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- Investment opportunities in South Sudan’s emerging gold industry
- Family planning drive in Kenya gets 450,000 self-injectable contraceptive doses from UK
- AfDB commits $2 billion to revolutionise clean cooking in Africa, save forests
- The harsh realities of family laws for African women revealed
- Kenyan home buyers shift preferences, seek affordable housing despite market downturn
- How startup Yeeo is shaping the future of business contacts with eco-friendly innovation
- Stakeholders in Nairobi seek to unlock Kenya’s green jobs potential
- Alarming surge in online child exploitation sweeps Africa
Countries
- Estimates show that family planning in Kenya prevented 2.4 million pregnancies in 2023.
- The 2023 report shows significant achievements in family planning across the globe, even in the face of stagnant funding.
- The contraceptives were procured by UNFPA with more than KES57 Million (£348,000) funding from the UK.
Efforts to make family planning more accessible to women in Kenya received a boost with the handover of 450,000 doses of Subcutaneous Depot Medroxyprogesterone Acetate (DMPA-SC), a self-injectable contraceptive that simplifies and enhances the accessibility of family planning.
The contraceptives were procured by the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) with more than $378,151 (KES57 Million) funding from the UK Government, and will be distributed by the Ministry of Health to health facilities across the country.
DMPA-SC is a user-friendly injectable contraceptive that can be administered by trained individuals, including community health workers and women themselves, thereby expanding access to family planning …
- In Africa, a staggering 1.2 billion people lack access to clean cooking facilities.
- Lack of clean cooking facilities is one of the main causes of deforestation in Africa.
- AfDB funding is a major step along the road to saving the lives of 600,000 mainly women and children each year.
The African Development Bank Group (AfDB) has pledged $2 billion over the next decade towards clean cooking initiatives in Africa, marking a huge stride in the effort to save the lives of 600,000 people, predominantly women and children, each year. This commitment aims to address the health hazards associated with traditional cooking methods that rely on charcoal, wood, and biomass, which contribute to severe respiratory illnesses and environmental degradation.
At a summit on Clean Cooking in Africa, held in Paris, AfDB President Dr. Akinwumi Adesina announced that the Bank would allocate 20 per cent of its energy project financing to promoting …
- Across Africa, gender inequality in marriage, divorce, custody, and property rights is perpetuated by sex discrimination embedded in both legal systems and customary laws.
- Discriminatory family laws have profound impacts, increasing the risk of sexual and gender-based violence for women and girls.
- Laws in Cameroon, Nigeria, Senegal, South Sudan, Sudan, and Tanzania still allow child marriage.
Discrimination against women and girls remains widespread in family laws across Africa, according to new research by Equality Now. An analysis of 20 African countries reveals that gender inequality in marriage, divorce, custody, and property rights is perpetuated by sex discrimination embedded in both legal systems and customary laws. Despite some significant legal reforms, progress has been slow, inconsistent, and hindered by setbacks, lack of political will, and weak implementation.
The report, “Gender Inequality in Family Laws in Africa: An Overview of Key Trends in Select Countries,” highlights how overlapping and …
- Kenya’s economic resurgence in 2024 proving a reality following a notable upturn in recent months, marked by positive indicators across sectors.
- According to CBK, leading indicators point to the continued strong performance of the Kenyan economy in the first quarter of 2024.
- According to the World Bank, Kenya’s economic growth is projected to be 5.2 per cent, boosted by increased investment in the private sector as the government reduces its activities in the domestic credit market.
A strong rebound
Kenya’s economic prospects are looking brighter, attributed to the interventions by the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund, which have played a massive role in easing volatility witnessed less than three months ago.
Major economic indicators in the country show that confidence is slowly creeping back after the government secured the International Monetary Fund’s facility to pay back the Eurobond.
The repayments had triggered volatility in financial markets, including the …
- Cairo, Egypt, holds third place after Athens and Manilla, Philippines.
