COP17/CMP7: Durban Climate Change Conference - November 2011
The 17th Conference of the Parties (COP17) to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) and the 7th Session of the Conference of the Parties serving as the meeting of the parties (CMP7) to the Kyoto Protocol, will be held in the sunny city of Durban, South Africa.
The United Nations Climate Change Conference, Durban 2011, will bring together representatives of the world's governments, international organizations and civil society. The discussions will seek to advance, in a balanced fashion, the implementation of the Convention and the Kyoto Protocol, as well as the Bali Action Plan, agreed at COP 13 in 2007, and the Cancun Agreements, reached at COP 16 last December.
World Population Day 2011: The World at 7 Billion
World Population Day will kick off the 7 Billion Actions campaign.
The tremendous interest generated by the Day of 5 Billion on 11 July 1987 led to the establishment of World Population Day as an annual event. For more than 20 years, 11 July has been an occasion to mark the significance of population trends and related issues.
This year, as the world population is expected to surpass 7 billion, UNFPA and partners are launching a campaign called 7 Billion Actions. It aims to engage people, spur commitment and spark actions related to the opportunities and challenges presented by a world of 7 billion people.
In many ways a world of 7 billion is an achievement: Globally, people are living longer and healthier lives, and couples are choosing to have fewer children. However, meeting the needs of current and future generations presents daunting challenges as our numbers continue to increase.
Whether we can live together equitably on a healthy planet will depend on the choices and decisions we make now. In a world of 7 billion people, and counting, we need to count each other.
World Health Day 2011
Promoting sustainable health reinforces and advances human and global development. Epidemics and infectious diseases -- HIV/AIDS, malaria, tuberculosis, cholera, pandemic influenza, and many others - are affecting entire populations at the social, economic and even political level. The implications for development are so notorious that health-related issues are becoming a policy focus of governments around the globe.
World Health Day will be commemorated on 7 April 2011, and will focus on 'antimicrobial resistance and its global spread'. Antimicrobial resistance threatens the continued effectiveness of many medicines used today to treat the sick, while at the same time it risks jeopardizing important advances being made against major infectious killers.
The World Health Organisation (WHO) has called on governments and stakeholders to implement policies and practices needed to prevent and counter the emergence of highly resistant superbugs, and to also provide appropriate care to those seriously affected by these microbes.
World Water Day - 22 March 2011
World Water Day is a global day of ceremony and action to illustrate notice to the position that water plays in our world and lives. The United Nations General Assembly chosen the first World Water Day in 1992 to focus on dangerous irrigation issues for developed countries. United Nations and the international society respect the day and attention an exacting theme on water every year on March 22.
Quick information
There are over 1 billion people across the world; they did not have pure water.
Water-related virus is the primary cause of fatality in the world.
There are many children died with water-related virus.
United Nations Climate Change Conference: Mexico COP16
The purpose of the UNFCCC is to attain stabilisation of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere to a level that prevents dangerous interferences with the climate system. After the less than successful COP15, Mexico has been assigned the task to create an environment where a legally binding agreement would be more viable.
World AIDS Day: Universal Access and Human Rights
Started on 1 December 1988, World AIDS Day is about raising money, increasing awareness, fighting prejudice and improving education. The World AIDS Day theme for 2010 is 'Universal Access and Human Rights'. World AIDS Day is important in reminding people that HIV has not gone away, and that there are many things still to be done.
According to UNAIDS estimates, there are now 33.4 million people living with HIV, including 2.1 million children. During 2008 some 2.7 million people became newly infected with the virus and an estimated 2 million people died from AIDS. Around half of all people who become infected with HIV do so before they are 25 and are killed by AIDS before they are 35.
The vast majority of people with HIV and AIDS live in lower- and middle-income countries. But HIV today is a threat to men, women and children on all continents around the world.
International Day for the Eradication of Poverty, 17 October 2010
The International Day for the Eradication of Poverty is a global observance day to promote people’s awareness of the need to eradicate poverty and destitution worldwide, particularly in developing countries.
Since 1993, the United Nations’ (UN) International Day for the Eradication of Poverty is observed on October 17 each year. Various non-government organizations and community charities support this day by actively calling for country leaders and governments to make the fight against poverty a central part of foreign policy.
In the year 2000, world leaders committed themselves to cutting by half the number of people living in extreme poverty by the year 2015.
