The Niger River, which runs for 550 kilometres through the southwest part of Niger, has for decades been faced with the phenomenon of siltation of its bed, accelerated by the severe desertification of the catchment areas, according to environmental experts. A programme is focused on slowing this phenomenon, which is seriously compromising socio-economic activity around the river. The measures taken include building berms, stabilising sand dunes, and planting trees.

'Sudan is among the global ‘hotspots’ for large-scale land acquisitions. Although most of this investment activity was thought to be focused in the Northern part of the country, recent research indicates that a surprising number of large-scale land acquisitions have taken place in the South as well in recent years. Now that Southern Sudanese have opted for independence in the 2011 referendum on self-determination, investment activity will likely increase further. This paper presents preliminary data concerning large-scale land acquisitions in two of the Green Belt states of Southern Sudan: Central Equatoria and Western Equatoria. It explores the concept land belongs to the community, a statement that has been taken up by communities in their demand for greater involvement in decision-making regarding community lands.'

Supporters of genetically modified (GM) crop technology fear that their four-year effort to get a biosafety bill enacted in Nigeria may have been in vain if the country's upper house fails to pass it before its tenure ends at the end of May. The 2007 bill, passed by the country's lower chamber last July, is with the Senate. It is one of more than 400 bills introduced to the National Assembly between 2007 and 2010 that were highlighted by the Nigerian Bar Association last December as needing passage before 29 May. But Environmental Rights Action (ERA), a Nigerian advocacy group, said the urgency to pass the bill may stem from other motives. 'Nigerians are yet to understand and adequately contribute to the bill,' an ERA spokesperson said. 'We suggest it is stopped in its tracks.'

Libyan regime forces laying siege on Misrata intensified their assault on the lifeline port on 8 May as smoke billowed from a fuel depot bombing, attacks a rights group said may amount to an atrocity. Two loud explosions were also heard in Tripoli, where the regime of Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi has its headquarters, as jets flew overhead, witnesses said.

Delegations from Reclaiming Public Water Network and Public Services International participated in the Global Water Operator Partnerships (GWOPA) Congress held on 20-21 March in Cape Town, South Africa. This video features unionists, activists as well as public water managers from Spain, Morocco, Netherlands and Uruguay who present their vision for Public Public Partnerships in the water sector. The video is a Transnational Institute/Public Services International Production and was filmed and edited by Liane Greeff of EcoDoc Africa, with music provided by Roy MacGregor.

National ministers from Africa gathered with hundreds of people from United Nations agencies, development banks, public water operators, non-profit groups and trade unions from around the world to celebrate World Water Day last month in Cape Town. A priority on the agenda: responding to the growing urban water challenge. But, writes Mthandeki Nhlapo, while the right to water is akin to the right to life, many governments are reluctant to recognise this most basic reality and shoulder their responsibilities to deliver safe, affordable water.

The Climate Justice lobby is already ‘furious’ about the involvement of the World Bank as an interim trustee of the UN’s Green Climate Fund. But appointing ‘South Africa’s most vocal neoliberal politician’, Trevor Manuel, as co-chair of the fund could be ‘fatal to climate change mitigation and adaptation’, warns Patrick Bond.

Videos from the international conference on global land grabbing held at the Institute for Development Studies at the University of Sussex between 6-8 April 2011 are now available. The selection of videos include Olivier de Schutter, Sam Moyo and Shalmali Guttal.

The Great Green Wall project aims to plant a line of trees nearly 8,000 kilometres long and 15 kilometres wide. This green belt would pass through 11 countries in the Sahel, from Senegal to Djibouti. It hopes to stop the desert from expanding and swallowing farmland. Many are happy with what is being achieved, but others are not, reports Farm Radio Weekly. Aliou Sow is a farmer in Senegal. He complains bitterly that the authorities planted trees in his community without consultation. While farmers travel miles on foot or by donkey to fetch water for the villages of Tessekeré, Amaly and Widou, wells are being dug specifically to irrigate nurseries for the Wall.

Participants at the International Conference on Global Land Grabbing overwhelmingly found that land grabbing is occurring at a scale and speed as never before, and resulting in widespread displacement and dispossession of rural and urban communities, especially smallholder agricultural producers. Held on 6-8 April at the Institute of Development Studies (IDS), University of Sussex, the Conference was organised by the Land Deals Politics Initiative (LDPI) in collaboration with the Journal of Peasant Studies and hosted by the Future Agricultures Consortium at the IDS.

