Jomo Kwame Sundaram was United Nations Assistant Secretary-General for Economic Development. Rob Vos is Director of Agricultural Development Economics at FAO and was Director of Development Policy Analysis at the UN Secretariat.

Seniors in conversation at Jongmyo Park, in downtown Seoul, Republic of Korea. UN Photo/Kibae Park

KUALA LUMPUR and ROME, Oct 1 2016 (IPS) – October 1st is the International Day of Older Persons. Just another day? Perhaps, but it should remind us that the world’s population is ageing, brought about by the combined effects of declining mortality and fertility rates and longer longevity. By mid-century, one out of five people …

Despite eradication and education efforts, drug use, especially heroin, remains rampant in parts of Myanmar. Photo: . Source:

ROME/VIENNA, Mar 7 2017 (IPS) – Women and girls comprise one-third of global drug users yet are only one-fifth of those receiving treatment, a UN-Backed independent expert body warned.

Citing a significant rise over the past year in the number of women dying from drug overdoses globally, the Vienna-based () warned that women and girls comprise one-third of global drug users.

“Yet [they] are only one-fifth of those receiving treatment, as significant systemic, structural, social, cultural and personal barriers affect women’s abil…

Rural women sell mango and sweet potato jam at the food processing shop in Bantantinnting, Senegal. Credit: UN Photo/Evan Schneider

ROME, May 26 2017 (IPS) – Women constitute the largest share of informal traders in Africa–about 70 per cent in Southern Africa and more than half in other parts of this vast continent made up of 54 states, home to over 1,200 billion people.

Informal cross-border trading, in which transactions are not compliant with local tax and other rules, accounts for a large share – between – of employment in sub-Saharan Africa, says a new United Nations specialised report.

Africa s vast but informal cross-border trade can contribute…

Over the next decade, China will be home to the world’s largest elderly population, while India — because of its demographic dividend – will require jobs for the world’s largest workforce. Credit: Neeta Lal/IPS

SEOUL/NEW DELHI, Oct 28 2017 (IPS) – Experts on population ageing converged in Seoul this week to discuss how to make reaching one s golden years a happy and sustainable process across the world.

They gathered at the Global Symposium on Ageing 2017. T…

Siddharth Chatterjee is the United Nations Resident Coordinator, Kenya. Radhika Shah, is Co-President Stanford Angels & Entrepreneurs

Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, Director-General of the World Health Organisation (WHO) pledged his full support for the delivery of universal healthcare within the next five years, one of the pillars of President Uhuru Kenyatta’s Big Four Action plan. Credit: State House

NAIROBI, Kenya, Feb 5 2018 (IPS) – Africa’s quest for health continues to be held back by a combination of factors such as natural disasters and pandemics, prevailing high rates of communicable and rising incidence of non-communicable diseases, sedentary lifestyles…

Tianyi Luo is a senior manager with the Aqueduct Project at the Global Water Program at World Resources Institute.

WASHINGTON DC, May 11 2018 (IPS) – Most power generation, whether to cool steam in thermoelectric plants or power turbines for hydropower. And the global demand for both water and electricity will continue to increase substantially in the coming decades.

Although growth is generally a good thing for the economy, it challenges nations—particularly —to better manage their limited water resources and invest in the right energy systems.

Power generation from solar photovoltaic (PV) and wind is clean and requires zero or little water use. These renewable forms of energy can help countries meet their increased demand for electricity without adding carbon…

Wendell C Balderas is Media and Communications Manager, Southeast Asia Tobacco Control Alliance (SEATCA)

Tobacco pickers carry leaves to one of the sheds where they are cured on the Rosario plantation in San Juan y Martínez, in Vuelta Abajo, a western Cuban region famous for producing premium cigars. Credit: Jorge Luis Baños/IPS

BANGKOK, Thailand, Nov 20 2018 (IPS) – Thailand is set to become the first Asian country to introduce standardized packaging of tobacco. On 14 November 2018, the Thai National Committee on Tobacco Control approved the Ministry of Health Regulation that requires cigarettes in Thailand to be sold in packaging stripped of the fancy, colorful and un…

Manoj K. Pandey is Lecturer in Economics, Australian National University; Vani S. Kulkarni is Lecturer in Sociology, University of Pennsylvania; and Raghav Gaiha is (Hon. ) Professorial Research Fellow, Global Development Institute, University of Manchester

Canberra, Philadelphia and Manchester, Mar 20 2019 (IPS) – Depression is often distinguished from other non-communicable diseases or NCDs (e.g., cancer, diabetes, cardio-vascular diseases, hypertension) because of the stigma attached to it. Among other consequences, those suffering from depression are often denied access to medical care. Indeed, the latter is an outcome of interaction between supply of and demand for medical care. On the provider side, stigmatizing attitudes by service providers are identified as a barrier to a…

Armida Salsiah Alisjahbana is Under-Secretary-General of the United Nations and Executive Secretary of the United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (ESCAP).

BANGKOK, Thailand, Aug 28 2019 (IPS) – The past five years have been the hottest on record in Asia and the Pacific. Unprecedented heatwaves have swept across our region, cascading into slow onset disasters such as drought. Yet heat is only part of the picture. Tropical cyclones have struck new, unprepared parts of our region and devastatingly frequent floods have ensued. In Iran, these affected 10 million people this year and displaced 500,000 of which half were children. Bangladesh is experiencing its fourth wave of flooding in 2019. Last year, the state of Kerala in India faced the worst floods …

Feroza Begum, Leprosy activist. Credit: Rafiqul Islam / IPS

DHAKA, Bangladesh, Dec 12 2019 (IPS) – When Feroza Begum was first diagnosed with leprosy in 2006, it felt as though she had been struck by a thunderbolt due to the deep-seated prejudice in her society that the disease is a curse from Allah (God).

“ I was affected with leprosy disease, nobody accepted me (in the past). They had made me isolated. I cannot forget the plight I suffered at that time. Even my family was broken as I was left by my husband,” she told IPS. The 35-year old says she was ostracized and made to feel like a lesser person.

Feroza travelled about 200 kilometres from Bogura d…