The report , ‘Climate Change, Water and Food Security’ by the Food and Agriculture Organization, warned that temperatures could increase by an estimated 4 degrees Celsius by 2080 and lead to a major decrease in water availability and create more regular droughts. Consequently, water supplies in key producing areas could become significantly reduced. Farmers in Sub Saharan Africa are likely to become highly affected by decreased water availability as they do not have the means to develop techniques that could help them manage their water resources.

Assistant Director General for Natural Resources Alexander Mueller, warned: ‘Both the livelihoods of rural communities as well as the food security of city populations are at risk.’

The findings of the report are essential and came during the United Nations Climate Talks in Bonn from the 6th to the 17th of June. NGOs are now campaigning for climate deals to ensure that the world’s population will have enough food.

Oxfam’s international climate adviser, Tim Gore, said ‘this is a comprehensive report with frightening conclusions. Climate change is already making life harder for poor farmers and, left unchecked, will devastate our future food supply.’

He added: ‘The negotiators sitting in the climate change talks in Bonn right now should take notice. We need less talk and more action if a warming world is to feed itself.”

The UN report found that farmers can use less water and improve irrigation by planting earlier or later than they usually do. Crops and production could get better by shifting to soil moisture conservation practices. Also, by planting deep-rooted crops, farmers would be able to use available soil moisture.

However, modest farmers in developing countries, who already produce crops below their own potential, will struggle to adopt such strategies because they do not have access to such funding, the report stated.

Mueller said: ‘The rural poor, who are the most vulnerable, are likely to be disproportionately affected.’

Farmers on the African continent are already being hit hard by climate change. The rising temperatures will cause crop yields to fall, the NGO Oxfam warned. There are also concerns that changes in seasons will make it difficult for farmers to understand when to sow, cultivate, and harvest.

As agriculture is causing almost a third of greenhouse gas emissions, Oxfam’s campaign, Grow stated that ‘it’s time to help poor communities adapt to the changes that are already happening, by agreeing exactly where the money promised at the ’09 Copenhagen UN climate summit will come from. It’s time to invest in small-scale farming in developing countries and in green, clean energy.’

It is graduation season, and one recent graduate, a Ford Foundation International Fellow, who recently completed his International Legal Studies Program at American University’s Washington College of Law, recently stood taller than all the other graduates, at least in my mind, as he received his Master of Laws degree. However, in reality; disabled Ugandan lawyer, Med Ssengooba doesn’t stand at all. In fact his mobility is effected by a wheel chair. I was fortunate to meet him at an event titled Challenges Of Living With A Disability In Africa: A Legal Approach organized by The African Justice Initiative, a group created to highlight, raise awareness and create discourse on African issues from a legal perspective headed by Nana Yaa Anyane-Yeboa at his school, where he spoke about the challenges of being a Person(s) With Disabilities (PWD) in Uganda. Below are excerpts.

Who is Med Ssengooba?

I was born in 1981 into a very large typical Ugandan family. During this period, polio was at its height in Uganda and the situation was exacerbated by political unrest. In 1984 at the age of 3, I contracted the disease and suffered from the resultant paralysis and hence became a PWD whose mobility is wheel chair dependent.

After years of treatment, I began my education at seven years old, which was late compared to other children, but at the time there were a few nursery schools that would accept children with disabilities. I later attended a special needs school for children with physical disabilities for my primary education. Studying in a specialized school seemed better to me because the physical environment was more accessible, and I had a no questions to answer from fellow students as we were all PWD. Receiving a secondary and university education was very challenging, as I had to cope with a very disability unfriendly environment, including teachers with little or no special education skills and some who seemed bothered by having a disabled student in their classroom.

