Full coverage: Development

08.05.2006 Bangladesh has made notable progress in both income and human poverty reduction since independence, with national poverty dropping by nine percent in the last decade. But the level of inequality has increased, widening the rich-poor gap every year, posing a threat to social coherence.

08.05.2006 Despite intelligence inputs sounding serious threats to Chief Minister Raman Singh's personal security, the State Government is all set to go ahead with 11-day-long "Gram Suraj" campaign.

08.05.2006 Take the accomplishments of the "Millennium Villages", an initiative of the U.N. Millennium Project, which over the last five years has demonstrated how relatively small amounts of money spent on health, education, fertiliser and other essential services can dramatically accelerate progress towards the faltering Millennium Development Goals (MDGs).

08.05.2006 After thousands of farm deaths, most of which are unaccounted for in official data, the Punjab government appears to have finally woken up to the extent of the agricultural crisis in the state and is formulating measures to alleviate rural distress

08.05.2006 No country in the world has developed using only the first and second rank holders! Although they are a cause of pride, what is needed is an improvement in the efficiency quotient and there is strong evidence that this is not entirely the domain of the upper castes. The question of reservation, however, has to be understood differently for education (higher, technical and specialised) and employment. In case of education, reservation only allows somewhat guided entry into the institution, but the index person has to meet all the benchmarks fixed to come out successfully.

08.05.2006 At a rally to generate support for the minority communities, former prime minister VP Singh on Sunday asked his old third front allies to unite on a common platform to fight poverty.

08.05.2006 THE DOHA development round of the World Trade Organization received a setback at the end of last month when trade negotiators failed yet again to reach an agreement on the modalities for cutting agricultural tariff, domestic farm subsidies and tariffs on industrial products (Non-agricultural Market Access — NAMA).

08.05.2006 The controversy over proposed reservation in the private sector for SCs, STs and OBCs and in higher educational institutions is yet to be settled but the Ministry for Social Justice and Empowerment has gone a step further — it has asked NGOs aided by the Centre to provide job reservations in their projects.

06.05.2006 Even as the Narmada dam case comes up for hearing in the Supreme Court for the third time in a month, on May 8, 2006, NBA activists along with the Delhi Solidarity Group (a support group of the NBA constituting Delhi based activists and NGOs) appeal to the National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) to uphold the human rights of affected people in the Narmada valley.

05.05.2006 At a press conference on “Human Rights Implications of Forced Evictions and Displacement: An International Perspective” organised by the Housing and Land Rights Network in Delhi, speakers, including Miloon Kothari, Special Rapporteur on the right to adequate housing of the United Nations Commission on Human Rights, pointed out the rampant violations of human rights being carried out across the country in the name of development.

05.05.2006 The main opposition UNP told the press that the countryÂ’s stability in law and order were fast deteriorating and urged President Mahinda Rajapaksa to arrest the dangerous trend

04.05.2006 Contento con la labor que hizo en el Ministerio de Comercio Exterior (COMEX) durante los pocos meses que estuvo al frente de esta cartera, pero preocupado por el futuro del país debido al radicalismo que muestran grupos interesados en aprobar el Tratado de Libre Comercio con Estados Unidos y Centroamérica (TLC) "a costa de cualquier cosa".

04.05.2006 Over 900 journalists were arrested and more than 250 scribes lost their jobs in Nepal during the 15-month rule of King Gyanendra, the Federation of Nepalese Journalists (FNJ) has said.

04.05.2006 The government's mandate is to provide basic services. As citizens, we have the right and the responsibility to participate in the process that translates outlays into outcomes. Mrs.Rukmini Banerji of Pratham a NGO, expressed this view in Times of India

04.05.2006 The Patna High Court(HC) on Tuesday directed the state government to file a supplementary affidavit to a PIL and state therein the status of the unutilised money meant for Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan and teaching in primary schools and secondary schools.

04.05.2006 More than a quarter of the population of Arunachal Pradesh will not live beyond 40 years of age. This disheartening figure was disclosed in the first Arunachal Pradesh Human Development Report, 2005, brought out by the United Nations Development Project (UNDP). It reveals a disturbing scenario on the health front.

03.05.2006 Giunto alla settima edizione, il World Social Agenda sceglie anche quest'anno Padova per parlare del Sud del mondo: dopo i temi africani de "L'Altr'Africa: il G8 delle donne" nel 2004 e quelli sudamericani di "AmericAmeriche" nel 2005, quest'anno la Fondazione Fontana, organizzatrice dell'evento assieme al Consorzio Etimos, Banca Popolare Etica e Civitas, propone "La Via Asiatica". L'Asia, questa sconosciuta, l'Asia, sempre più tra noi: l'intento della manifestazione, una maratona dia ppuntamenti che si svolgeranno in numerosi luoghi significativi di Padova, dentro e fuori Civitas, è far conoscere sia la realtà lontana sia quella delle comunità asiatiche del Veneto attraverso due percorsi, uno educativo e formativo rivolto agli studenti e già in corso nelle scuole padovane da ottobre e uno informativo che prevede all'inizio di maggio una serie di incontri pubblici aperti. Il momento clou della manifestazione sarà rappresentato dalla conferenza internazionale in programma per il 5 maggio alle 20 all'interno di Civitas: interverranno relatrici di rilevanza mondiale per parlare di economia, di politica, degli obiettivi di sviluppo del millennio e di autodeterminazione della comunità di cui la donna è, soprattutto in Asia, la principale animatrice.

03.05.2006 A worldwide study released by UNICEF reveals that some 5.6 million children die every year in part because they are not getting enough of the right nutrients. And 146 million children are at risk from dying early because they are underweight.

03.05.2006 ADB will help strengthen the role of civil society in the fight against corruption through a technical assistance (TA) grant of US$150,000.The TA will provide small grants to civil society organizations (CSOs) to demonstrate their role in improving transparency and accountability, and fighting corruption.

03.05.2006 For over two decades, globalization and open markets have been accepted as the main ingredients in the recipe for serious socioeconomic growth. Governments continue to pepper their documents and press releases with these mouth-watering terms, often tying them to the claim that foreign trade is the main course to continued economic expansion.