- India stands out, with three cities being included in the world’s top 10 most stressed cities.
- Los Angeles, US, holds the ninth place with the highest obesity rate on the list.
Experts conducted a study to identify the most stressful cities to live in 2024. The study measured several parameters including the quality of life, safety, and pollution index as main criteria, also considering the presence of stress-related habits such as smoking rates, obesity, and alcohol consumption. The final score was made, considering all of the mentioned criteria.
The most stressed city in the world is Athens, Greece, with the highest stress levels, which include a low safety index and a high rate of stress-related habits such as smoking, over-eating, and alcohol consumption. Compared to other cities on the list, Athens has the highest smoking rate, with 31.3 per cent …
- The increasing food prices have majorly occasioned the rise in consumer expenditure.
- In the review period, 50 per cent of the Kenyans polled indicated static income levels over the last year
- 53 per cent of Kenyans polled allocated less than 10 per cent of their income to travel and leisure expenditures.
The slight drop in inflation in Kenya has failed to soften the impact of Increased consumer spending after posting a 42 per cent rise in spending in the past six months. This is after a new survey showed that the country posted a six per cent rise in Kenyan expenditures compared to the preceding three months, which ended December 2023.
According to the latest spending index from ICEA LION Group, Kenyans’ spending escalated by 6 per cent from January to March this year. However, this growth was more subdued than the previous quarter, which witnessed a 36 per
- A total of 77 people, including 22 Chinese and a Cameroonian, all suspects in an elaborate cybercrime ring in Zambia targeting thousands of people across the world, have been arrested in a crackdown.
- Masquerading as call centre agents, Zambian youth were recruited into conning people via Telegram and WhatsApp platforms.
- Authorities in Zambia say the scam affected people in Singapore, Peru, the UAE, and some African countries.
In Zambia’s posh Roma district, the morning African sun barely peeked through the offices of Golden Top Support Services. This company had promised scores of respectable jobs to young Zambians as call centre agents.
Instead, it had covertly plunged them into the depths of a sprawling cybercrime syndicate. This chilling reality came to light following a decisive raid led by the country’s Drug Enforcement Commission (DEC), exposing a narrative that conjures up the global challenges of cybercrime.
This operation was a huge score …
- Following a slow recovery from the debilitating impact of COVID-19, Africa’s economic growth declined to an estimated 3.8 per cent in 2022 and later deteriorated to 3.3 per cent in 2023.
- Africa is not immune to economic shocks and has recently faced a multi-crisis situation.
- African countries have posted more than 5 per cent output expansions in 2024.
Africas economic outlook
Before COVID-19, Africa experienced 20 years of solid growth and made tangible economic and social progress. However, the COVID crisis brought this progress to an abrupt halt, and many countries, which are under increasingly tight budget constraints, struggled to invest in essential sectors amidst recovering from the aftermath of the health crisis.
Following a slow recovery from the debilitating impact of COVID-19, Africa’s economic growth declined to an estimated 3.8 per cent in 2022 and later deteriorated to 3.3 per cent in 2023.
However, according to a recent UN …
- Kenya’s business conditions weakened slightly in March despite easing inflation.
- Kenyan firms reduced their purchases of inputs in line with weaker sales.
- Most businesses remain optimistic about their workforce size and revenue growth in the year’s second quarter (April-June).
The latest Stanbic Bank Kenya Purchasing Managers’ Index indicates that Kenya’s business conditions weakened slightly in March despite easing inflation.
The deterioration in operating conditions was witnessed across the private sector as order book volumes and output levels contracted. The downturn contrasted with February, which saw an improvement in the private sector for the first time in six months.
Despite the decline, the survey data provided some positive signals for Kenyan businesses. Staffing and inventories showed further growth, indicating potential expansion opportunities.
Additionally, input cost inflation slowed to its lowest level in over three years amid a recovery in the shilling against the US dollar and other major currencies, including those …
