Philanthropy Action

Category: Africa

There are 67 entries in this category.

May 22, 2008

Silver Linings and Dark Clouds Surround the Food Crisis

It seems that everyone except for the US Congress has woken up to the food crisis. The topic has made the cover of many magazines, and is featured almost daily in major national newspapers. Most debate has now turned to the causes and solutions, if any, to the situation. While there are some silver linings, the biggest dark cloud of all is centered over Washington, DC this week where the US Congress will overturn a presidential veto and pass the 2008 farm bill.

May 20, 2008

Interview: AIDS Journalist Helen Epstein on The Invisible Cure

Philanthropy Action sat down with Helen Epstein, author of The Invisible Cure: Africa, the West and the Fight Against AIDS, to discuss her book, Uganda, and how Western dollars could best make a difference in the African AIDS crisis.

Apr 29, 2008

The Global Fund Not Seeing Red

Some recent news articles raise new, conflicting questions about Bono’s (Product)Red campaign.

Apr 21, 2008

Turning a Corner on Malaria?

The UN is planning a focused five-year campaign to eradicate malaria. Such an effort could save millions of lives. But we should watch the rhetoric of the campaign carefully, and be prepared for a long fight—one that will demand the attention of thoughtful donors long after the current spotlight has moved on.

Apr 16, 2008

Global Food Inflation: What Can Be Done?

Rapidly rising food prices around the world are capturing front page headlines daily. The problems in the agricultural sector of been decades in the making and will take several years to fix.The biggest danger is that in the rush to short-term fixes, we’ll simply create more distortions that don’t deal with the real issues and make future food crises even worse.

Mar 19, 2008

More News of an Africa on the Economic Upswing

The commodities boom and bust in the 1980’s left most developing nations worse off than they started. Particularly hard hit was sub-Saharan Africa.

Mar 14, 2008

Legalization and Criminalization of Illicit Trade

Experts in a variety of fields passionately debate how to combat illicit trade in everything from drugs to endangered species to, worst of all, people. There are rational, credible arguments for both criminalizing and aggressively prosecuting those engaged in illicit trade and for legalizing and regulating the trade.

Mar 05, 2008

Ethiopian Exchange Looks Promising

A group of donors, including the Ethiopian government, the World Bank and a few countries, such as the US, are funding the creation of a grain exchange in Addis Ababa

Feb 25, 2008

China’s Role in African Infrastructure Development

It’s important to understand the reasons for the differences between Western aid/philanthropy and Chinese aid in Africa. While “fashion” in aid plays a role, Western donors have largely moved away from infrastructure projects because of the way in which they have been historically mired in deep corruption; and Western-funded buildings and roads have rarely been maintained once they’ve been built. Because of Chinese insistence on using Chinese firms and labor and the lack of transparency in many of these deals, there is reason to be concerned that China is undermining Western philanthropy’s investment in good governance and human development.

Feb 13, 2008

The Bottom Billion in the News

Recent news events from some of the world’s poorer regions are providing more real-life examples of Paul Collier’s main theories from The Bottom Billion. In his book, and illuminated in our recent interview, Collier argues that there are four under-researched “traps” that lock a handful of the world’s countries, with a total population of close to one billion, in a cycle of despair.

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