Lessons from the Making of the MDGs: Human Development Meets Results?based Management in an Unfair World

This article argues that two ideas – human development and results?based management – were particularly significant in shaping the MDGs. These are unlikely intellectual bedfellows, but by charting the evolution of the MDGs, their many influences are demonstrated. The conclusion identifies three main lessons. First, it argues that the MDGs have had only limited impact on policies and actions because the idea behind them, human development, was never fully institutionalised. Second, the article points out the disjuncture that occurred with global goals, the MDGs being operationalised by country level Poverty Reduction Strategies (PRSs) overseen by the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank. PRSs need to be genuinely owned by countries, and the IMF and World Bank need to introduce internal ‘Arrogance Reduction Strategies’ to transform their control?oriented cultures. Finally, the conclusion questions whether the idea of human development is past its ‘sell?by’ date – do we need a new idea to mobilise and guide post?2015 pro?poor policy

The analytical framework of water and armed conflict: a focus on the 2006 Summer War between Israel and Lebanon

This paper develops an analytical framework to investigate the relationship between water and armed conflict, and applies it to the ‘Summer War’ of 2006 between Israel and Lebanon (Hezbollah). The framework broadens and deepens existing classifications by assessing the impact of acts of war as indiscriminate or targeted, and evaluating them in terms of international norms and law, in particular International Humanitarian Law (IHL). In the case at hand, the relationship is characterised by extensive damage in Lebanon to drinking water infrastructure and resources. This is seen as a clear violation of the letter and the spirit of IHL, while the partial destruction of more than 50 public water towers compromises water rights and national development goals. The absence of pre-war environmental baselines makes it difficult to gauge the impact on water resources, suggesting a role for those with first-hand knowledge of the hostilities to develop a more effective response before, during, and after armed conflict

Legal Empowerment and Horizontal Inequalities after Conflict

This article explores whether legal empowerment can address horizontal inequalities in post-conflict settings, and, if so, how. It argues that legal empowerment has modest potential to reduce these inequalities. Nevertheless, there are risks that legal empowerment might contribute to a strengthening of group identities, reduction of social cohesion, and, in the worst case, triggering of conflict. It looks at how two legal empowerment programmes in Liberia navigated the tensions between equity and peace

Natural Approaches to Crop Protection and Soil Conservation

Guest speakers: Mr. Nelson Laville, Plant Pathologist, Phyto-Sol Plus Inc. - Dominica, Mr. Damian Adjodha, Agroecological production specialist, New Flower Regenerative Garden - St. LuciaMr. Nelson Laville, Plant Pathologist at Phyto-Sol Plus Inc. Dominica, presents on some simple, practical and cost-effective natural approaches to crop protection in agriculture production. Mr. Laville delves into plant health and crop protection, common pests encountered on farms in the Caribbean, understanding of plant and pest interaction, key factors that influences plan health, integrated crop management as a whole farm approach, and approaches to natural crop protection including nutrition, planting and harvesting time, use of resistant crop varieties, habitats and crop diversity, recipes for home-made remedies and botanicals for treating pest a diseases in agriculture crops.Mr. Damian Adjodha, Agroecosystems Director at New Flower Regenerative Garden St. Lucia, presents on regenearative agroecological soil conservation where he delves into leaning soil conservaition from the forest and implemenitng it on the farm, orchestrating ecological niches by observing guiding elements in a natural system that works in sysnergy together, the use of vetiver grass, stones, cover crops and green manure in agroecology and soil conservation. Mr. Adjodha also shares his experience and methods of regenerative soil management

Approches Naturelles de la Protection des Cultures et de la Conservation des Sols

