Kala Dera, India: The Coca-Cola company has continued to operate its bottling plant in Kala Dera in Jaipur, India even as the area has been declared a drought area last summer and the groundwater levels are falling sharply – leaving the largely agrarian community with severely restricted access to water.
Data obtained this week by the India Resource Center from the Central Groundwater Board, a government agency, confirm that groundwater levels in Kala Dera fell precipitously again – a drop of 4.29 meters (14 feet) in just one year between August 2008 and August 2009, from 30.83 meters below ground level to 35.12 meters respectively. (more…)
Anyone who has reveled in Middle Eastern or Mediterranean cuisine knows the important role olives play in giving their taste buds cause to cheer. Whether eaten whole or through their oil, olives complete nearly any meal. Yet, here in Palestine in particular, zaytoun (olives) provide flavor to our lives beyond simply satisfying our palates. They are a vital part of the Palestinian economy, and are the nation’s largest commercial crop. According to UN figures, olive trees account for more than 45 percent of all farmland and 80 percent of all orchards in Palestine. They also happen to be a consistent target for Israeli settler and military attacks.
By Afsaneh Najmabadi - The meaning of a Muslim woman’s veil is both multiple and historically contingent, its meaning has been subject to callenges and negotiations to which Muslim women themselves have been, and have become even more so today, a major party. As much as for some Muslim women the veil has become an oppressive requirement, for others its observance is what makes it possible to be part of modern public sociability. See full text (pdf format) - Source: Monthly Review
The CEDAW is made up of 16 substantial and 14 procedural articles. It is a surprisingly significant convention because it deliberately goes beyond conventional equality approaches and puts forward “positive measures” to promote women, and contains active political and legal steps towards gender equality. See WIDE information and analysis (pdf format). See also WIDE - CEDAW Campaign and Blog .
The International Civil Society Forum (FISC, for its Portuguese acronym) is an international event on Youth and Adult Education, to be held in Belém, capital of the state of Pará, Brazil, between November 28th and 30th, 2009. This is a plural space for reflection and formulation of proposals that seeks to promote the exchange of experiences and organize the process of incidence in the VI International Conference on Adult Education. See full information.
October 31, 2009 - At the NGO CSW Roundtable meeting on the Economic Commission for Europe (ECE) review of the 15th anniversary of the Beijing Platform for Action women gathered to develop recommendations that reflected the needs and experiences of women in the region.The two day NGO meeting took place in Geneva from October 30-31, 2009 and focused on “the challenges of gender equality in the context of the economic and financial crisis.” (more…)
DAWN’s Supplement on ICPD+15: ICPD+15 at the Crossroads: Health, Rights and Citizenship; Advocating for Full Sexual and Reproductive Health and Rights: Still and Uphill Battle; Sexual and Reproductive Health and Rights and Global Finance - Crisis or Opportunity?; ICPD Agenda Remains Fragmented. See pdf: DAWN’s Supplement on ICPD+15
The Honduran crisis as reported by Honduran Feminists in Resistance
On June 28, the democratically elected President of Honduras, Manuel Zelaya, was forcibly removed from power and exiled to Costa Rica by the Honduran military in a coup d’état. On September 21, Zelaya returned to Honduras with the support of the government of Brazil and has taken refuge in the Brazilian Embassy where thousands of people from around the country have amassed to show their support for a return to democracy. In response, the de facto government deployed the police and Armed Forces to control the demonstrations resulting in violent attacks against the thousands of peaceful protesters. Below are some of the highlights received from the women of the Honduran Feminists in Resistance who have been on the frontlines of pro-democracy actions and resistance since the coup occurred three months ago. (more…)
By John W. Foster, researcher at the North-South Institute
Crowded into Monumental Baptist Church, several hundred youth, community folk and activists spent three hours with Nobel Prize winner Joe Stiglitz, Steelworkers leader Leo Gerard, Washington-based Emira Woods, Enrique Daza of the Hemispheric Social Alliance, Carl Redwood Junior of the Hill District Consensus Group, Rev. John Welsh of the Pittsburgh theological school, Tammy Ban Luu of the Labour/Community Strategy Center of Los Angeles and others. On the “hill”, just down the street from the tent “village” and in one of Pittsburgh’s “no go” areas (according to our taxi driver), the atmosphere was charged with enthusiasm.
Source: India Resource Center
