Governor Ifeanyi Okowa of Delta State has inaugurated a 17-man Local Organising Committee (LOC) for the 2018 Senior Africa Athletics Championship, tagged “Asaba 2018.” Asaba, the state capital, will host the event. The governor, who is keen on seeing the LOC hit the ground running, charged the members to organise a world class championship that would leave a lasting mark in ...

The United Nations is helping to ensure that young professionals from developing countries are able to contribute to the implementation of the Paris Climate Change Agreement and the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals with the help of a new fellowship programme run by two key UN agencies based in Bonn, Germany. The fellowship initiative will offer work experience in a vibrant ...

United Nations Secretary-General, António Guterres, has appointed Ovais Sarmad of India as Deputy Executive Secretary of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), at the Assistant Secretary-General level. The appointment has been made after consultation with the Conference of Parties (COP) through its Bureau. Mr. Sarmad succeeds Richard Kinley of Canada, to whom the Secretary-General and the Executive Secretary ...

Nigerian conservationist, Odey Oyama, recently discovered freshly cut logs on the edge of a pineapple plantation, and nearby sits a saw mill. The Dangote Group, an industrial conglomerate, seems to be clearing the forest in the Cross River National Park to plant pineapple. And Oyama has no doubt that the company will continue destroying forest to expand its plantations. “Farming ...

The need for public consultation and participation in the approval processes of applications that directly affect the people’s health and wellbeing cannot be overstressed. Many issues surround the matter of our food and agricultural modern biotechnology that require clarifications and in-depth interrogations. It is to this end that the Health of Mother Earth Foundation (HOMEF) on April 25, 2017 had ...

Mariann Bassey-Orovwuje, lawyer and coordinator of the Food Sovereignty Programme of Friends the Earth Nigeria and Africa, as well as Chair of AFSA, in a reaction to a publication, says that the authorities should take a second look at the sector I read with amusement the off-the-wall allegations against the anti- gmo activists in a write up posted on News Express, amongst ...

A new study, supported by the Minamata Convention’s Interim Secretariat hosted by UN Environment (UNEP) reveals that women of childbearing age living in four Pacific Island countries have elevated levels of mercury in their bodies. The study, titled “Mercury monitoring in women of childbearing age in the Asia and the Pacific Region”, jointly conducted by the interim secretariat of the ...

The Government of Norway on Friday, May 12, 2017 deposited its instrument of ratification, thereby becoming the 44th future Party to the Minamata Convention on Mercury. This is coming on the heels of Afghanistan’s deposition of its instrument of accession on Tuesday, May 2, 2017, thereby becoming the 43rd future Party to the Convention. Prior to that, Burkina Faso and Canada ...

In Spain the battle for the Spanish La Liga title continued at the weekend as Barcelona got a comfortable victory on the road to beat Las Palmas 4-1. Neymar got a hat-trick, scoring in the 25th, 67th, and 71st minutes of play, ensuring that reigning champions Barcelona remain top of the league table. Title rival Real Madrid beat Sevilla with ...

Farmers and communities in the Northern Savannah Zone of Ghana are being assisted to adopt sustainable land management practices to help reverse land degradation and desertification. Land degradation in Ghana – and indeed Africa – is increasingly being recognised as a key development issue because of its impact on the productive capacity of land. In Ghana, rural households are majorly ...