Difference between revisions of "Category:Africa"

This is part of By Place

See also Economics, Colonialism, Food Scarcity, and Third World Development as well as Population and Human Rights.

Overviews

Video overview 2009

News/Action Items

News about Africa from Grist.

You don’t have to live on a coast to get flooded out by climate change 2/14

Discovery: Huge Water Reserve in Kenya Brings Hope to Most Vulnerable 9/13. See also Carbon for Water video documentary on social entrepreneur project that will bring clean water to 900K ppl here.

Shell Niger Delta Oil Spill: Company To Negotiate Compensation And Cleanup With Nigerians 9/13.

M23 Rebels Killing, Raping in DR Congo 7/13

Cassava was supposed to help us survive climate change, and now it’s dying 6/13

Civilians attacked in Sudan 12/12

Saltwater agriculture is possible examples include Mexico and Eritrea in Africa.

Somalia Famine Partially Blamed On Climate Change In New Study 3/13.

Congo Humanitarian Crisis Worsens Amidst Renewed Violence Linked to Rebels Backed by Rwanda |11/28|A massive humanitarian crisis is unfolding in Central Africa, where fighting has displaced tens of thousands in the Democratic Republic of Congo. Rebels believed to be backed by Rwanda postponed their departure Friday from Goma for "logistical reasons," defying for a second time an ultimatum set by neighboring African countries and backed by Western diplomats. Last week, the World Food Program suspended its food distribution over security concerns, but it has now resumed activity in several refugee camps across the Congo. Meanwhile, many who fled their homes amidst the fighting are looking to return, but thousands are still living in camps as the conflict drags on. "It’s one of the greatest humanitarian crises anywhere in the world since the end of World War II. Some five million people have died since 1998 when serious fighting broke out again in the region," says veteran reporter James North, who has covered Africa for almost four decades. He is a contributing writer to The Nation, where his latest article is "Washington’s Role in the Renewed Violence in DR Congo."More

Four teenage girls in Africa have invented a generator powered by pee

Elephant Poaching thrives in Tanzania 10/12

Liberia's Forestry Dept. Giving Large Amounts Of Land To Logging Firms, Global Witness Report Says. 9/12

One Year Later: South Sudan's Ongoing Conflict (audio and text) 7.12.

Global weirding disrupts food supply and Drought/Famine in Africa Hits Niger's Children Particularly Hard PBS NewsHour 7.12

Despite Grim Headlines, Africa Is Booming NPR audio coverage of Africa.

Video overview 2009

Poachers attack reserve in DRC 7/12.

Land grab by China and multinational corporations such as Monsanto and private equity funds (sometimes as tax dodge) may be the largest threat to food security. "Inefficient" small subsistence farmers (mostly women) become refugees and miners. Extensive research by Oakland Institute. Land and water grabs in developing Third World countries 1/13.

Conflict minerals from Africa 6.12

Currently, there is a humanitarian emergency in the Democratic Republic of Congo, a failed state with a long-running civil war, fueled by factions trying to control resources such as diamonds and the coltan in our cell phones, laptops and game consoles. Systematic rape is happnening on an enormous scale. The Greatest Silence: Rape in the Congo here is an audio interview with Robin Penn Warren and others (1/09). Harden in the course reader provides background (updated info on Congo Gorillas here),background on current civil war in DR Congo. 12/09 Doctors Without Borders site. Video of Mountain Gorillas

Global 3000, a German program shown on PBS, has extensive coverage of green issues, especially with respect to Third World entrepreneurs. Examples: Coltan mining in Congo 7/10.

In August 2008, the Shell Oil pipeline that ran through his property in the Niger Delta burst, smothering everything in its path with crude oil. tens of Thousands of people living along the Niger Delta have suffered the same devastating fate caused by oil spill after oil spill. While the Niger Delta has been awash in pollution, Shell has been swimming in profits -- $30.9 billion globally in 2011. Tell Shell -- Own up. Pay up. Clean up. 4/12

Preparing for drought in Sahel, Africa 3/12.

