Friday August 26, 2011 saw the Coalition of African Lesbians, CAL, launch its LGBT Human Rights Defenders, HRD project in Lagos, Nigeria. Participants in the HRD workshop, which was held in collaboration with The Initiative for Equal Rights, TIER, a Nigerian-based LGBT human rights organization, attended the launch alongside some members of the Lagos LGBT community.

Fish is the primary source of protein for the majoirty of Ghana's 23 million inhabitants. Because of significant challenges impacting the global fishing industry, including unsustainable fishing practices, these individuals are rapidly losing their primary source of income and nutrition. Rural entrepreneurs across the country have attempted to start their own fish farms to fill the protein need and subsequent market demand. These fish farmers, however, have not been successful due to poor dissemination of technical resources, lack of quality supplies, and ineffective business models. Tilapiana was created to address this market opportunity and social need by working with village entrepreneurs to design, implement, and manage sustainable fish farms.

Brian Moonga reports for Radio Netherlands Worldwide that widows in Zambia are increasingly experiencing theft, alienation and sexual exploitation. According to Ruth Mwewa, president of Zambia Widows Association, the privatisation of numerous industries over the past two decades, which resulted in the liquidation of over 2,000 companies, saw many families become destitute and desperate.

While both North–South partnerships and South-South Partnerships have strengths and limitations, linking these in networked models is an effective way to mobilise expertise and funding and achieve success. Such a networked partnership, involving six public water operators from Europe and two from Africa, was developed to improve access to water in Mauritania. The partnership rests on a solid basis of shared public service principles. A crucial factor in the partnership is the contribution of the Moroccan state water company ONEP, one of Africa’s best performing public water operators.

Applications are invited for the post of Programme Manager to join the Partnership for Child Development (PCD). PCD is an organisation committed to improving the education, health and nutrition of school-age children and youth in low-income countries. The Partnership for Child Development has launched a new programme that will support government action to deliver cost effective school feeding programmes in sub-Saharan Africa. The Home Grown School Feeding (HGSF) programme supports government action to deliver sustainable, nationally owned school feeding programmes sourced from local farmers in sub-Saharan Africa. The programme provides direct, evidence-based and context-specific support and expertise for the design and management of school feeding programmes linked to local agricultural production.

The expansion of schools in the rural areas has shown significant growth, according to the Ministry of Education. Reports indicated that the number of schools ranging from elementary to secondary level rose from about 750 in 1996/7 to 1,681 in 2010/2011, of which 1,176 are in the rural areas.

South Africa’s Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) announced that it is to collaborate with researchers in Kenya to develop a nano-medicine technology aimed to revolutionise treatment of communicable diseases. The aim of the technology is to improve on the efficiency of the existing drugs used in the treatment of diseases like HIV/AIDS, TB and malaria.

The international relief organisation Médecins Sans Frontières/Doctors Without Borders (MSF) treated over 100 patients in the town of Pieri and referred another 57 to hospitals in Leer and Nasir following a raid on the town of Pieri and twelve surrounding villages in Jonglei State, South Sudan. The majority of the referred cases were women and children with gunshot wounds.

While the focus of HIV and AIDS interventions has always been on the 20-40-year-olds most likely to be infected, African democracy institute Idasa warns that health workers and social planners have neglected to take into account the elderly who have contracted the virus – and their numbers are growing.

An Afrographique infographic depicting the percentage share of formal firms that are owned by women in Africa.

Institutions such as United Nations’ Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) and pan-African rice research organisation AfricaRice are promoting the adoption of national seed policies that will support sustainable growth and development of the seed sector in West Africa.

According to a new report released by the Water and Sanitation Program (WSP) at the World Bank, African countries that transition to taking a leadership role in safe water and sanitation service delivery to the millions of people without access have an unprecedented opportunity to drastically reduce these numbers by 2015.

New media platforms are changing how people communicate with each other around the world. However, there is great variation in both the kind of communication platforms people make use of as well as in how they access these platforms. Computer ownership and internet access are still the prerogative of the wealthy few in wide swathes of the African continent. All the same, mobile internet access is on the rise and if current growth rates continue, African mobile phone penetration will reach 100 per cent by 2014.

Africa will conquer hunger when its governments give the citizens tools and resources they need to feed themselves, Kanayo F. Nwanze, president of the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD), said on the eve of an international conference in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, to address the famine crisis in the Horn of Africa. In a statement sent to PANA, Nwanze urged African countries not to wait for the international community to solve problems facing the continent.

A solar cooker manufactured by Consumer’s Choice that uses bio-ethanol gel and cuts down on harmful indoor emissions has sold over 2,000 units and is looking to upscale its production by creating partnerships with UN agencies and other non-governmental organisations. Consumer’s Choice is currently partnering with the United Nations High Commission for Refugees, UNHCR in a pilot project at the Kakuma refugee camp in Kenya. Under the programme, 70 families have been supplied with the stove and a daily one litre ration of bio-ethanol gel.

Containing video documentation, this report reveals that a joint undercover investigation by BBC Newsnight and the Bureau of Investigative Journalism has uncovered evidence that the Ethiopian government is using development aid as a tool for political oppression. Posing as tourists, the team of journalists travelled to the southern region of Ethiopia.

The Kenyan Parliament has made history by passing 15 Bills that required to be enacted by August 27 in a record four days. The Bills include the Elections Bill, the National Gender and Equality Bill, the Kenya National Rights Human Commission Bill, the Political Parties Bill, the National Police Service Bill, the Ethics and Anti-Corruption Commission Bill and the Commission on Administration of Justice Bill.

South African police fired rubber bullets and tear gas to disperse supporters of the leader of the youth wing of the governing African National Congress (ANC) in Johannesburg. Julius Malema was due to face a disciplinary hearing when hundreds of his supporters started to throw stones and bottles at police.

The death toll from the suicide bombing at the UN headquarters in the Nigerian capital stands at 21, with 73 injured, the deputy United Nations chief announced, reducing a previous toll of 23.

'Two Worlds' is a documentary film which looks to address inequality in post-Apartheid South Africa, a country described as both a 'first' and a 'third' world in one. The film features interviews from 18 people including students, researchers and activists, searching for answers to some of the crucial issues affecting the country today. The documentary questions why South Africa has one of the greatest divides between rich and poor in the world, and ultimately attempts to use South Africa as an example of global inequality.