Archive for October 2011
Population has become a dirty word. It is a word that many of my predecessors and counterparts have, some might say understandably, steered clear of for decades. That's because it is normally followed by words like 'control' and 'explosion'. It conjures images of forced euthanasia and sterilisation at one extreme or famine, poverty, disease and [...]
This month, the seven billionth human being will be born. It may be a baby boy or a baby girl, it will probably be born in the developing world, and chances are good that this baby's mother will suffer complications or even a severe birth injury like obstetric fistula. Up to 45,000 women do, every [...]
Later this year a baby will be born - probably on 31 October - and the birth will mark the moment when the world's population reaches seven billion. The birthday may be emblematic, but the demographic marker it symbolises is startlingly real - there are now twice as many people alive on earth as there were [...]
It was a great pleasure to be in London recently to launch the last phase of a campaign that is wiping Guinea worm disease from the face of the earth. This devastating parasitic disease affects some of the poorest and most neglected people on the planet and is one that I and my colleagues at [...]
Thinking about what to blog on the theme of food for Blog Action Day, I considered what cooking has to do with poverty. Many people would point to the role of dietary habits in tackling malnutrition, and they'd be right. But another crucial link, now starting to get the attention it deserves, is between indoor [...]
A few years ago, my grandparents came to visit my husband and me in London. It was a Sunday, so we welcomed them with a lovely, organic roast chicken. Unfortunately, it didn’t go down too well, particularly with my (now late) grandmother. And this is why. My grandmother comes from a beautiful part of Kenya, on [...]
Eating poulet à la moambe – one of Congo's famous dishes – at the weekend, it occurred to me that I tend to spend an unhealthy amount of time thinking about and enjoying food. So I really welcome the chance that World Food Day gives me to think about food in a less greedy and [...]
So many of us taking part in Blog Action Day this year will have seen the Horn of Africa food crisis unfold on our computers or televisions. Yet it is difficult to get a true sense of the scale and urgency of this disaster via a screen. What I have seen firsthand on the ground [...]
People from every corner of the globe will come together online today as part of Blog Action Day. This digital gathering (which also marks World Food Day) will raise the alarm on the ongoing food crisis in Ethiopia, Kenya and Somalia – the worst in a generation. Right now, across the Horn of Africa, millions [...]
I've been reflecting on the changes to people's lives in Afghanistan, particularly women, over the last ten years of UK involvement there. In the UK, women take it for granted that when we have a baby we will get good prenatal support, give birth in a clean hospital, that our baby will survive, and that we [...]
