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  • “Portfolios of the Poor” book review
    9 March 2010

    Portfolios of the Poor: How the World’s Poor Live on $2 a Day represents a unique attempt to interrogate not only the balance sheets of poor households, but more importantly the processes of cash flow and turnover, and the money management strategies and decision-making processes that govern these processes. The authors employ a new technique they call “financial diaries”, from which the information emphasises that far from being a homogenous group, the 2.5 billion global population classified as poor or ultra poor are very different and their lives and contexts are dynamic.

  • Botswana journalists cover poverty
    4 March 2010

    Following the training workshop sponsored by RHVP and facilitated by FrayIntermedia in Gaborone in January, which covered reporting on poverty, food security and social protection, several entries were submitted for the best article or report. The winner is announced in this issue of the Wahenga Reporter.

  • RHVP’s Josee Koch comments on South Africa’s child grant increase
    25 February 2010

    South Africa’s children, the country’s most vulnerable population group, will benefit through the increase in social grants recently outlined in the national budget.

    The latest Department of Social Development statistics show that more than 12.8 million children benefited from the CSG at the end of January 2009.

    Regional Hunger and Vulnerability Project policy advisor Josee Koch agrees... that the increase in monthly grant payments can generally be described as a positive development, but questions what impact it will have on individual recipients.

  • UNICEF Vacancy: Chief (Policy Advocacy), New York
    24 February 2010

    Purpose of the Position
    Under the overall guidance of the Associate Director PAKM, you will be responsible for the coordination, planning, development and management of UNICEF’s policy advocacy, in particular in the area of social and economic policy.

  • 2009 SADC Vulnerability Assessment and Analysis Programme Annual Organizational Meeting Report available now
    23 February 2010

    The 2009 SADC Regional Vulnerability Assessment and Analysis (RVAA) Programme Annual Organization Meeting (AOM) was held in Livingstone, Zambia from 1st to 4th December 2009 at Zambezi Sun Hotel. The main objective of the AOM was to share experiences and challenges during 2009 by the participating agencies of the RVAA Programme which include National Vulnerability Assessment Committees (NVACs), the RVAA Programme Management Unit (PMU), and the Regional Vulnerability Assessment Committee (RVAC).

  • CALL FOR PAPERS: New Faces for African Development
    23 February 2010

    Deadline: 9 April 2010
    The European Report on Development (ERD) is a multiannual process, which is the main outcome of the Mobilizing European Research for Development Policies initiative promoted and financed by the European Commission and seven EU Member States (Germany, Finland, France, Luxembourg, Spain, Sweden, and the United Kingdom)...

    This year European Report on Development focuses on the issues of poverty, inequality and social protection, with an emphasis on Sub-Saharan African countries.

  • UNICEF Social Protection vacancies
    29 January 2010

    Three posts are currently being advertised by UNICEF:

    • Social Protection Specialist, ESARO (The Regional Office in Eastern and Southern Africa)
    • Social Policy Specialist, Ghana
    • Social Policy Specialist, Namibia
  • Planning for Prosperity?
    25 January 2010

    “It happens that you see it is better that the little ones eat and you can stay as you are, and there is nothing that you can do, and when the children ask why is it that mommy is not eating, you will say that you will eat after them..."

    Poverty appears to be too stubborn in South Africa to ever disappear. Too many people are living in absolute survivalist mode, spending their days searching for sufficient food and water to survive for the next day. What policies have we adopted to really bring an end to this, and are they appropriate?

  • New FREE distance learning module: CLIMATE CHANGE & DEVELOPMENT
    28 December 2009

    SOAS has launched new postgraduate distance learning module in Climate Change and Development that will be available to students and professionals from February 2010.

  • UNICEF: Lilongwe consultancy position - National Social Support Programme
    18 December 2009

    Institution to provide the Team Leader for the design of the National Social Support Programme...

  • The Land of Less Contrast - How Brazil reined in inequality
    5 December 2009

    Suddenly, Brazil has become an unlikely benchmark in the global campaign to close the gap between rich and poor. Since 2003, some 21 million Brazilians have climbed out of poverty...

  • Namibia - Two Year Basic Income Grant Pilot ends
    4 December 2009

    After two years of successful implementation, the last payout will take place in December 2009. What now?

  • Hungry for Change: An eight-step, costed plan of action to tackle global child hunger
    2 December 2009

    There's a crucial window in which malnutrition can be prevented, from conception to a child’s second birthday. After this, the effects are permanent...

  • Witness to climate change: Learning from older people’s experience
    2 December 2009

    Climate change and ageing are two of the biggest issues facing humanity this century, yet explicit links between the two are rarely made...

  • New report on Malawi’s National Social Support Policy
    26 November 2009

    A new report on Malawi’s National Social Support Policy and its economic impact, written by Candace Miller MHS ScD of Boston University, has been added to the library...