== Climate Change == (see also Conflict)

Extreme weather and civil war in Somalia: Does drought fuel conflict through livestock price shocks?

Conflict in Africa because of water scarcity.

Discovery: Huge Water Reserve in Kenya Brings Hope to Most Vulnerable 9/13.

A new study has found that that often war is associated with global climate change. According to the report, there are links between the climate phenomenon El Niño and outbreaks of violence in countries from southern Sudan to Indonesia and Peru. The scientists find that El Niño, which brings hot and dry conditions to tropical nations, doubles the risk of civil war in up to 90 countries, and may help account for a fifth of conflicts worldwide during the past 50 years. We speak with the report’s lead author, Solomon Hsiang, a postdoctoral researcher at the Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs at Princeton University. 8/11

== Maps == (see also Maps Page

UN map of Africa showing effects of Global Warming.

UCSC Library Resources

African Studies Research Guide A good starting point

Database:

Africa-Wide: NiPAD Available online to UCSC students, faculty, and staff. UCSC access is limited to one concurrent user. Searachable database of information on all aspects of Africa. Topics covered include politics, history, economics, business, mining, natural sciences, environment, development, social issues, anthropology, literature, language, law, music, and tourism. Sources include books, journal and magazine articles, radio and television broadcasts, newspapers, pamphlets, maps, reports, theses and music recordings. Subject area(s): Humanities, Social Sciences.

General Websites

Yale Environment 360 coverage.

Africa Policy Information Center

Bibliography

Worldwatch Institute

Video

Ethiopia: A Battle for Land and Water PBS Food for 9 Billion. 2/12. Forced migration, often because China and Saudis buy the land and water.

U2 head man Bono on ending poverty has good news, including on Sub-Saharan Africa.

Drought/Famine in Africa Hits Niger's Children Particularly Hard PBS NewsHour 7.12

Raoul du Toit coordinated conservation initiatives that have helped to develop and maintain the largest remaining black rhino populations in Zimbabwe. Learn more at Goldman Prize.

60 MINUTES segment on gold, war and rape in DR of Congo. 11/09.

Ghana's bright future PBS NewsHour 6/11.

Conflict in Africa because of water scarcity.

2010 Goldman Prize (the green Nobel) for Africa: Thuli Makama see also video. all African winners

A Thousand Suns tells the story of the Gamo Highlands of the African Rift Valley, one of the most densely populated rural regions of Africa yet its people have been farming sustainably for 10,000 years. The film explores the modern world's untenable sense of separation from and superiority over nature and how the interconnected worldview of the Gamo people is fundamental in achieving long-term sustainability, both in the region and beyond.

Charlie Rose is an excellent PBS interview series. Here, for example, he discusses foreign aid and development with Peter Singer, author of "The Life You Can Save: Acting Now to End World Poverty" as well as social entrepreneur Jacqueline Novogratz and aid critic and Africa scholar Dambisa Moyo.

The Market maker setting up a commodity exchange in Ethiopia by an American student who was born there, inspired by the famine. Shown on PBS Wide Angle program.

Botanist Corneille Ewango talks about his work at the Okapi Faunal Reserve in the Congo Basin -- and his heroic work protecting it from poachers, miners and raging civil wars (TEDtalk).

In this provocative TEDtalk, journalist Andrew Mwenda asks us to reframe the "African question" -- to look beyond the media's stories of poverty, civil war and helplessness and see the opportunities for creating wealth and happiness throughout the continent. Link.

In this five minute TEDTalk, William Kamkwamba, a 14 year old African discusses how he built windmill video Here's a later and longer Tedtalk

Other TEDtalks on Africa

UCR research on cow peas for use in Africa

Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala as the first female Finance Minister in Nigeria, attacked corruption to make the country more desirable for foreign investment and job creation. Now as a director of the World Bank and head of the Makeda Fund, she works for change in all of Africa. TEDtalk video

Afrigadget site

Global Health: HIV and the Epidemic in Africa UCTV 90 min. 2010

Fighting Malaria in Africa UCTV 90 min 2010. Also, UCSC alum Nina Grove, formerly of Genentech, works on malaria in Africa.

