Johannesburg, 23 November 2010 (IRIN) - Africa has struggled to make accurate and detailed predictions of the impact of climate change on its countries, but the Coordinated Regional Climate Downscaling Experiment (CORDEX) which began earlier in 2010, will see the continent take a "quantum leap" in climate change projection, says Bruce Hewitson, the project's Africa coordinator.

CORDEX, an initiative by the World Climate Research Programme, will help downscale the global climate model climate change projections being prepared for the next assessment report of the

19 Nov 2010 17:23:57 GMT

Source: Reuters

By Ibrahim Mshelizza

MAIDUGURI, Nigeria, Nov 19 (Reuters) - Gunmen opened fire during Friday prayers at a mosque in a northeastern Nigeria, killing at least two people in the latest in a series of attacks by a radical Islamist sect.

Three people were shot at during the prayers at Gomari ward in Maiduguri, killing two, while a third person was receiving treatment at the University of Maiduguri Teaching Hospital.

The attacks have raised fears that Boko Haram, a radical Islamist sect behind an uprising last year that led to

Despite many efforts to ease Nigerian farmers' access to quality and affordable fertilizer, it remains a key challenge for Nigerian agricultural policymakers As a result, the Nigerian government is experimenting with implementing a fertilizer voucher scheme, which is intended to improve on the current fertilizer distribution system. This brief analyzes the application of input vouchers in the Nigerian states of Kano and Taraba in 2009. It explores the effect of the voucher program on the quantity and quality of fertilizer received; the timeliness of receipt, and the price paid by respondents.

ABUJA, 12 November 2010-Today the First Lady of Nigeria, Dame Patience Jonathan, UNICEF and other partners marked World Pneumonia Day at the State House in Abuja as part of a global movement to fight a disease that in Nigeria alone is responsible for the death of some 200,000 children every year.

Pneumonia threatens mostly the very young and the very old. It is the leading infectious cause of death in children under five years of age in every region of the world, killing 2 million every year. Because it tends to strike children who are poor, malnourished

The majority of Nigeria's smallholder farmers are often too poor to employ modern tools, such as tractors and plows, even with substantial government support. In this respect, an agricultural mechanization policy would need effective targeting with regard to particular farming activities and types of farmers for which different forms of mechanization efforts could be directed. Key knowledge gaps for such targeting in Nigeria include the important roles of farm power1 in comparison with other improved agricultural inputs, such as improved seeds and fertilizer, and the prospects

By Aminu Abubakar (AFP)

GOMBE, Nigeria - Fatima Idi straps her two-year-old to her back and begins a long trek every week that takes her to a place where Nigeria's tragic struggle with child malnutrition is on full display.

"I breastfed my child for 18 months before I weaned him, but he kept growing thinner and sicker," Idi said at a feeding centre amidst the weak cries of frail children. She walks about 15 kilometres (about 10 miles) to get here.

Nigeria has one of the world's highest number of malnourished children, and the problem is particularly concentrated

Executive summary

It is estimated that only about three percent of the cultivated area (0.9 hectares) in Nigeria use water management techniques, of which approximately 0.2 million hectares are irrigated with equipment such as pumps and tube wells. Of the cultivated area that benefits from water management, more than 95 percent uses farmer-managed small-scale irrigation schemes. The cultivated area in Nigeria that adopts irrigation techniques can therefore expand rapidly, if the constraints to private irrigation are addressed to help meet farmers' demand for small-scale private