Full Coverage: MDGs

30.08.2006 The ultimate goal in gender equality is to ensure that women and men have equitable access to, and benefit from society's resources, opportunities and rewards. And, as part of this, women need to have equal participation in defining what is valued and how this can be achieved, women's groups told the Planning Commission.

30.08.2006 The House of Representatives instructed the government to endorse the International Labour Organisation (ILO) Convention on Indigenous and Tribal Peoples. If its backers maintain pressure on the government, ratification should happen in the next session of parliament in a couple of months, said parliamentarian Bijaya Subba, who piloted the recommendation through the house.

29.08.2006 Norway has made a US$20 million contribution to ADB's Pakistan earthquake fund through an innovative debt-for-development swap. The debt-for-development swap means that $20 million worth of outstanding loan repayment obligations from Pakistan to Norway will be converted into a grant to be administered by ADB.

29.08.2006 As part of his ongoing campaign to highlight threats to press freedom worldwide, the Director- General of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) condemned the murder of a journalist in Sri Lanka.

29.08.2006 A World Bank's report has bracketed Andhra Pradesh as being in `middle of the pack, neither outstanding nor poor' in carrying out reforms process and in human development index

29.08.2006 The children living in slum areas, who do not go to school, will now be educated under a special government scheme. Children from six to 14 years of age will be imparted free education at Alternative and Innovative Education Centres (AIEC), which will be opened in slum areas under the Sarv Shiksha Abhiyan, a Centre-sponsored scheme.

28.08.2006 The main message the Conference delivered may be that in spite of the progress over the last 25 years, there was no room for complacency. It is time to deliver! There are almost 40 million people living with HIV, including 24.5 million in sub-Saharan Africa. In 2005, 2.8 million people died of AIDS.

25.08.2006 he past seven years have been a period of marked improvement in a number of health indicators in Maharashtra, Orissa, Punjab, Gujarat and Chhattisgarh, according to the third National Family Health Survey

25.08.2006

AIDS

Although Sri Lanka is categorised as a low HIV/ AIDS prevalence country, its geographical positioning makes it a future ‘high risk’ nation that may see an AIDS epidemic in the future says Dr. Sujatha Samarakoon,Venereologist and National STD/ AIDS Control Programme.

24.08.2006 The high interest rates and forced loan recovery practices of micro-finance institutions have been held responsible for the suicide of several farmers in Andhra Pradesh. It is evident that poverty makes good business sense to MFIs, writes Sudhirendar Sharma

23.08.2006

wider

The reference to ‘flatness’ alludes to the more level playing field due to globalization that has enabled China, India, and others to start catching up with the living standards of rich countries. But as Birdsall points out, the world is far from flat. In particular, unequal opportunities exist and persist both at the level of households within countries and at the level of nations in a global context; indeed the same forces of globalization are likely to exacerbate these inequalities

22.08.2006 The Andhra Pradesh State AIDS Control Society delivers the means for safe sex along with the morning news as part of the stateÂ’s AIDS campaign that has always found unique ways to promote condom use

22.08.2006 In order to advance towards the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), gender equality cannot merely be limited to a number of specific objectives, but must be the lens through which all the targets are viewed, say experts and representatives of women's movements in Argentina.

21.08.2006 Serbian organization the PeopleÂ’s Parliament became a member, in beginning of August, of the Stop Child Poverty global campaign.

21.08.2006 A tall lanky youth rounds a bend in a mountain path and sees a group, stripped of their packs, resting in the shade of a tree near a small waterfall. He approaches, says hello and shakes hands with those nearest and then stretches and even clambers up a small incline to clasp hands with everyone, rare behaviour in this remote hill region.

21.08.2006 U.S. Chargé d’Affaires in Pakistan Peter Bodde has announced the awarding of U.S. Agency for International Development Earthquake Reconstruction grants worth $70 million to international and Pakistani non-governmental organizations that will improve health and education services in the earthquake-affected areas and create economic opportunities for the local population.

21.08.2006 Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan (SSA) the governments flagship programme to enrol all children in the age group of 6-14 in schools suffers from inadequacies, ranging from misuse of funds to ineffective monitoring both at the national and state levels, the Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) has said.

18.08.2006 Social activists in India want the UN Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) to include achieving social equity and curbing human rights violations against certain communities. Many communities like tribals, Dalits and minorities have been denied their social, economic and cultural rights and are therefore languishing in poverty.

18.08.2006

kids

The economics literature on gender bias and son preference was linked directly with the discussion of religion and fertility. This study argued that bringing together the notion of ‘son preference’ and the complementary concept of ‘daughter aversion’ provides insights: just as sons bring ‘benefits’ to their parents, daughters impose ‘costs’ and complementing a desire to have sons is a desire not to have daughters

18.08.2006 From the Simputer to the $ 100 laptop for children, there have been many innovations that have attempted to bridge the digital divide. But these have created a divide of their own, with one group of technologists calling it the “ultimate solution” and another dismissing it as “the scam of the century”