As a student with a physical disability, and a wheelchair user, my education has been hampered by many factors beyond my school fees, many of which my scholarships couldn’t help. I have experienced several types of disability based discrimination. For example, I almost lost a year of high school because schools weren’t interested in admitting a wheelchair bound student who had better grades than most of their students. Access to school facilities has always been very difficult and sometimes impossible for me. Most schools don’t have handicap accessible toilets, meaning I’d have to restrain myself for the day. Classrooms, libraries and dormitories weren’t any better. I faced reoccurring accessibility and negative behavioural situations, which always carry extra financial and psychological costs all through my undergraduate education till I received my post graduate diploma. I cannot measure the impact such situations like writing exams without being given extra time, and being lifted on steps by kind but untrained people and the associated risks of injury involved have had on my academic grades. These inconveniences caused by very limited accommodation of PWD questions the saying, “Disability is not inability,” because they directly impact one’s grades, which are subsequently used to measure one’s intellectual abilities.

My experiences as a PWD and an advocate for disability rights have exposed me to numerous human rights violations that PWD endure, most of which are unchallenged. Our society excludes and construes PWD in a demeaning way. PWD are victims of myths and superstitions, are objects of ridicule and are branded with demeaning names like “Kasiru,” which in Luganda, the Ugandan language, literately means a deaf person, but loosely translated means “stupid.”

It should be noted that like in many other parts of the world, a number of positive changes are taking effect to positively impact the lives of PWD in Africa. These changes have seen a few PWD like me acquire an education and assume leadership positions. However, there still remains much to be done to improve the lives of PWD at the family, society, state and national levels. Such combined efforts have had proven successful results. For example, in my case, my parents sponsored and facilitated my education till I finished high school. I then won a government scholarship for my undergraduate law degree and a Ford Foundation Scholarship for my Master of Laws degree. This shows the relevance of coordinated efforts between different actors, which if adopted by all sectors including the employment and health sectors, independent living will become a reality for many more PWD, which will in turn positively impact the nation.

What are the realities of PWD in Africa?

I am an attorney in Uganda, but I am an exception not the norm. In Uganda, as in many other parts of Africa, disabilities are associated with evil spirits, curses, and punishment for the wrong deeds of one’s parents or ancestors. There’s little understanding that a PWD is a human being who is equal to everyone else in society and is entitled to all the same rights, privileges, and opportunities. PWD are often totally dependent on others who often don’t treat them well. They usually have no means to effectively manage their disability and the related needs including mobility devices, medication and regular medical treatment. Many PWD have no capacity to decide their fate and are abandoned in the rural areas, where they stay poor, helpless, neglected and betrayed by their family and community members who should protect them.

Generally, PWD in Africa lack access to public and government facilities including health centers, schools and legal centers like police stations and courts. The majority of PWD are uneducated and vocationally unskilled, so they are mostly unemployed. Those who do receive an opportunity to earn an income are destined for menial jobs. This partly explains the large numbers of disabled beggars on the streets of many capital cities of African countries.

PWD are often left homeless and live on the streets where they are even more vulnerable. Most endure unwanted conflicts, assaults and batteries. Female PWD also endure sexual exploitation. As a result of rape and defilement, many have contacted HIV/AIDS. Unwanted pregnancies have also resulted from such situations and the additional burden of raising fatherless children alone is added to their already difficult lives.

What are current disability trends in Africa?

Fortunately, international civil society organizations have prioritized PWD by targeting it either directly or indirectly in many programs they support in Africa. The trend is now formation of associations and partnerships such as Disabled Persons Organizations (DPOs), Community Based Organizations (CBOs) and International partnerships with donors, the community and advocacy based agencies. For example, the non-profit organization where I’m an administrator, Legal Action for Persons with Disabilities (LAPD), was receiving financial and technical support in its legal aid service provision to PWD in Uganda from different actors from the US, UK, and Denmark.

Legislative and policy measures on disability are currently under way. Countries like Uganda, South Africa, Ghana, and Tanzania, have either enacted laws on disability or restructured their domestic laws to reflect disability needs. Numerous policies and strategies have been generated to guide disability work in several African countries. Many countries have included and captured disability performance data because of the Millennium Development Goals, which has necessitated the need to report to numerous human rights committees and other groups.

