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Tense times

At the end of February, Senegal’s voters will elect the president who will govern their country for the next five years. According to the constitution, the head of state may serve two terms. The nation’s president is running for a third. By Mohamed Gueye »» read more

Comment

The motive for the murder: hate of lesbians

It’s nothing new that lesbians and gays become victims of violence, rape and even murder in South Africa. What is new is that a court has appropriately punished such a crime as a hate crime with the motive of homophobia. By Friederike Wyrwich »» read more

Comment

In troubled waters

President Thomas Boni Yayi of Benin is the new chairman of the African Union. The organisation faces huge challenges, and it remains doubtful whether the president of a small country will be able to solve the countless problems troubling the continent. By Karim Okanla »» read more

Food security

Boost productivity

Africa’s population is growing fast, and so is the continent’s food need. In the future, more has to be done to increase agricultural productivity than just expanding land use. By Kwadwo Asenso-Okyere »» read more

Humanitarian aid

Hunger in the horn of Africa

The world of today is instantly connected by high-tech media and has sophisticated, long-term weather forecasts. Hunger catastrophes as a consequence of drought should be a thing of the past. But the recent and ongoing food emergency in East Africa has shown the opposite: Despite early warnings, the crisis hit full force before the world community reacted. By Jedida Oneko »» read more

Agriculture

“We all win”

B-BOVID is an innovative Ghanaian company. The name stands for “Building business on values, integrity and dignity. The company’s purpose is to do business in organic agriculture, agro-processing, exports of related products and agro-eco-tourism. One of its managers explains B-BOVID’s approach in the following essay. By Ewald Quaye Garr »» read more

Aid effectiveness

A Nicaraguan NGO’s experience

At the High Level Forum (HLF) in Busan last year, high ranking policymakers discussed the progress made in the aid-effectiveness agenda since the summits in Paris (2005) and Accra (2008). The rules the HLFs make do not apply only to governments, but to all parties that are involved in development affairs. Unfortunately, however, the experience of a Nicaraguan non-governmental organisation is not encouraging. »» read more

Natural resources

Mandatory standards

When oil, gas or valuable ores are produced, many governments still ignore the environmental and social impacts. Non-governmental experts recommend that German industry should verify whether certain standards are observed – preferably at the point of extraction. »» read more

Editorial

Risky investments

For structural reasons, international development affairs are among the least transparent areas of politics. The public of rich nations is not interested in the details of how their governments spend the small share of tax revenue they use in support of poorer countries. In Germany, for instance, the Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development is only in charge of about two per cent of the federal budget. And the people of developing countries, for good reason, focus their attention on the action of their own governments, not on donor agencies’ performance. »» read more

Crime

Art versus violence

For years, the rate of violence in Colombia has stayed stubbornly and alarmingly high. Local peace initiatives are relying on the arts and creativity with remarkable success. State agencies, moreover, are turning to innovative methods, especially when reaching out to victims of violence. By Cletus Gregor Barié »» read more

Niger

Africa’s new oil exporting nation

Chinese companies have done in Niger what their western competitors failed to achieve since 1960. They developed oil fields near the border with Chad. Production is dwarfed by Nigeria, however, and that West African giant’s policies still have a great impact on Niger. »» read more

Aid effectiveness

When funding is discontinued

Development cooperation depends on donors and recipient governments agreeing on what needs to be done. Last year, Malawi experienced what it means when these parties no longer achieve consensus and donors stop granting budget support. By Raphael Mweninguwe »» read more

Donor action

Results matter, not input

Andris Piebalgs, the European commissioner for development affairs, considers the recent High Level Forum in Busan an important step towards achieving results more effectively. In his essay, he explains why. By Andris Piebalgs »» read more

News

McDonald’s leaves Bolivia

The global market leader for industrial fast food pulled out of Bolivia in January. »» read more

Haiti

Reconstruction in slow motion

Haiti continues to suffer from the effects of the earthquake two years ago. But the causes of many problems run deeper. Civil society organisations say that donor commitment remains crucial. »» read more