Guest speakers: Mr. Nelson Laville, Plant Pathologist, Phyto-Sol Plus Inc. - Dominica, Mr. Damian Adjodha, Agroecological production specialist, New Flower Regenerative Garden - St. LuciaM. Nelson Laville, phytopathologiste chez Phyto-Sol Plus Inc. Dominique, présente quelques approches simples, pratiques et naturelles à effet de coût pour protéger les cultures et la production agricole. M. Laville se penche sur la santé des végétaux et la protection des cultures, les ravageurs courants rencontrés dans les fermes des Caraïbes, la compréhension de l’interaction entre les plantes et les ravageurs, les facteurs clés qui influencent la santé du plan, la gestion intégrée des cultures dans l’ensemble de l’exploitation et les approches de la protection naturelle des cultures, y compris la nutrition, le moment de la plantation et de la récolte, l’utilisation de variétés de cultures résistantes, les habitats et la diversité des cultures. Recettes pour les remèdes maison et les plantes pour le traitement des ravageurs et des maladies dans les cultures agricoles.M. Damian Adjodha, directeur des agroécosystèmes au New Flower Regenerative Garden St. Lucia, présente la conservation agroécologique régénératrice des sols où il se penche sur la conservation des sols de la forêt et sa mise en œuvre à la ferme, en orchestrant des niches écologiques en observant les éléments directeurs d’un système naturel qui fonctionne en synergie ensemble, l’utilisation de l’herbe de vétiver, des pierres, les cultures de couverture et les engrais verts dans l’agroécologie et la conservation des sols. M. Adjodha partage également son expérience et ses méthodes de gestion régénérative des sols

Risk Management Solutions for Supply Shortages

Mr. Dominique Zami, Manager, PTL Agro - Guadelopue, Ms. Yannick Bock, Manager of the Agriculture and Agro-Food Project, Communauté D'Agglomération Du Nord Grande-Terre - Guadeloupe, Ms. Céline Carles, Environment and Agriculture Officer, DENEL - MartiniqueMr. Dominique Zami, Manager of PTL AGRO Guadeloupe shares the experiences in working towards meeting food related economic and societal challenges through a range of food and processed food products. Mr. Zami discusses how PTL Agro works with local farmers and producers to secure it supply in order to efficiently process its local Guadeloupe products which includes chopped vegetables, chips, flour and flour mixes and cookies as well as some of the key actions that have contributed to the company successes. Ms. Yannick Bock, Manager of the Agriculture and Agro-Food Project in Nothern Grande-Terre Urban Community in Guadeloupe shares her experiences implementing the Territorial Food Plan which is a concerted approach to the development of agriculture and the agro-ecological transition.Ms. Céline Carles, Environment and Agriculture Officer at DENEL Martinique shares her experiences in encouraging local sourcing of raw material and adapting to inter-seasonality. Ms. Carles provides a brief background on DENEL which was founded in 1908 as a pineapple canning factory and goes on to provide details on the main activitities and adaptation strategies implemented by DENEL to manage climate change impact, reduce negative environmental impact, and inter-seasonality of raw material

Pattern and levels of spending allocated to HIV prevention programs in low- and middle-income countries

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>AIDS continues to spread at an estimated 2.6 new million infections per year, making the prevention of HIV transmission a critical public health issue. The dramatic growth in global resources for AIDS has produced a steady scale-up in treatment and care that has not been equally matched by preventive services. This paper is a detailed analysis of how countries are choosing to spend these more limited prevention funds.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>We analyzed prevention spending in 69 low- and middle-income countries with a variety of epidemic types, using data from national domestic spending reports. Spending information was from public and international sources and was analyzed based on the National AIDS Spending Assessment (NASA) methods and classifications.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>Overall, prevention received 21% of HIV resources compared to 53% of funding allocated to treatment and care. Prevention relies primarily on international donors, who accounted for 65% of all prevention resources and 93% of funding in low-income countries. For the subset of 53 countries that provided detailed spending information, we found that 60% of prevention resources were spent in five areas: communication for social and behavioral change (16%), voluntary counselling and testing (14%), prevention of mother-to-child transmission (13%), blood safety (10%) and condom programs (7%). Only 7% of funding was spent on most-at-risk populations and less than 1% on male circumcision. Spending patterns did not consistently reflect current evidence and the HIV specific transmission context of each country.</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p>Despite recognition of its importance, countries are not allocating resources in ways that are likely to achieve the greatest impact on prevention across all epidemic types. Within prevention spending itself, a greater share of resources need to be matched with interventions that approximate the specific needs and drivers of each country's epidemic.</p

