16 July: UNICEF/Zambia:  Zambia’s Ministry of Health and the UN Children's Fund (UNICEF) have joined together with two of the country’s leading mobile phone companies, ZAIN and MTN, to spread the message about vaccinations and other key interventions during Zambia's Child Health Week, which this year focus on preventing polio. [More information]
17 July: Africa-South America: Energy Partnerships: The First Africa-South America (ASA) Conference of Ministers in Charge of Energy, held from 13-17 July, discussed various matters concerning energy and partnerships. Ministers shared information on the process of identification and selection of concrete projects and programmes, provided an overview the overall strategy for cooperation and partnership in the energy sector under the ASA Cooperation Framework (ASACOF), and considered and adopted the Draft Declaration and the Draft Plan of Action. [More information]
18 July: AU/Women's Rights: A three-day Stakeholders’ Meeting on the Domestication and Implementation of the Protocol to the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights on the Rights of Women in Africa, held in Kigali., Rwanda, concluded with the adoption of a communiqué containing recommendations and strategies for strengthening the domestication, implementation and reporting on the Protocol fostering and protecting African women’s rights. [Press release]
20 July: AfDB: Mid-Term Review: During the first half of 2009, the African Development Bank (AfDB) Group recorded positive results with actual delivery far exceeding the performances recorded during the same period last year, according to the Bank Group’s “2009 Mid Year Budget and Performance Report” presented to the Board of Directors. The report shows that overall, the 2009 work programme was on schedule, with 39% of the yearly target delivered compared to 15% last year. Project Completion Report (PCR) coverage shot up to 96% from a yearly target of 40% while capital budget allocation show good alignment to Bank strategy with 54% allocated to ICT and 19% to other projects mainly addressing decentralization needs. [More information]
20 July: World Bank: The World Bank has agreed to a US$25 million financing agreement to assist Lesotho's efforts to secure long-term reliable water supply for its people and industry. The financing agreement, which includes a US$8.5 million grant component, will benefit Maseru, the capital city and adjoining areas. [More information]
20 July: AU: African Youth Charter: The African Youth Charter was adopted by the Assembly of the Heads of State and Government of the African Union (AU) at its seventh Ordinary Session held in Banjul, the Gambia in July 2006. The Charter is the AU’s basic and legal instrument for youth empowerment and provides a framework for youth development programming across the member states. Following the deposit of the fifteenth instrument of ratification, the African Youth Charter will enter into force in August 2009.
[Download the press release here]
21 July: UN: FAO warns of spread of deadly fish disease: A deadly disease devastating fish stocks in Africa’s Zambezi River basin and threatening the livelihoods and access to food of millions of rural people could soon reach other parts of the continent, the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) of the UN has warned. The most affected country is Zambia, covering two-thirds of the basin’s almost 1.4 million square kilometres, with over 2000 villages and some 7000 people now at risk of hunger as fish is a major source of income in many rural districts and the cheapest source of protein. [Press release]
22 July: UN-HABITAT/AU: Heads of State and Government of the African Union have adopted a new set of policy guidelines to ensure that landless people, women, youth, displaced people and other vulnerable groups have equitable access to land. In a joint declaration adopted at the thirteenth Ordinary Session, held from 1-3 July 2009, the African leaders resolved to “ensure that land laws provide for equitable access to land and related resources among all land users including the youth and other landless and vulnerable groups such as displaced persons.” They also said they will “strengthen security of land tenure for women, which merits special attention”. [Press release] [Declaration on land issues and challenges in Africa]
22 July: UNEP: Blue Helmets go Green: The Alpha Company of the UN Peacekeeping Operations (DPKO), working in the region of Kakata in western Liberia, has joined the UN Environment Programme’s (UNEP) worldwide Plant for the Planet: Billion Tree Campaign, and plans to plant a total of 1,000 trees by December 2009. Working under UNEP’s Billion Tree Campaign, which aims to plant seven billion trees, or one for every member of the human race, by December 2009, DPKO has already planted some 28,000 trees. It has also pledged to plant 33,000 more in 11 missions, including in Timor Leste, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Côte d’Ivoire, Sudan, Western Sahara, Haiti, Lebanon and Liberia. [Press release]
22 July: FAO: EU/FAO to boost agricultural production: The FAO has welcomed a €75 million ($105 million) donation from the European Union (EU) to help poor countries boost agricultural production. The EU-funded aid package to13 countries in Africa, Asia, the Caribbean and Central America, severely affected by high food prices, provides enormous additional backing to the UN's efforts to turn the tide of growing hunger in the world. The package follows a historic €125 million (US$170 million) donation from the EU just one month ago. [Press release]
22 July: UN/Sudan: UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon and the top United Nations envoy to Sudan have welcomed the court ruling on the disputed oil-rich area of Abyei, and called on the parties to proceed with the remaining tasks under the peace deal that ended the country’s north-south civil war. The demarcation of Abyei has been one of the outstanding issues related to the Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA), signed by the National Congress Party (NCP) and the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement (SPLM) in 2005. [More information] [Statement]
23 July: UN/FAO/OIE: A major UN-backed drive to bring food and mouth disease (FMD) – a highly contagious viral disease affecting cloven-hoofed animals which can easily hop borders between nations – under global control has been launched to ensure the livelihoods of herders. The new campaign, a joint effort between FAO and the World Organization for Animal Health (OIE), was unveiled last month in Asunciòn, Paraguay. [More information]
23 July: ECA/Agro-industry: Experts meeting at the UN Economic Commission for Africa (ECA) in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, have called for the promotion of agro-businesses as an essential element of Africa’s industrialization efforts. The expert meeting, held from 22-24 July, is expected to conclude with the preparation of a draft document on using public-private partnerships as a vehicle for promoting agro-industry and agribusinesses. Some key issues addressed by the experts included: the increasing disconnection of African farmers from both input and product markets; the extreme fragmentation of the African food and agricultural markets; how to improve the conceptualization of regional agricultural value chains; and inter-institutional collaboration for promoting regional value chains.
[Press release]

28 July: Launch of the African Economic Outlook, Kigali, Rwanda. [More information]
10-14 August: Informal Meetings of the AWG-LCA and the AWG-KP (Bonn Climate Change Talks), Bonn, Germany.
[More information]
17-23 August: 2009 UNEP Tunza International Children and Youth Conference, Daejeon, Republic of Korea. [More information]
23-28 August: Second Congress on World Agroforestry, Nairobi, Kenya. [More information] 
31 August- 4 September: Third World Climate Conference, Geneva, Switzerland. [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.