2 July: World Bank/Niger: Reform Management and Technical Assistance Project: The World Bank’s Board of Executive Directors approved a project on reform management and technical assistance for Niger. The project is a five-year technical assistance grant that seeks to support the reform process at the Ministry of Economy and Finance by developing capacities that are needed to implement the PFM reform. [More information]
3 July: ECA: Aid for Trade Review: United Nations Under-Secretary General and Executive Secretary of the Economic Commission for Africa (ECA), Abdoulie Janneh, has said that ECA will continue to closely monitor the implementation of the Aid for Trade initiative in order to maximize the benefits accruing to African countries. Janneh made the comments on the eve of the Second Global Review of Aid for Trade, taking place in Geneva, Switzerland from 6-7 July 2009, which will scrutinize the operationality of aid for trade initiatives in recipient countries and examine progress made in securing additional financing. [More information]
6 July: World Bank/Gabon: African Natural Gas: An international conference on the future of natural gas in Africa was held in Libreville, on June 4–5, 2009 under the auspices of the World Bank. The meeting brought together representatives of ministries of hydrocarbons and finance from eight African countries. Participants familiarized themselves, through presentations made by experts, of the importance of the African continent’s gas reserves. [More information]
6 July: MDGs:  The Millennium Development Goals Report 2009 was launched in Geneva by the Secretary-General on 6 July. The report, which presents the yearly assessment of global progress towards the MDGs, is prepared by the Statistics Division of DESA on the basis of inputs provided by the members of the Inter-agency and Expert Group on MDG Indicators. Less than six years away from the 2015 deadline to achieve the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), the report warns that despite many successes, overall progress has been too slow for most of the targets to be met by 2015. And major advances in the fight against poverty and hunger have begun to slow or even reverse as a result of the global economic and food crises. [More information]
6 July 2009: UNCCD: The Secretariat of the UN Convention to Combat Desertification (UNCCD) has published the first issue of a new bi-monthly “UNCCD News” newsletter. In the first issue, UNCCD Executive Secretary Luc Gnacadja highlights that “Land is becoming a central element of the world’s efforts to cope with climate change and promote sustainable development.” The newsletter also contains reports on: preparations for the scientific conference that will convene from 22-24 September 2009, in parallel to the Conference of the Parties in Buenos Aires, Argentina; and Land Day, which convened on 6 June 2009, in parallel to the UNFCCC conference in Bonn. [UNCCD News 1.1]
6 July: World Bank/Tunisia: Energy Efficiency and Renewable Investment: The World Bank’s Board of Executive Directors recently  approved the energy efficiency and renewable investment project for Tunisia.  The project aims to scale up industrial energy efficiency and cogeneration investments, and thereby contribute to the government's new four-year energy conservation program. The project concept was designed to provide an integrated technical and financial analysis of end-use projects to be financed by Participating Financial Intermediaries (PFIs). [More information]
7 July: DRC-UN-HABITAT: A national conference, organized by the Government of the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), UNHCR and UN-HABITAT, to discuss the issue of land, housing and property for returning refugees and internally displaced persons concluded with the adoption of a 17 point action plan for which a follow-up mechanism will be established. The two-day a political and technical conference, was held as part of the UN stabilization plan for the eastern DRC, which aims at building a sustainable framework for the refugees’ return and reintegration. The recommendations revolved around land conflict prevention and resolution; regional land policy; shelter and housing strategies. [More information]
8 July: UN: Launch of West Africa Coast Initiative:With its porous borders and slack security making West Africa an easy target for criminal networks smuggling cocaine, guns, cigarettes and other illegal goods, the head of the United Nations anti-crime agency announced today a joint initiative that would integrate the expertise of regional actors with the global reach of INTERPOL (International Criminal Police Organization) to tackle the threats posed by organized crime in the sub-region. [More information]
9 July: UNIDO-AU:The United Nations Industrial Development Organization (UNIDO) and African Union Commission launched a new Internet-based Monitoring Platform to map investment flows in Africa and offering investors more information for analysis and decision making. [More information]

12-17 July: 2009 IEEE International Geoscience and Remote Sensing Symposium, Cape Town, South Africa. [More information]
13-17 July: First Africa–South America Joint Conference of Ministers in Charge of Energy, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. [More information]
16 July: Launch of the 2009 Least Developed Countries Report, Geneva, Switzerland. [More information]
20-22 July: Sub-regional workshop for trainers in integrated environmental assessment and reporting, Cairo, Egypt.
[More information]
20-24 July: Drafting Committee Meeting for the Report of the Second Ad Hoc Technical Expert Group on Biodiversity and Climate Change, Cape Town, South Africa. [More information]
20-24 July: Regional Preparatory Meeting to UNCCD COP 9 for Africa, Tunis, Tunisia. [More information]
25-31 July: Sub-regional workshop for trainers in integrated environmental assessment and reporting, Abidjan, Côte d’Ivoire.
[More information]

The Africa Weekly Sustainable Development Guidance Document is a publication of the International Institute for Sustainable Development (IISD) <info@iisd.ca>, publishers of the Earth Negotiations Bulletin © <enb@iisd.org>. This issue was compiled and edited by Tallash Kantai and Richard Sherman. The Guidance Document is part of IISD Reporting Service’s African Regional Coverage (ARC) Project in partnership with South Africa’s Department of Environmental Affairs and Tourism (DEAT), the UN Environment Programme’s Regional Office for Africa (UNEP ROA) and the Secretariat of the Convention on Biological Diversity. The Director of IISD Reporting Services is Langston James “Kimo” Goree VI <kimo@iisd.org>. The Programme Manager of the African Regional Coverage Project is Richard Sherman <rsherman@iisd.org>. Funding for the Africa Weekly Sustainable Development Guidance Document has been provided by Germany’s Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development and the International Development Research Centre, Canada, through the African Regional Coverage Project for IISD Reporting Service’s coverage of African regional meetings. IISD can be contacted at 161 Portage Avenue East, 6th Floor, Winnipeg, Manitoba R3B 0Y4, Canada; tel: +1-204-958-7700; fax: +1-204-958-7710. The opinions expressed in the Guidance Document are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of IISD. Electronic versions of the Guidance Document are sent to the electronic distribution list (in HTML format) and can be found on the Linkages WWW-server at <http://enb.iisd.org/africa/>. For information on the ARC, including requests to provide reporting services, contact the Director of IISD Reporting Services at <kimo@iisd.org>, +1-646-536-7556 or 300 East 56th St., 11A, New York, New York 10022, US.