International Conventions such as the United Nations (UN) Convention on the Rights of PWD (CRPD) have guided laws on disabilities in countries like Uganda and Tanzania. While a lot still needs to be done to implement and fine-tune these laws to reflect the real intentions of the authors, there’s now a ray of hope. The CRPD has led to the creation of numerous disability rights agencies sponsoring disability work inAfrica and some offer technical support. They include Disability Rights Fund (DRF),   Open Society Institute’s (OSI) Disability Rights Initiative (DRI), and International Disability Alliance’s (IDA) CRPD Forum, all of which are targeting effective and full implementation of human rights enhancement for PWD worldwide based on the UNCRPD. Also, there are now enhanced conceptualizations of disabilities from a human rights perspective, and national human rights commissions have established units on disabilities in Uganda, Nigeria, South Africa and Ghana.

What type of sensitization is needed?

Changing wrong perceptions about PWD is absolutely necessary. Understanding disability from a human rights perspective as being similar to a patient with care needs and utilizing suitable approaches in handling disability concerns is necessary. Methods including the media, community outreaches, and empowerment of PWD and their care givers can be utilized to achieve sensitization goals. Also, human rights violations of PWD should deemed unacceptable and criminalized.

What are the effects of the wars on PWD in Uganda?

There have been several political unrests. The most recent was Lord Resistance Army led conflict in different parts of northern Uganda which lasted from 1987 to 2007 creating close to a million internally displaced persons (IDPs) that were subsequently constantly raided by rebels.

One of the greatest effects of this war was the increase in the number of PWD making the challenge insurmountable. Many victims “lucky” enough to be alive suffered physical, sensory, psychological, and emotional trauma, including loss of limbs, sight and hearing due to attacks with weapons and land mines. Physical trauma is often addressed first, however, if mental trauma is left untreated, it may lead to mental illnesses and other post-traumatic stress syndrome disorders. Unfortunately, people with mental illness aren’t often counted as victims of war because their scars aren’t visible. Also, the confinement of PWD in camps where some are still stranded despite the ongoing resettlement programs is another issue with some having increased vulnerability because access to basic services like food and water became more challenging as they can’t reach relief centres.

Many women with disabilities were sexually assaulted. In addition to coping with their severe disabilities, they also had to carry pregnancies to term and be delivered of babies by unidentified rapist fathers that they had to raise alone in a war zone when they clearly have no means to do so. Many acquired HIV/AIDS and access to medicine was and is still very difficult for them. They experienced triple marginalization as women with disabilities living with HIV/AIDS, in addition to the challenges of being in a war torn developing country.

What is being done to arrest the problem?

Unfortunately, even now, the current situation is still bad. However, organizations like CARE, AVIS, World Vision, and CARITAS are providing basic support in terms of food and related necessities. Many women with disabilities also lack mobility devices like wheel chairs, white canes, and hearing devices, which restricts their mobility. This means reaching out to service providers is very complicated or even impossible for them. For example, many PWD still live in camps; and they can’t physically walk to where food is being shared to get their portions. A female PWD I encountered who has 10 kids said she can’t physically walk to receive the portions she should for her and her 10 kids, and even when she does, it’s not enough.

What is being done to resolve the problems? There’s talk about resettlement, however, being in Northern Uganda and interacting with these victims made me realize that the resettlement efforts may not be productive because these victims can’t go home. There’s no thought or effort being put into what these victims will go home to because water, wheel chairs, schools and health care facilities are not being provided for them. Also, confiscated lands, destabilized families and deserted spouses are other issues they must grapple with. Resettlement programs have not clearly addressed the needs of PWD, especially from a gendered perspective. So many PWD are still stranded in “officially” closed camps. Another issue is that a significant number of them are aging which is hastening their marginalization. What’s on the horizon?

I attended President Obama’s town hall meeting on the future of Africa at the White House with over a hundred other African youth where many issues were discussed. My attendance was to highlight the plight of PWD. Also, LAPD is one of the first nonprofit organizations to provide legal assistance specifically for PWD in Africa. We deal with employment, accident claims, child neglect, land and property confiscation, accessibility to public places, discrimination and education. Our preference is for mediation and out of court settlements especially in civil cases. We also conduct public awareness campaigns, electoral sensitization, and we are also helping Uganda revise its laws to match the U.N. Convention on the Rights of PWD, which Uganda has signed and ratified. What laws and policies are needed to help PWD progress?