The Manuel Rivera-Ortiz Foundation for International Photography is currently seeking to award one social documentary photographic project produced in the journalistic tradition of Manuel Rivera-Ortiz. One project based on pressing social issues in the developing world will receive a grant of 5,000 USD to be utilised for the production or completion of a pre-approved project.

African civil society leaders have criticised the role of developed countries, particularly the European Union (EU) in UN climate negotiations. At a press conference hosted by the Pan African Climate Justice Alliance (PACJA), a network of over 300 organisations from over 45 countries, civil society leaders stood in solidarity with African negotiators. These negotiators were continuing to fight against the EU’s refusal to sign up to a second commitment period of the Kyoto Protocol and against the United State’s blocking tactics over the adoption of a comprehensive work plan for the negotiations for 2011.

Ghana’s investment in organic farming could transform the country’s agriculture sector and improve the country’s economy dramatically, reports Journalists for Human Rights. One small organic project is called the Abusua Sustainable Organic Farm (ASOF) is attempting to tap into the organic industry and convince the country of the benefits in organic farming.

Shell's plans to drill wells for natural gas across a large swathe of the Karoo are fatally flawed and should be rejected, according to lawyers representing local landowners. Derek Light Attorneys criticised Shell's environmental management plan submitted to the Petroleum Agency of South Africa (Pasa) this week, describing it as 'a worthless paper exercise' that was misleading, biased, unprocedural and unconstitutional. Shell's plan has set the stage for a possible legal battle over its ambitions to drill for natural gas in shale formations that cover about 90 per cent of South Africa.

Western calls for an international ban on trading in Zimbabwe’s controversial Chiadzwa diamonds appear to have been silenced, after a reported agreement on the country’s trade future was met in Dubai last week. It’s understood that officials in China and India have managed to persuade the European Union (EU) and the United States to soften their stance on the export of the diamonds. The Western states had been resisting growing pressure to allow Zimbabwean exports to resume, amid ongoing human rights concerns at Chiadzwa, where its feared that at least 20 people are killed a month.

Ficksburg Magistrate's Court on Monday (18 April) for the death of protester Andries Tatane. Outside the court on Monday morning, a few police cars had arrived in anticipation of the appearance of the men from the public order police unit in Bloemfontein.

Jennifer Madongonda, 43, shares a seven-roomed house with three other families in the low-income suburb of Budiriro, about 15km southwest of the Zimbabwean capital, Harare. Seven months ago the municipality cut off water supply because they couldn’t pay the bill. Budiriro was regarded as the epicentre of the cholera epidemic that began in August 2008 and lasted for a year before it was officially declared at an end in July 2009. Chris Magadza, a researcher at the University of Zimbabwe, told participants at a recent workshop that 'clinical studies carried out on Harare's water supplies, and the results obtained, revealed that the water bodies carry a significant amount of pollutants, which pose a potential health risk'.

In Madagascar, grassroots struggles against corporate-driven land grabbing have emerged as a political point of focus in the growing global spotlight on land grabs throughout the global south, a process that the UN special rapporteur on the right to food says has 'negative effects on the right to food as well as other human rights'. Mass scale corporate land occupations are expanding throughout Africa, and Madagascar is an example of the intensity of the corporate push for national lands but also on the ability for communities to resist such land grabbing.

Saudi Prince Alwaleed bin Talal, the richest man in the Middle East, had a grand vision for turning a swath of land in southern Egypt into an agricultural marvel. Since 1998 Alwaleed has invested $127 million in 100,00 acres (40,470 hectares) of land in the Nile River delta Tushka agricultural project (also known as Toshka). Egypt’s public prosecutor’s office said Sunday (10 April) it froze the land controlled by Alwaleed because the original sale of the land violated the law, Reuters reported.

Mineral Resources' Minister Susan Shabangu has told Pondoland opponents of a titanium dune mining project that she needs another month to consider their appeal against the Xolobeni coastal dune mining project. Amadiba Crisis Committee spokesman Sinegugu Zukulu said the mining project 'has become an ever more menacing threat to the unique biodiversity of the Wild Coast and traditional way of life of the amaMpondo'.