Comment

Dubious raids

That police officers and public prosecutors raided the offices of civil society organisations in Cairo caused international alarm. One of the institutions affected was the German Konrad Adenauer Foundation. By Eva-Maria Verfürth »» read more

Health care

Scooter pharmacies

Poor people tend to pay more than rich people do for the same medicine, but nonetheless often do not get ­access to the medication they need. A new publication shows how all this could change. »» read more

Democracy

Populism and bloodshed

In many developing countries, elections compound the problems they are supposed to solve. Though the motives of foreign aid workers and election observers are good, bloodshed is proof of democracy promotion often failing. »» read more

Comment

Religion wins

Egypt’s lower-house elections ended in mid-January. The result was a faith-based landslide that will leave its marks on the country’s yet-to-be-drafted constitution. What role the military will play in the future remains to be seen. By Ronald Meinardus »» read more

December edition

Letters to the editor

Readers' feedback to the articles of Vera Dicke and Peter Hauff in our December edition. »» read more

Civic participation

Grassroots matter

Civil society organisations are struggling in the Republic of Niger. The basic legal provisions for their activities are in place, but they lack money, education and members. If aid agencies want to help, they should start at ground level. By Michael Konow »» read more

Comment

The menace of Boko Haram

Islamist terrorism in Nigeria has local roots and international implications. Nigeria must improve governance and do more to develop its disadvantaged northern states, which are predominantly Muslim. By Vladimir Antwi-Danso »» read more

Good governance

Sensible but insufficient

For the European Union, it matters very much that democratic change succeed in the Arab world. The EU was just as unprepared for the uprisings in North Africa and the Middle East as it was for December’s street protests in Russia over electoral fraud. In the future, a new European Endowment for Democracy is supposed to make sure that shortcomings of this sort do not occur again. So far, however, the Endowment does not seem to amount to more than holding conventions on the topic regularly. That will not do. By Maria Elisabeth Rotter »» read more

Multilateral summit

“A rather solid  foundation”

At the end of last year, the 4th High Level Forum on Aid Effectiveness was held in Busan, South Korea. Earlier multilateral summits of this kind were held in Rome in 2003, in Paris in 2005 and in Accra in 2008. “Managing for Development Results” became a guiding principle of the aid effectiveness debate early on (see box by Vera Dicke). The Busan summit coined the new term “Focus on Results”. Hans Dembowski discussed the implications with Antonio Tujan Jr. of BetterAid, an international umbrella organisation for civil society agencies. Interview with Antonio Tujan Jr. »» read more

Brief History

New paradigms in a new millennium

The average newspaper reader in Germany is not aware of what terms like “ownership” or “managing for results” mean in development circles. Indeed, the general media hardly covered important aspects of the international aid debate in the past ten years. »» read more

Africa

Regional cooperation

The appreciation of regional integration is a striking feature of the Busan Partnership for Effective Development Cooperation, the document that was agreed at the recent High Level Forum. In Africa, this is a very important matter. It offers new approaches to more effective development efforts and south-south cooperation. By Mamadou Lamine N’Dongo »» read more

Policy ownership

“We must learn to say no”

Aid money will not be made effective use of unless donor governments accept the policy Ownership of developing countries. All parties concerned still have a long way to go to fulfil the promises of the Paris Declaration, says Guatemala’s Karin Slowing Umaña. Interview with Karin Slowing Umaña »» read more

Policy advice

Bridging the gap

In the past decade, knowledge-based development cooperation has become a hot topic among policymakers, implementing agencies and research institutes. New technologies, global challenges and innovative policy tools make well-founded advice to policy­makers ever more important. Many implementing agencies, more­over, understand that a critical outsider’s view can help them to improve their performance. By Fabian Scholtes »» read more

Aid effectiveness

Subtly distorted

Unless development efforts are country-owned, they do not succeed. The international community is right to emphasise this matter, but it has not taken the right approach to dealing with it. Instead of disbursing large sums to countries that lack the necessary leadership, donor governments should invest more in global public goods. They could also do more to help build country ownership by helping to broker solutions to the collective action challenges that often prevent more coordinated efforts within developing countries. By David Booth »» read more