African countries must enact, repeal, amend, revise and implement disability laws. They should also design workable regulations and guiding policies, utilizing the CRPD model. Currently, many countries have no or conflicting definitions or understanding of disability. Disability concerns are sidelined in legal and policy making interventions, thus PWD are usually left out of strategy generation and implementation sessions. Consequently, the resultant service delivered is inadequate or inappropriate. In reality PWD should be at the forefront. Specialized policies must be generated and introduced in international environments for the policies to be effected. For example, in Uganda there is a National Policy on Disability and the PWD Act, but implementing them is a challenge. Affirmative action is also required by law, and statutes should be enacted for special groups and PWD. The state through its public service should take a lead role in employing PWD, and organizations that employ a significant number of employees may be required to hire members of these special groups.

How do we move forward? PWD are often isolated and conditioned to accept everything and not question anything, even things done to them; subsequently their capacity to make decisions is often greatly impaired. Therefore they must be empowered and encouraged to speak up for themselves and speak out against negative occurrences. For example, a female PWD told me, “There’s a man who comes and rapes me daily, but who can I tell?” In the West this may seem unbelievable, but in Africa it happens because often PWD are not considered human, so crimes against them are ignored by law enforcement agencies. Issues like these need to be addressed. People should challenge perpetrators of crimes on PWD and their inclusion in mainstream society and programs is essential. Also, education and vocational skills training should be made available to enable PWD to become self-sustaining and productive members of the society.

What may people not know about helping PWD in Africa?

The African environment is different from the West; therefore solution providers must have that awareness. For example, I had a wheel chair made in the US which didn’t last because it’s not designed for the rugged African terrain. Also, if it breaks there aren’t replacement parts readily available to repair it.

What can people do to help?

They should help promote, protect, and respect the rights of PWD and teach these tenets to their children and the next generation to ensure continuity. Each of us can make contributions towards the fulfilment of the rights of PWD. Ensuring disability rights begins with you.

Living with a disability is difficult enough; however in a developing African country like Uganda, life is extremely difficult for PWD because they have special needs. Due to wrong perceptions, superstition, ignorance and misinformation, many PWD are often deemed inhuman, negatively stereotyped, discriminated against, abandoned, mistreated, ignored, excluded from society and discouraged from reaching their full potential.

I am sharing Med’s story to generate awareness about PWD in Africa to show that they can become productive professionals who make positive contributions to the society if they are assisted. I hope this article spurs discussion on how they can be assisted by everyone including the government, NGOs, faith organizations, and everyday people. Please think about what you can do for the PWD around you.

The author, Susan E. Majek is a freelance journalist, writer and blogger who has covered many stories, events & personalities. She is a contributor to The Women’s International Perspective (The WIP), Glory International Magazine, Africa News, World Press, African Outlook and several other publications. She is also the Editor-In-Chief of Sociable Susan Magazine , a on-line lifestyle magazine.

But in retrospect, the question that must be asked is this: why were UN peacekeepers fighting on the side of rebels attacking the residence of the president of a sovereign nation? Yes, indeed, rebels, because the force that Ouattara has mustered against the recalcitrant incumbent, Laurent Gbagbo, is technically speaking, made up of rebels who plunged the country into civil war between north and south in ‘02, two years after Ouattara was disqualified from contesting the presidential election in ‘00, which was won by Gbagbo.

The northerners claimed that one of their own – Ouattara, whose roots are embedded in Burkina Faso – had been hard done by in an electoral system that disenfranchised Ouattara and other northerners.

I suspect those courageous pioneers would look at our world today with a mixture of pride and disappointment. There has been remarkable progress as the last century has seen an unprecedented expansion of women’s legal rights and entitlements. Indeed, the advancement of women’s rights can lay claim to be one of the most profound social revolutions the world has seen.

