Zoltán Kálmán Ambassador, Former Permanent Representative of Hungary to the UN Food and Agriculture Agencies in Rome

ROME, Jun 9 2021 (IPS) – In three cycles I spent all together more than 15 years in Rome, at the Permanent Representation of Hungary to the Food and Agriculture Organization of the UN (FAO) and between my last two assignments in Rome my responsibilities in Budapest included FAO related issues. This made it possible for me to witness the development of this organization under the leadership of four Directors-General. Edouard Saouma, Jacques Diouf, Jose Graziano da Silva and Qu Dongyu. This long association and “historic” view of FAO would definitely help me in fulfilling the role of the Independent Chairperson of the Council of FAO (ICC). As conventional wisdo…

ROME, Jul 26 2021 (IPS) – Back-to-back droughts followed by plagues of locusts have pushed over a million people in southern Madagascar to the brink of starvation in recent months. In the worst famine in half a century, villagers have sold their possessions and are eating the locusts, raw cactus fruits, and wild leaves to survive.

Barbara Wells

Instead of bringing relief, this year’s rains were accompanied by warm temperatures that created the ideal conditions for infestations of fall armyworm, which destroys mainly maize, one of the main food crops of sub-Saharan Africa.

Drought and famine are not strangers to southern Madagascar, and other areas of eastern Africa, b…

Jamaica is increasingly cited as a model of meaningful youth engagement. Here Environment and Climate Change Minister Pearnel Charles Jr plants trees with a young environmentalist. Credit: NDC Partnership

DOMINICA, Sep 21 2021 (IPS) – When the NDC Partnership, the alliance which helps governments to determine and achieve their climate goals, held its first-ever Global Youth Engagement Forum in July, several segments were underpinned by Jamaica’s model of engaging young people and sustaining youth interest in climate initiatives.

The Caribbean country, a co-chair of the , has committed to ensuring that , through representation on boards such as the Climate …

Girls’ sexual and reproductive rights activist Mía Calderón stands on San Martín Avenue in San Juan de Lurigancho, the most populous municipality of Peru’s capital. She complained that the pandemic once again highlighted the fact that sexual violence against girls comes mainly from someone close to home and that the g…

Afghan women leaders and human rights defenders speak to the press outside of the UN Security Council chambers on 21 October 2021. Pictured from left to right: Asila Wardak, Fawzia Koofi (speaking), Anisa Shaheed and Naheed Farid. Credit: UN Women/ Amanda Voisard

UNITED NATIONS, Dec 14 2021 (IPS) – We are former UN officials with decades of combined experience supporting international civil society and governments to advance the rights of women and girls.

We came together to alert the United Nations and the international community to the urgency of preventing a human catastrophe in Afghanistan. Afghan women and men must not be condemned to yet another decade of re…

A household participating in BRAC’s Graduation approach in Rangpur, Bangladesh. Credit: BRAC (2021)

DHAKA, Bangladesh, Feb 14 2022 (IPS) – With consistent, robust economic growth, countries across Asia have made monumental strides in eradicating extreme poverty over the past 30 years. In Bangladesh, for example, the population dropped from 43% in 1991 to in 2019. Similarly in Cambodia, poverty incidence fell from to .

In these countries, economic growth has enabled governments to develop new social protection programs, expand existing ones, and make substantial investments in human capital, leading to a more equitable distribution of wealth and enabling .

However, e…

Supported by the European Journalism Centre*

Viraj from India, in a squat where he has been living for three months near Velika Kladusa, Bosnia. He hopes to join family in Italy. February 2022. Credit: Chiara Luxardo

Bihać, Bosnia, Apr 19 2022 (IPS) – Responding to several shouts Viraj emerges from the ruins of his shelter in northwest Bosnia. He is originally from India but is now squatting near Bihać in what remains of a house abandoned since the 1990s Balkans war.

“I was in the bathroom,” says Viraj although there is no such facility. The building doesn’t even have windows, just gaps exposed to a freezing wind. Collapsing walls are patched wit…

On 24 February 2022 in Afghanistan, UNICEF Executive Director Catherine Russell listens to a girl reading from a textbook at a UNICEF-supported community-based school in Kandahar’s Dand district. Credit: UNICEF/Omid Fazel

Jun 7 2022 –  

became UNICEF’s eighth Executive Director on 1 February 2022.

Ms. Russell brings to the role decades of experience in developing innovative policy that empowers underserved communities around the world, including high-impact programmes that protect women and girls, including in humanitarian crises. She has extensive experience building, elevating and managing diverse workforces and mobilizing resources and political sup…

Sizable differences in the levels of children dying persist especially between more developed and less developed regions. Credit: Franz Chávez/IPS

PORTLAND, USA, Sep 5 2022 (IPS) – The chances of a child dying before reaching age five years have dropped substantially worldwide during the recent past. However, a significant divide remains among countries as well as within regio…

A community health worker spreads the message of screening for cervical cancer along with HIV. Credit: Joyce Chimbi/IPS

Nairobi, Dec 6 2022 (IPS) – Damaris Anyango* was recently discharged from Kenyatta National Hospital, battling the twin challenge of cervical cancer and HIV. She is 50 years old and was diagnosed with HIV nearly ten years ago.

Despite the heightened risk of…