Interviews

“The longer we wait for the substantial reduction of emissions, the more carbon dioxide we need to remove from the atmosphere, said Jonas Pasztor, Executive Director for the Carnegie Climate Geoengineering Governance Initiative (C2G2), adding that if the world doesn’t act fast, the process will be not only “more challenging, but also more expensive”.

Mr. Pasztor highlighted the fact that the world reached a point where the reduction of emissions is no longer sufficient.

“Agriculture is the backbone of the African economy”, according to the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) and combined with the challenges of a growing population, the organization is now joining forces with the African Union to develop a way of mechanizing farming throughout the continent in a sustainable way.

More than 75 percent of farmers in sub-Saharan Africa use only hand tools, and with “zero hunger” the target by 2025, the UN African Union has pledged to banish the hand hoe.

It’s a little-known fact that soldiers from every African country took part in the First World War, which ended exactly 100 years ago last month.

To remember them – and those from even further afield who also made a major contribution – an exhibition at the UN in Geneva hosted by the Mission of Belgium has provided a fascinating insight into their experiences on the front line in Northern Europe from 1914-18.

Since late August 2017, more than 725,000 mainly-Muslim Rohingya have left Rakhine state, across the border into southern Bangladesh, fleeing widespread and systematic ethnic violence.

But they left behind at home a ‘vast land not being cultivated’, with an estimated 70% reduction in agricultural production just in Maungdaw District alone, said the UN Development Programme’s Regional Director for Asia and the Pacific, Haoliang Xu, in a recent interview with UN News.

2018 has been “terrifying” for Yemenis, who have suffered from a conflict characterised by indiscriminate military attacks, and the worst humanitarian crisis in the world.

Food insecurity has become a major issue in Gaza and the West Bank, not because food is hard to find, but because hard-pressed families cannot afford to buy it.

That’s according to Stephen Kearney, the World Food Programme’s (WFP) Representative and WFP Country Director in Palestine.

The message is simple: better data saves lives.

At the highest levels of the UN, it is understood that digital tools play a crucial role in ensuring that aid gets to the people who need it most.

Until we tackle the issues presently driving 258 million people to leave their home countries, the world’s refugee crisis “will not stop,” said the President of the UN General Assembly, María Fernanda Espinosa on Monday.

“No one in their right mind” wants to flee their home, she said, adding that climate-change, economic challenges, and discrimination are pushing people to seek refuge.

Gaza Hospitals unable to feed their own patients, elective surgeries postponed for years – those are just a few examples of what the UN’s Deputy Special Coordinator for the Middle East, Jamie McGoldrick, describes as a “collapsing system in freefall”.

On Monday, he issued an appeal as part of the Humanitarian Response Plan for next year, for $350 million, to help 1.4 million people in the most need, across the occupied Palestinian territories, chiefly the the Gaza Strip.

A $5.5 billion appeal has been launched by the UN to help 5.6 million Syrian refugees and millions more people hosting them in neighbouring countries.

In an interview with UN News, Samuel Rizk from the UN Development Programme (UNDP), explained that although around 30,000 Syrians have gone home so far this year, the overwhelming majority still need help in Turkey, Lebanon, Jordan, Egypt and Iraq.