One hundred years ago, only two countries allowed women to vote. Today, that right is virtually universal and women have now been elected to lead Governments in every continent. Women, too, hold leading positions in professions from which they were once banned. Far more recently than a century ago, the police, courts and neighbors still saw violence in the home as a purely private matter. Today two-thirds of countries have specific laws that penalize domestic violence and the United Nations Security Council now recognizes sexual violence as a deliberate tactic of war.

But despite this progress over the last century, the hopes of equality expressed on that first International Women’s Day are a long way from being realized. Almost two out of three illiterate adults are women. Girls are still less likely to be in school than boys. Every 90 seconds of every day, a woman dies in pregnancy or due to childbirth-related complications despite us having the knowledge and resources to make birth safe.

Across the world, women continue to earn less than men for the same work. In many countries, too, they have unequal access to land and inheritance rights. And despite high-profile advances, women still make up only 19 per cent of legislatures, 8% of peace negotiators, and only 28 women are heads of state or government.

It is not just women who pay the price for this discrimination. We all suffer for failing to make the most of half the world’s talent and potential. We undermine the quality of our democracy, the strength of our economies, the health of our societies and the sustainability of peace. This year’s focus of International Women’s Day on women’s equal access to education, training, science and technology underscores the need to tap this potential.

The agenda to secure gender equality and women’s rights is a global agenda, a challenge for every country, rich and poor, north and south. It was in recognition of both its universality and the rewards if we get this right that the United Nations brought together four existing organizations to create UN Women. The goal of this new body, which I have the great privilege to lead, is to galvanize the entire UN system so we can deliver on the promise of the UN Charter of equal rights of men and women. It is something I have fought for my whole life.

As a young mother and a pediatrician, I experienced the struggles of balancing family and career and saw how the absence of child care prevented women from paid employment. The opportunity to help remove these barriers was one of the reasons I went into politics. It is why I supported policies that extended health and childcare services to families and prioritized public spending for social protection.

As President, I worked hard to create equal opportunities for both men and women to contribute their talents and experiences to the challenges facing our country. That is why I proposed a Cabinet that had an equal number of men and women.

As Executive Director of UN Women, I want to use my journey and the collective knowledge and experience all around me to encourage progress towards true gender equality across the world. We will work, in close partnership, with men and women, leaders and citizens, civil society, the private sector and the whole UN system to assist countries to roll out policies, programs and budgets to achieve this worthy goal.

I have seen myself what women, often in the toughest circumstances, can achieve for their families and societies if they are given the opportunity. The strength, industry and wisdom of women remain humanity’s greatest untapped resource. We simply cannot afford to wait another 100 years to unlock this potential.  By Michelle Bachelet, Executive Director, UN Women

Ki-moon made the pledge Mon 25^th May in a message for Africa Day, which marks the founding in 1963 of the Organization of African Unity, now known as the African Union (AU).

The annual event serves as an opportunity to highlight Africa’s achievements as well as take stock of remaining challenges.

Drawing attention to the devastating effect of the ongoing economic downturn on the continent, the secretary-general urged the international community not to step back from its commitments.

‘At the very time when Africa has achieved several years of sustained economic growth and improved stability, the global economic crisis is having a severe impact. We must protect the continent’s poorest and most vulnerable people,’ he stated.

Another threat to Africa’s development is climate change, he said, emphasizing the importance of countries to ‘seal a deal’ and reach agreement in Copenhagen Dec ‘09 on a new global pact to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

‘If we work hard, and agree on deep cuts in greenhouse gas emissions, we can avoid some of the worst consequences – but not all of them,’ said Ki-moon. ‘That is why we must also support adaptation, especially for the poor, who will suffer first – and worst.’

The UN chief also pointed to what he described as ‘a troubling re-emergence of unconstitutional changes of government’ on the continent. ‘This reminds us not only of the need to support democratization, but to strengthen Africa’s capacity to maintain peace and security,’ he stressed.

Toward that goal, he said, the UN security council is building a closer working relationship with the AU peace and security council. The world body is also moving ahead with the UN ten-year capacity-building programme in support of the AU, especially in providing technical support for AU peacekeeping.