MBABANE –As the festive season approaches, the United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) will be celebrating - along with 97,000 orphans and 33,000 other vulnerable children - with the resumption of food distributions to 1,600 Swaziland neighbourhood care points. The service was disrupted earlier this year due to lack of funding.

Tropical cyclone Evan hit Samoa and Fiji on 13 and 16 December. As a category 4 storm, Evan caused significant damage to homes and infrastructure on both islands.

This summary note is an excerpt from the chapter on Swaziland that will appear in the peer-reviewed IFPRI monograph, Southern African Agriculture and Climate Change: A Comprehensive Analysis.

The research, produced in collaboration with scientists from the countries studied, is based on scenarios from economic global climate change models, and takes into account estimates of each country’s economic and population growth. Each study includes a set of policy recommendations.

1) Moisture deficits remain following a mid-season dry spell that occurred in early November and recent drier than average conditions. With a shortened recovery period in the next several weeks, this could result in a deterioration of pastoral and agro-pastoral conditions, and possible crop yield reductions by the end of season throughout parts of Ethiopia, Somalia, Kenya and eastern Tanzania.

DOHA, Dec 4 2012 (IPS) - Qatar may be one of the richest countries in the world, but it has something in common with its African counterparts – food insecurity.

This Middle-Eastern oil-producing nation imports 90 percent of its food because it is a dryland country.

“Food is very expensive here,” an immigrant Ghanaian taxi driver who opted to remain anonymous told IPS.

POSTED BY MAKILA JAMES / DECEMBER 01, 2012

GENEVA – The Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria announced new results on Thursday showing a substantial increase in the number of people being treated for HIV and in the prevention of mother-to-child transmission of the virus.

The results show an increase of 900,000 in the number of people receiving antiretroviral therapy since the end of 2011, taking the total now getting treatment under programs supported by the Global Fund to 4.2 million.

For Khumbu Shiba, who has been HIV-positive for three years, WFP’s food and nutrition assistance has meant all the difference. Before, she was barely able to care for her family, and felt very weak. Now, she has regained her health and has even started her own business.

SWAZILAND – Khumbu Shiba,* 60, has struggled with HIV for many years with little assistance from others.

In 2004, her husband died after having been sick for a long time. Although she did not know at the time that her husband had been HIV-positive, Mrs. Shiba herself was diagnosed with the virus in 2009.

KEY MESSAGES

The 2012/2013 rainfall season is starting normally in most areas in the region.

Several areas in the region are starting the season with below-average vegetation conditions.

Forecasts call for below-normal rains in several of the areas affected by last season’s drought.