Climate change is not a crisis of developing countries' making, yet the impacts of global warming will disproportionately hit the world's poorest people.
The Challenge
The impact of climate change presents a new hurdle in the fight against extreme poverty and disease. Experts predict that in many sub-Saharan African countries, climate change could mean more frequent drought and floods, water scarcity, and increased health challenges such as under-nutrition. These new challenges will not only make achieving the Millennium Development Goals more difficult, but could also threaten some of the progress already made in fighting extreme poverty and disease. Read more.. http://www.one.org/c/us/issue/10/
Quick Facts
- 75-250 million people in sub-Saharan Africa could be exposed to increased water stress by 2020 as a result of climate change.
- 260-320 million more people could be living in malaria-infested areas by 2080 as a result of changing global temperatures.
- The forests of the Congo basin span 700,000 square miles, making it one of the world's most important carbon sinks.
Success Stories / SMART Aid helps harness Africa's agricultural potential
The Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa (AGRA) (http://www.agra-alliance.org) is an initiative funded by international donors including the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and the Rockefeller Foundation. AGRA works to enhance agricultural productivity in Africa by training smallholder farmers, supporting the development of high-yielding seed varieties, and ensuring that farmers have access to good quality seeds, tools, and fertilizer. AGRA's Program for Africa's Seed Systems (PASS) provides grants and scholarships to agricultural scientists who take their knowledge into local communities, working with farmers to see which seed varieties best suit their land. AGRA works on innovative ways to make these seeds and other supplies widely available to rural farmers. Since 2006, AGRA has trained and certified over 5,000 new agro-dealers, and aims to reach 9,000 by 2011. This is having a real impact on farmers: in 2006 in Western Kenya, for example, a farmer had to travel an average of 17 kilometers to an agro-dealer to purchase seeds and fertilizer; today that distance is an average of five kilometers. AGRA has also provided loan guarantees through which farmers can access credit to purchase supplies that will boost their yields.
Read more... http://www.one.org/c/us/issuebrief/2818/
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"What is the good of having a nice house without a decent planet to put it on?"
- Henry David Thoreau
"The struggle to save the global environment is in one-way much more difficult than the struggle to vanquish Hitler, for this time the war is with ourselves. We are the enemy, just as we have only ourselves as allies."
- Al Gore
