News headlines in December 2017, page 2

SANTO DOMINGO, Dominican Republic, Dec 19 (IPS) - A few years ago, someone shared a video with me that deeply impacted me. It was called "The Girl Effect". In three minutes, the video demonstrates the fate of millions of girls and teenagers around the world.

NEW DELHI, Dec 19 (IPS) - Lack of diet diversity is viewed as the major cause of micronutrient malnutrition in Sub-Saharan Africa. Imbalanced diets resulting from consumption of mainly high carbohydrate based-diets also contribute to productivity losses and reduced educational attainment and income. Consequently, micronutrient malnutrition is currently the most critical for food and nutritional security problem as most diets are often deficient in essential vitamins and minerals. In Tanzania, for example, most rural and urban households consume mainly staples as their main food, which are high in carbohydrates, but low in micronutrients and vitamins. Staple food items increase energy availability but do not improve nutritional outcomes if not consumed together with micro-nutrient rich foods.

CARACAS, Dec 19 (IPS) - Corruption in the Venezuelan state oil industry, denounced by the government itself, and with former ministers and senior managers behind bars, is the latest evidence that, in the country with the largest oil reserves on the planet, the industry on which the economy depends is falling apart.

CHOMA, Zambia, Dec 18 (IPS) - "We have various financial obligations that push us to charcoal making. Top on the list is farming inputs and school fees," explains Arclay Moonga, a charcoal producer and chairperson of the recently formed Choma District Charcoal Association in Southern Zambia.

WASHINTON DC, Dec 18 (IPS) - Without reliable access to water, human beings cannot survive. Yet 3 out of 10 people do not have a safely managed water supply, and 6 out of 10 lack safely managed sanitation. Over 2 billion people drank water that was fecally contaminated in 2015, and the World Bank estimates that the annual cost of poor sanitation is in excess of $260 billion annually.

GENEVA, Dec 18 (IPS) - "I'm a migrant, but didn't have to risk my life on a leaky boat or pay traffickers. Safe migration cannot be limited to the global elite." Thus spoke United Nations Secretary General Antonio Guterres in September 2017.

ROME, Dec 18 (IPS) - While the media may be attracted by images of migrants drowning or sold as slaves, another flagrant but lesser-known drama is that of care workers, who are overwhelmingly women, often migrants, and who make a very large contribution to global public health, but are exposed to great health risks themselves with little or no protection, let alone basic labour rights.

Dec 18 (IPS) - On Nov. 23, the governments of Myanmar and Bangladesh signed an agreement to return the Rohingya refugees — more than 600,000 people who escaped from Rakhine state in western Myanmar to Cox's Bazar in Bangladesh — after ethnic cleansing carried out by Myanmar's armed forces since August.

Dec 18 (IPS) - Only a few millimeters of corrugated metal keeps us apart from the advancing dusk.

COX'S BAZAR, Bangladesh, Dec 16 (IPS) - Ferdous Begum was cleaning her child after he had defecated in the open, using leaves she collected from a nearby tree at Bangladesh's Teknaf Nature Park. The settlement is packed with Rohingya refugees who fled military persecution in Myanmar since August.