News headlines in 2019, page 54

UNITED NATIONS, Jul 11 (IPS) - Dr Natalia Kanem is Executive Director of the UN Population Fund (UNFPA).

Every year on World Population Day (July 11), UNFPA receives queries from journalists about the total number of people around the world. Numbers are indeed important because they help governments develop policies that respond to evolving needs for services such as education and health.

UNITED NATIONS, Jul 11 (IPS) - The United Nations has warned of drought, disease and war preventing farmers from producing enough food for millions of people across Africa and other regions, leading to the need for major aid operations.

MADRID, Jul 10 (IPS) - In case you were not aware or just do not remember: all you eat, drink, breathe, wear, take as a medicine, the cosmetics you use, the walls of your house, among others, is full of chemicals. And all is really ALL.

BRASILIA, Jul 10 (IPS) - Mario Osava interviews YOHEI SASAKAWA, president of the Nippon FoundationYohei Sasakawa has dedicated half of his 80 years of life to combating the "disease of silence" and is still fighting the battle, as president of the Nippon Foundation and World Health Organisation (WHO) goodwill ambassador for elimination of leprosy, formally known as Hansen's Disease.

NAIROBI, Jul 10 (IPS) - Muthoki Mumo is Sub-Saharan Africa representative of the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ). She is based in Nairobi, Kenya, and has a master's degree in journalism and globalization from the University of Hamburg.

On June 22, Ethiopia was plunged into an internet blackout following what the government described as a failed attempted coup in the Amhara region.

ROME, Jul 10 (IPS) - On 23 June 2019 Mr Qu Dongyu of China was elected as the new Director General of the Food and Agriculture Organization. FAO is one of the largest UN specialized agencies with a budget for 2018-19 of  US$2.5  billion,  offices in over 130 countries and more than 11,000 employees.  

UNITED NATIONS, Jul 10 (IPS) - The nominations of Christine Lagarde of France as the first woman to head the European Central Bank (ECB) and Ursula von der Leyen of Germany as the first woman to lead the 28-nation European Commission, have been described as significant landmarks in the higher echelons of international institutions long dominated by men.

UNITED NATIONS, Jul 09 (IPS) - Luis Felipe López-Calva is UN Assistant Secretary-General and UNDP Regional Director for Latin America and the Caribbean.

Transparency is a critical element of making governance more effective. By making information available, it creates a foundation for greater accountability to citizens.

KUALA LUMPUR, Malaysia, Jul 09 (IPS) - For decades, the two Bretton Woods institutions have rejected the contribution of industrial policy (IP), or government investment and technology promotion efforts, in accelerating and sustaining growth, industrialization and structural transformation.

Finally, two International Monetary Fund (IMF) staff members, Reda Cherif and Fuad Hasanov, have broken the taboo. They embrace industrial policy, arguing against the current conventional wisdom that East Asian industrial policies cannot be successfully emulated by other developing countries.

STOCKHOLM / ROME, Jul 09 (IPS) -

And I've seen it before,
and I'll see it again.
Yes I've seen it before,
just little bits of history repeating.

-- Propeller Heads: History repeating

The Libyan catastrophe and the suffering of "illegal" migrants are generally depicted as fairly recent events, though they are actually the results of a long history of greed, contempt for others and fatal shortsightedness. Like former Yugoslavia, Libya was created from a mosaic of tribal entities, subdued by colonial powers and then ruled by an iron-fisted dictator. Now, Libya is a quagmire where local and international stakeholders battle to control its natural resources. The country holds the largest oil reserves in Africa, oil and gas account for 60 percent of GDP and more than 90 percent of exports.¹ This is one reason why Egypt, France, Russia, Saudi Arabia, the U.S., and many other nations are enmeshed in Libya. Furthermore, European nations try to stop mainly sub-Saharan refugees and migrants from reaching their coasts from Libya. An attempt to understand Italy´s essential role in the struggle over Libya´s oil and attempts to control unwanted immigration may help to clarify some issues related to the current situation.