Malawi's fertiliser subsidy scheme, credited for transforming famine-prone Malawi into an exporter of maize, is in danger. The executive director of the Malawi Economic Justice Network, Dalitso Kubalasa, explained the government's woes in précis.'Fuel and fertiliser are scarce because the suppliers can't get the forex needed to pay for the stuff. There's no forex in Malawi's banks because Malawi has allowed itself to become dependent on a single forex earner, tobacco, and the tobacco price slumped last year. The freeze in Western aid tied Malawi's other hand, as it were,' he said.

This year, 44 journalists have already been murdered, says the World Association of Newspapers and News Publishers (WAN-IFRA), which launched a review of press freedom around the world during World Newspaper Week, held from 10 to 15 October in Vienna, Austria. During the events, which included its Congress and World Editors Forum, WAN-IFRA presented the Golden PEN of Freedom to Dawit Isaak, jailed in Eritrea since 2001. The Golden Pen of Press Freedom 2011 was accepted by Esayas Isaak on behalf of his brother, who has not been heard from since 2005. The Golden Pen of Press Freedom 2011 was accepted by Esayas Isaak on behalf of his brother.

Cutting off peoples’ limbs - in most cases their hands - was one of the brutal strategies used by members of the Revolutionary United Front to terrify people to support them. Some 27,000 Sierra Leoneans are estimated to have been disabled or have had one or more of their limbs amputated during the 1991-2002 civil war. In 2004 the Truth and Reconciliation Committee (TRC), set up to try to deliver accountability for human rights abuses, issued a report recommending that amputees, war widows, children, victims of sexual violence and the seriously war-wounded, should receive reparations in the form of free education for children, free health care and skills training to be managed by the National Commission for Social Action (NaCSA). But many have received nothing.

In the context of the South African government's relationship with non-profits, the author of this article writes that there is growing pressure on non-profits to operate more like businesses and generate ‘earned’ income. This is being felt worldwide as governments make massive spending cuts and philanthropic giving falls in the face of global recession. 'The problem with the income-generation imperative, however, is that NPOs are established to deliver services that do not generate income. They are inherently unsuited to business as they have social development priorities that limit profitability.'

With 31 October marking the point at which the global population reaches a staggering seven billion, this National Geographic page collects a year's worth of reporting looking at all aspects of population growth - demographics, food security, climate change, fertility trends, managing biodiversity.

The families of 90,000 Nigerien migrants forced home because of the uprising in Libya face greater hunger and poverty now they no longer receive regular remittances, the International Organisation of Migration (IOM) said. The men were mostly working on construction sites and farms in Libya, which borders Niger. An IOM poll showed 86 per cent used to send enough money to support five family members in Niger, and that their return had 'an overall negative impact' on the lives of hundreds of thousands of others living in areas hit by chronic food insecurity and underemployment.

Amid the still-visible damage from election unrest in Côte d’Ivoire’s main city Abidjan is another less tangible but very real form of destruction - psychological trauma. It is difficult to say how many people need mental health care after the recent unrest, according to health experts in Côte d’Ivoire; the health ministry says it has no such figures. But health workers and residents told IRIN people seeking help with conflict-related trauma have few places to turn.

Zimbabwe's Justice Minister Patrick Chinamasa has rejected calls by Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai to enshrine gay rights in a new constitution. Chinamasa told the BBC that gay rights could not be 'smuggled' into the constitution because most Zimbabweans opposed it. Earlier, Tsvangirai told the BBC that gay rights were a 'human right' that should be respected.

Political parties have welcomed President Jacob Zuma’s decision to axe Cabinet members Gwen Mahlangu-Nkabinde and Sicelo Shiceka. Zuma announced in Pretoria that Mahlangu-Nkabinde would be replaced as public works minister, and Shiceka as traditional affairs and co-operative governance minister. Zuma's government had been beset by controversy for several months. Public Protector Thuli Madonsela had urged Zuma to take strong action against those involved in leases for police office space, as well as Shiceka for his abuse of public money.

'Hungry in the City' is a collection of stories from people in developing countries around the world who explain how they are surviving in an era of higher food prices, inflation and hunger. These case studies are offered for use alongside articles on food price hikes, inflation, urban living and hunger.