Debt Relief Effectiveness and Institution Building

The history of debt relief is now particularly long, the associated costs are soaring and the outcomes are at least uncertain. This paper reviews and provides new evidence on the effects of recent debt relief programs on different macroeconomic indicators in developing countries, focusing on the Highly Indebted Poor Countries. Besides, the relationship between debt relief and institutional change is investigated to assess whether donors are moving towards and ex-post governance conditionality. Results show that debt relief is only weakly associated with subsequent improvements in economic performance but it is correlated with increasing domestic debt in HIPCs, undermining the positive achievements in reducing external debt service. Finally, there is evidence that donors are moving towards a more sensible allocation of debt forgiveness, rewarding countries with better policies and institutions

Community-based environmental management for malaria control: evidence from a small-scale intervention in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania

Historically, environmental management has brought important achievements in malaria control and overall improvements of health conditions. Currently, however, implementation is often considered not to be cost-effective. A community-based environmental management for malaria control was conducted in Dar es Salaam between 2005 and 2007. After community sensitization, two drains were cleaned followed by maintenance. This paper assessed the impact of the intervention on community awareness, prevalence of malaria infection, and Anopheles larval presence in drains. A survey was conducted in neighbourhoods adjacent to cleaned drains; for comparison, neighbourhoods adjacent to two drains treated with larvicides and two drains under no intervention were also surveyed. Data routinely collected by the Urban Malaria Control Programme were also used. Diverse impacts were evaluated through comparison of means, odds ratios (OR), logistic regression, and time trends calculated by moving averages. Individual awareness of health risks and intervention goals were significantly higher among sensitized neighbourhoods. A reduction in the odds of malaria infection during the post-cleaning period in intervention neighbourhoods was observed when compared to the pre-cleaning period (OR = 0.12, 95% CI 0.05-0.3, p < 0.001). During the post-cleaning period, a higher risk of infection (OR = 1.7, 95% CI 1.1-2.4, p = 0.0069) was observed in neighbourhoods under no intervention compared to intervention ones. Eighteen months after the initial cleaning, one of the drains was still clean due to continued maintenance efforts (it contained no waste materials and the water was flowing at normal velocity). A three-month moving average of the percentage of water habitats in that drain containing pupae and/or Anopheles larvae indicated a decline in larval density. In the other drain, lack of proper resources and local commitment limited success. Although environmental management was historically coordinated by authoritarian/colonial regimes or by industries/corporations, its successful implementation as part of an integrated vector management framework for malaria control under democratic governments can be possible if four conditions are observed: political will and commitment, community sensitization and participation, provision of financial resources for initial cleaning and structural repairs, and inter-sectoral collaboration. Such effort not only is expected to reduce malaria transmission, but has the potential to empower communities, improve health and environmental conditions, and ultimately contribute to poverty alleviation and sustainable development

Population policies, programmes and the environment

Human consumption is depleting the Earth's natural resources and impairing the capacity of life-supporting ecosystems. Humans have changed ecosystems more rapidly and extensively over the past 50 years than during any other period, primarily to meet increasing demands for food, fresh water, timber, fibre and fuel. Such consumption, together with world population increasing from 2.6 billion in 1950 to 6.8 billion in 2009, are major contributors to environmental damage. Strengthening family-planning services is crucial to slowing population growth, now 78 million annually, and limiting population size to 9.2 billion by 2050. Otherwise, birth rates could remain unchanged, and world population would grow to 11 billion. Of particular concern are the 80 million annual pregnancies (38% of all pregnancies) that are unintended. More than 200 million women in developing countries prefer to delay their pregnancy, or stop bearing children altogether, but rely on traditional, less-effective methods of contraception or use no method because they lack access or face other barriers to using contraception. Family-planning programmes have a successful track record of reducing unintended pregnancies, thereby slowing population growth. An estimated $15 billion per year is needed for family-planning programmes in developing countries and donors should provide at least$5 billion of the total, however, current donor assistance is less than a quarter of this funding target