SADC Multi-stakeholder Water Dialogue
The SADC Multi-stakeholder Water Dialogue is an activity under the IWRM Awareness Creation Component of the SADC–DANIDA Regional Water Sector Programme which is a programme in the Regional Strategic Action Plan of the SADC Water Division in the Directorate of Infrastructure Services.
Africa Day is the annual commemoration on May 25 of the 1963 founding of the Organisation of African Unity (OAU). On this day, leaders of 30 of the 32 independent African states signed a founding charter in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. In 1991, the OAU established the African Economic Community (AEC), and in 2002 the OAU established its own successor, the African Union (AU or UA). However, the name and date of Africa Day has been retained as a celebration of African unity.
Bioenergy Markets Africa in Maputo, Mozambique - 11-13 May 2010
Bioenergy Markets Africa is happening on 11-13 May 2010 in the Hotel Cardoso in Maputo, Mozambique. Over 150 bioenergy professionals will be attending to debate, discuss and develop bioenergy policies and the African biofuel, biogas and biopower markets.
Hosted by the Mozambique Ministry of Energy, this high level congress is the major meeting place in 2010 for all regional and international bioenergy players.
NEW KEYNOTE SPEAKER ANNOUNCED: Carlos Manuel Pedroso Neves Cristo, Chief of Staff of the Brazilian Ministry of Development, Industry and Foreign Trade will bring to Africa Brazil’s experience in developing a leading biofuels market.
MIAGI's 10 Years Anniversary Celebrations! JHB Linder Auditorium, on 1 May @ 20h00 - MIAGI Youth Orchestra & Youth BigBand
This concert is the culmination of the annual MIAGI Youth Orchestra and Youth BigBand (MYO & MYBB) course at HeronBridge College. The 117 MYO & MYBB members are young musicians between 15 and 25 years of age from all strata of South African society. There is no cost to individual participants who have been selected.The stunning MYO & MYBB in concert is an opportunity not to be missed, at least not if you believe the feed-back from their sold out performance at the Berlin Konzerthaus during a highly successful tour to Germany in August 2009.
South Africa - Deputy Minister Ebrahim to attend the SADC Council of Ministers. 24-26 February 2010, Kinshasa, DRC
International Relations and Cooperation Deputy Minister Ebrahim I Ebrahim will on Wednesday, 24 February 2010, depart for Kinshasa, Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) to attend the Southern African Development Community (SADC) Council of Ministers meeting from 25 to 26 February 2010.
South Africa will participate in the SADC Council of Ministers' meeting within the context of strengthening SADC which remains the primary vehicle to achieve regional development and integration. In addition SADC, as one of the Regional Economic Communities on the continent, is regarded as a building block in the consolidation of the African Agenda and wider continental integration.
The Council of Ministers meeting will be preceded by the Standing Committee of Senior officials and the Finance Committee meeting. Accordingly, the SADC Council of Ministers' session will consider the following:
The Regional Food Security Situation,
Establishment of the Centre for Coordination of Agricultural Research and Development (CCARDESA),
Review the Application of the SADC Quota System,
The establishment of the Zambezi Watercourse Commission, and
A report of the Finance Committee.
It is expected that the Council of Ministers will discuss the Implications of the global economic crisis on the region, Institutional arrangements for the SADC Economic Partnership Agreement (EPA); a report on the EPA Processes; progress made in the Eastern and Southern Africa and East African Community EPA and the proposed COMESA-EAC-SADC Tripartite FTA as well as the SADC monetary Integration.
Deputy Minister Ebrahim and delegation will return to South Africa on Friday, 26 February 2010.
United Nations Climate Change Conference: 7-18 December 2009, Copenhagen, Denmark
The city of Copenhagen, Denmark will be hosting the 15th United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP15) at Bella Centre from the 7th to the 18th of December 2009. The conference will be the largest international political conference ever held in Denmark with approximately 15,000 participants from 192 countries representing governments, the business community, and civil society.
The meeting seeks to find solutions to the rise in global average air and ocean temperatures, widespread melting of snow and ice, and rising sea levels due to increased emissions of greenhouse gases such as carbon dioxide.
"The world is facing a major challenge. We cannot continue using fossil fuels the way we do today. Scientists have laid out the risks we face and it has become clearer than ever that now is the time to take serious action on climate change. If we do not act today, the opportunity will not only slip out of our hands but it will also become much more expensive to carry out the necessary low-carbon transition in the future", said H.E. Connie Hedegaard, Minister for the United Nations Climate Change Conference, Copenhagen 2009.