Why Clean, Safe Water Is Still Out of Reach for Liberia 4.12 PBS NewsHour.

Audio

New York Times correspondent Jeffrey Gettleman received a George Polk Award for his coverage of East Africa including Darfur, Congo, and Somalia. (Audio interview, some a bit disturbing)

The winner of this year’s Buckminster Fuller Challenge is an initiative that helps transform packed dry grasslands and savannahs into water-rich pastures. Operation Hope promotes managed cattle grazing, a technique that contradicts conventional beliefs on the effects of animals and soil preservation. link

Books

The Bright Continent: Breaking Rules and Making Change in Modern Africa Hardcover by Dayo Olopade. (review), audio interview.

China's Second Continent: How a Million Migrants Are Building a New Empire in Africa by Howard W. French (audio interview).

See "We Are Still Here" in Earth Odysseyor e-book on the origins of Darfur, Sudan.

Mike Davis Late Victorian Holocausts Davis, author of City of Quartz, traces the creation of what we now call "The Third World," through a complex series of seemingly disparate natural and market-related events beginning in the 1870s. Includes Ethiopia famine.

Majka Burhardt, Coffee Story: Ethiopia

King Leopold's Ghost: A Story of Greed, Terror, and Heroism in Colonial Africa

We Wish to Inform You That Tomorrow We Will be Killed with Our Families by Philip Gourevitch interview. it's a powerful book about the Rwandan genocide (which may have had ecological roots? Here's a more recent example of fights over water) which inspired Rye Barcott, former Marine and co-founder of the global health and development non-profit, Carolina for Kibera. Barcott's eye-opening experience confronting poverty in Kenya started him along the tumultuous journey that led to his non-government organization and book, It Happened on the Way to War. a radio interview 2011. Google talk (video)

Webcomic about the Lord's Resistance Army in the Congo.

Articles

Soil loss through erosion was a significant factor in the Rwanda genocide. Diamond looks at this in Collapse, which is critiqued here

People

Nnimmo Bassey is and activist and poet, the executive director of Environmental Rights Action (ERA), Nigeria and elected chair of Friends of the Earth International. He is one of Time Magazine's Heroes of the Planet 2009 and co-winner of the 2010 Right Livelihood Award (the Alternative Nobel Prize). His books include To Cook a Continent (excerpt), Oilwatching in South America and Genetically Modified Organisms: the African Challenge. video interview.

Wangari Mathai First environmentalist to win the Nobel Peace Prize. 11/06 Interview (audio). 2007 audio interview. A new documentary on her shown on PBS in mid-April Taking Root, trailer. UCSC Media Center DVD6865 and DVD7441 Video of 2009 talk "Challenge for Africa."

Amina Az-Zubair, Nigerian Working To End Poverty. bio.

Born in Kitale and raised in the violent region of the Lake Turkana Basin, 31-year-old Ikal Angelei was taught at a tender age to protect herself amid ethnic conflict between the indigenous communities of Kenya and Ethiopia. She was working at the Turkana Basin Institute, an anthropology research center, when she heard from research scientists about construction of the massive dam—and immediately felt a responsibility to stop it. Outraged at the fact that plans were moving forward without any consultation from local communities, she founded the group Friends of Lake Turkana (FoLT) in 2008. Goldman Winner 2012

Jay Naidoo discusses his book "Fighting for Justice" Video interview.

UCSC alum Nina Grove, formerly of Genentech, works on malaria in Africa. UCSC GIIP students working in Africa 10/10.

