out against its ambitious plans to locate the country's first international business school in the area. It was barely two months ago that the Chief Minister, Mr Chandrababu Naidu, had touted the project as a major …
The South Pacific island of Fiji is suffering from a massive drought. The sugarcane crop of 1998 is well below normal production. Even the torrential rains due to La Nina, which lashed Australia, have stayed away from Fiji. "We were hoping that La Nina could come and bring some rain …
THE world's first hand transplant has been carried out by an international team of doctors at a French hospital. The right hand and forearm of an anonymous donor were attached to 48-year-old Australian Glint Hallam, whose hand was amputated in 1989 after an accident. Doctors attached "all the arteries, veins, …
The Rajasthan Government has constituted a permanent high-power committee to lay down the policies from time to time in connection with poverty alleviation and urban development in accordance with the directives of the Centre.
More than 44 million Russians, or 30 per cent of the entire country, now live below the poverty line and the economic crisis appears likely to push the numbers even higher, according to government figures released on Monday.
Amartya : Economics Nobel laureate Amartya Sen has said that the basic problem with India is that it has ignored education, health care and other aspects of 'social opportunity building' . At a hurriedly-called press conference at New York after the announcement of the Nobel Prize, Sen said in India's …
United Nations' "Race Against Poverty" Award-1998 for the Asia-Pacific region, to be given by the U.N. Secretary General Mr. Kofi Annan, has been bestowed on Fatima Bi, Sarpanch of Kalva village of Kurnool district of Andhra Pradesh, for her extraodinary effort in spearheading social mobilisaiton and community empowerment for poverty …
The South Korean government is planning to charge an additional 100 won per ton of tap water to fund a project to improve the quality of potable water as early as next year. The ruling coalition and the government agreed on the additional charges to households in Seoul and Inchon …
At least 15 villages under Kalichak Block II have been washed away after the unprecedented change in the Ganga's course during and after the floods. Nearly 2,500 families, residing in villages near the river, have been rendered homeless andcompelled to take shelter at Bangitola and on the state highway near …
IN A rare display of solidarity, politicians and non-governmental organisations (NGOs) have joined hands in expressing support for Anna Hazare. On September 10, Hazare was sentenced by the Mumbai metropolitan court to three months simple imprisonment in connection with a defamation suit filed by Maharashtra social welfare minister Babanrao Gholap. …
The International Monetary Fund's (IMF) handling of East Asian currency crisis and insentitivity to the consequence of its prescriptions on developing world's people has come in for a scathing attack from the top echelons of World Bank showing a growing rift between the two Bretton Woods institutions, analysts say. World …
The floods in Bangladesh have dealt a nasty blow to one of the country's most celebrated instituions, the Grameen Bank. After years of providing credit to the very poor, it has come to symbolise the microcredit movement that, according to the World Bank, now lends some $7bn around the world. …