Nigeria's drive to boost the quality and processing of cassava, launched two months ago as part of a larger plan to turn the country into a powerhouse for food production, now has a leading cassava scientist at its helm. But the approach to agriculture being adopted by Nigeria has been criticised by a board member of the International Institute of Tropical Agriculture (IITA) for failing to acknowledge the needs and capabilities of peasant farmers. John Pickett, an IITA board member and a researcher at the UK-based agricultural research centre Rothamsted Research, was concerned that industrialising Nigeria's agriculture could have 'disastrous' consequences for its farmers. 'By and large it is just about making money out of industrial agriculture. I am not in any way convinced that the green revolution has much to offer the large majority of farmers in Africa.'

NGOs in Uganda continue to heavily depend on donations from foreign sources, says this report on NGO sustainability on the website of the Uganda National NGO Forum. 'Grants and donations to NGOs are still the primary source of income to at least 90% of NGOs. In 2010, there was a reduction in foreign grants inflow in Uganda owing to the global economic downturn and financial crisis and changes in development policies in previously major funding countries like Netherlands. Some traditionally financially sound NGOs were forced to scale-down significantly due to funding cuts.'

Reporters Without Borders has called for a thorough and impartial investigation into the fatal shooting of Zakariya Isa, a reporter and cameraman for the state-owned Nigeria Television Authority (NTA), in Maiduguri, the capital of the northeastern state of Borno, on 22 October. His murder has been claimed by Boko Haram, an armed Islamist movement operating in northern Nigeria.

Women in Cameroon have developed a vision for a gender-sensitive approach for their country’s nascent Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation (REDD+) programme. They have put together a roadmap to ensure that women are involved in the formulation of Cameroon’s national REDD+ strategy. The premise is that women should be given equal opportunities to learn about REDD+ initiatives, and their capacity strengthened so they can influence, participate in and benefit from the programme. The roadmap will be presented at the UN Climate Convention in Durban in December.

Doreen Sibanda, 27, was among the first undocumented Zimbabwean nationals to be deported in early October 2011 after South Africa apparently lifted its more than two year moratorium on expulsions imposed following widespread xenophobic violence in 2008. 'I was on my way to the shops to buy porridge for my four-year-old son when I was stopped by the police [in the inner city Johannesburg suburb of Berea] who asked for my passport and residence permit. I lied to them that I had forgotten them at home but they never gave me a chance,' Sibanda told IRIN.

The global demand for secondary education has risen exponentially, says a new United Nations report, which adds that governments, especially in sub-Saharan Africa, are having a hard time keeping up and many children are being left out. The 2011 Global Education Digest by the Institute for Statistics of the UN Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), says there are only enough seats for 36 per cent of children who want to enrol in secondary education in sub-Saharan Africa.

Qaddafi’s shadow will continue to be felt in Libya and neighbouring countries, especially Chad, says this briefing from the International Crisis Group. 'The upheavals that preceded and followed his fall have created new and potential problems, including massive displacement of populations; tribal tensions within Libya and racist attacks against nationals of sub-Saharan countries; a possible resurgence of Islamism; and the proliferation of fighters and weapons. It is too early to say whether the changes will evolve into medium- and long-term factors of instability in the region, notably in the Sahel and Darfur.'

The Zimbabwean government through its Justice and Legal Affairs Minister Hon. Patrick Chinamasa has only accepted 81 recommendations to improve the country’s precarious human rights situation and to improve compliance with international human rights instruments and obligations out of 177 recommendations which were tabled following Zimbabwe’s Universal Periodic Review (UPR) held on 10 October 2011 in Geneva, Switzerland.

In this brief, researcher William Odendaal of the Land, Environment and Development Project at the Namibian Legal Assistance Centre, examines some emerging trends and dynamics in changing power relations in rural Namibian communities due to emerging new elites and the threats to subsistence farmers’ access to communal land and natural resources. 'Land enclosures mean that powerful individuals have appropriated communal land for personal use at the expense of many communal farmers who do not have sufficient access to grazing land.'

Europe's largest and most influential biotech industry group, whose members include Monsanto, Bayer and other GM companies, is recruiting high-profile 'ambassadors' to lobby European leaders on GM policy. Green MP Caroline Lucas said: 'This brazen attempt by EuropaBio to recruit covert "ambassadors" to "change the debate" on GM is yet further proof that the powerful GM lobby will stop at nothing to push its hugely unpopular and unnecessary products onto European citizens. We need far stronger regulation on corporate lobbyists across the EU to prevent this kind of insidious behind-the-scenes manoeuvring from seriously undermining our democratic system.'