Marc Ona Essangui winner 2009 Goldman Prize. In Gabon, a country without a culture of civic engagement, Marc Ona led efforts to publicly expose the unlawful agreements behind a huge mining project threatening the sensitive ecosystems of Gabon’s equatorial rainforests. Ona’s efforts led to an unprecedented victory for civil society in Gabon, with the government adopting new environmental oversight regulations and significantly reducing the size of the mining concession.

Ken Saro-Wiwa (1941-95) was executed by the Nigerian government during his fight to prevent the further exploitation of his Ogoni people by the Shell Oil Company. book devoted to him and his writings. A video remembrance. His daughter has a new book

UCSC People

Martin Case (business management economics, '08) will soon join the Banana Slug tradition of service. Case departs June 1 to train for a two-year assignment in Cameroon. He will work in small business development. Case says he is drawn to the Peace Corps to for a "grasp of the bigger picture of world economics through hands-on experience." An active member of his community, Case sang opera at UCSC and volunteers at Santa Cruz's Homeless Garden Project and the Resource Center for Nonviolence. With 47 alumni in service, UC Santa Cruz ranks No. 21 on the annual list of "Peace Corps Top Colleges and Universities," released last week.

Nina Grove, formerly of Genentech, works on malaria in Africa.

Cheryl Scott runs the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) office in East Africa.

Brian M. Dowd-Uribe is currently a Ph.D. candidate in Environmental Studies at UCSC. His primary expertise is in agricultural development in sub-Saharan Africa, and he has been a lecturer in environmental science at Santa Clara University and in sustainable development and environmental interpretation at UCSC, as well as a Peace Corps volunteer in Togo. His research explores both the agro-ecological and social impacts of alternative agrifood movements, including organic and fair trade cotton production, and the social impacts of the introduction of genetically engineered crops.

Katie Roper has done internships in Kenya, and spent a year living in a "sustainable community" on campus. She she single-handedly produced a six-minute video documentary called Thirsty Trees: And the Search for Better Alternatives

Rhys Thom, also GIIP (more on GIIP in Ghana), served as the project director for Delta Info Initiative, a rural information technology project in Nigeria’s Niger Delta. He earlier interned at the Office of the Ombudsman of Namibia working on human rights and environmental projects. He is currently employed at the World Resources Institute (WRI). As the Program and Communications Coordinator for EMBARQ, he researches and implements environmentally and financially sustainable urban transport solutions.

South Sudan: Finding peace in the 'world’s most displaced' country. The signing of a cease-fire in South Sudan last week is a positive step forward but bringing about lasting peace and alleviating poverty will involve substantial grassroots efforts, according to UC Santa Cruz professor Mark Fathi Massoud who has written widely about the world's youngest nation. 1/14.

Ben Crow has expertise in water and hunger issues. He teaches SOCY-167 - Development & Underdevelopment SOCY-179 - Nature, Poverty, and Progress, as well as SOCY-220 - Global Transformation. He also works on Atlas of Global Inequality. His new article on water projects in Kenya 11/11

Paul Lubeck has expertise on globalization and advises Global Information Internship Program GIIP. After 12 years, GIIP has transformed from an idea to a full-fledged academic program. Last summer, GIIP became a major and a minor. The sociology department now includes an honors major and minor, Global Information and Social Enterprise Studies (GISES), that is modeled after GIIP.

Volunteer Opportunities

UC Santa Cruz Global Brigades is one of the many university chapters of Global Brigades, Inc in North America and Europe where volunteering students are dedicated to the research, design, and construction of socially responsible, environmentally sustainable solutions towards problems in the developing world. Ultimately, extended relationships between brigades and communities will result in not only the implementation of a variety of projects, but also the accumulation of a vast wealth of knowledge from which future students and communities can learn. Works in Africa.

Rise Up Development Collective (RUDC) is a nonprofit organization focused on development in the Wli Todzi community, in the Volta Region in Ghana. We raise funds to sustainably construct, stock, and staff a much needed health clinic for the people of Wli Todzi.

Friends of Congovideos has various ways to take action (they really need cell phones and Blackberries).audio interview 6/11/14.