DIRS.INFO The most relevant business & tech news

☆ Biden warns Uganda of possible sanctions due to anti-gay law
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-29 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +1 min

WASHINGTON, May 29 (Reuters) - President Joe Biden condemned Uganda's new anti-gay law on Monday, and said the United States may impose sanctions and will evaluate the implications of the law "on all aspects of U.S. engagement with Uganda." Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni on Monday signed one of the world's toughest anti-LGBTQ laws, including the death penalty for "aggravated homosexuality," drawing Western condemnations and risking sanctions from aid donors. "This shameful act is the latest development in an alarming trend of human rights abuses and corruption in Uganda," Biden said in a statement. "And we are considering additional steps, including the application of sanctions and restriction of entry into the United States against anyone involved in serious human rights abuses or corruption," said Biden. Same-sex relations were already illegal in Uganda, as in more than 30 African countries, but the new law goes further.

☆ How do you stop a pirate? Put more fish in the sea.
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-20 | by ( Katherine Tangalakis-Lippert | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +5 min

Fishermen in east Africa and the South China Sea turn to piracy when the fish supply is low. As climate change kills fish, the former fisherman grow more desperate in their attacks, the study's authors told Insider. Between 1995 and 2013, Time reported, 41% of the world's pirate attacks took place in Southeast Asia. The increasing water temperatures have benefited fish in the South China Sea, increasing production, but harmed fish off the coast of Africa, decreasing it. "So we have this really great experiment where we show that, essentially, when fish production goes down, piracy goes up.

☆ A body odor buffet reveals which scents attract mosquitoes
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-19 | by ( Kate Golembiewski | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +7 min

CNN —Anyone who has spent a summer evening swatting away mosquitoes, or a summer day scratching mosquito bites, can agree: Mosquitoes stink. In a scientific report published Friday, scientists helped pinpoint the different chemicals in body odor that attract these insects by building an ice-rink size testing arena and pumping in the scents of different people. Hundreds of mosquitoes in the main 20-by-20-meter facility were then treated to a buffet of the sleeping subjects’ scents. The researchers found what many who have been on a picnic would attest to: Some people attract more mosquitoes than others. (Vosshall said that even scrubbing with unscented soap doesn’t get rid of the natural scents that attract mosquitoes.)

JOHANNESBURG, May 18 (Reuters) - Ghana is targeting $10.5 billion of external debt service relief from 2023-2026, the IMF said, giving an early indication of how large a hit investors might face in an impending debt overhaul. "Our back-of-the-envelope calculations suggest that this translates to a 40%-50% haircut on external debt, if there is not further restructuring of domestic debt," Bojosi Morule, an economist at Goldman Sachs, said in emailed reaction to the DSA. Ghana's already strained finances buckled under the fallout of COVID-19 and Russia's invasion of Ukraine and it is now seeking to restructure $20 billion of its roughly $30 billion external debt, including about $13 billion of Eurobonds, under the Group of 20's Common Framework platform. Earlier this year it completed a domestic debt exchange. Other risks include Ghana not regaining market access to issue debt and the domestic debt exchange posing dangers to financial sector stability, the IMF said.

☆ Malawi: Toddler dead, 23 others missing as hippo capsizes boat in Nsanje district
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-16 | by ( Nimi Princewill | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +1 min

CNN —A toddler has died after a boat ferrying more than 30 villagers across the Shire River in Malawi’s Nsanje district was attacked by a hippo, causing it to overturn, authorities said. A police spokesperson, Agnes Zalakoma, said the incident happened early Monday and 23 of the boat’s 37 passengers were missing and feared dead in the water, which is infested with crocodiles and hippos. “Well-wishers managed to rescue 13 people while 23 others went missing and the dead body of the toddler has been found,” Zalakoma said in a statement Monday, adding that the deceased child was only one-year-old. According to a lawmaker for the Nsanje district, Gladys Ganda, the villagers were crossing the Shire River to get to their farms at the Malawian border with Mozambique when their boat was hit by a hippo. In December, a two-year-old Ugandan boy was attacked by a hippo which swallowed half of his body before spitting him out, Uganda’s police said.

☆ Fair access to proper housing can boost economic growth - report
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-15 | by ( Marine Strauss | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +1 min

BRUSSELS, May 15 (Reuters) - Providing equitable access to appropriate housing in slums and other informal settlements could massively increase economic growth and boost life expectancy, a report to be published on Tuesday by home-building charity Habitat for Humanity shows. Proper housing could increase economic growth by up to 10.5%, while life expectancy could go up by 2.4 years on average, the report said. Adequate housing could help up to 41.6 million children who are currently missing education to enroll in school, the report stated. According to the United Nations, more than 1 billion people live in slums or informal settlements, where they have limited access to basic services such as clean water, sanitation, and electricity. Of those, 80% are in East and South-East Asia (370 million people), sub-Saharan Africa (238 million) and Central and South Asia (227 million).

JOHANNESBURG, May 15 (Reuters) - South Africa's climate policy body on Monday suggested the government could delay retiring its ageing coal-fired power plants to address electricity shortages and said a power crisis had put the country on track to meet its climate goals anyway. The ruling African National Congress has recommended that state power utility Eskom delay the decommissioning of its ageing coal-fired power stations to help minimise rolling electricity outages. "The least-cost approach is to pull the coal plants off when they reach the end of their economic life," said Crispian Olver, executive director of the Presidential Climate Commission (PCC). South Africa relies on coal for electricity. South Africa's national target for emissions reductions is 398-510 MtCO2e by 2025, and 350-420 MtCO2e by 2030.

☆ W.H.O. Ends Global Health Emergency Designation for Covid
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-05 | by ( Stephanie Nolen | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +2 min

In Egypt, excess deaths were roughly 12 times as great as the official Covid toll; in Pakistan, the figure was eight times as high. Developing nations bore the brunt of the devastation, with nearly eight million more people than expected dying in lower-middle-income nations by the end of 2021. And Covid continues to spread: The W.H.O. recorded 2.8 million new cases globally, and more than 17,000 deaths, from April 3 to 30, the most recent numbers available. As many countries have reduced their testing for Covid, these numbers also probably represent a significant undercount.

☆ Westinghouse unveils small modular nuclear reactor
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-04 | by ( Timothy Gardner | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +3 min

WASHINGTON, May 4 (Reuters) - U.S. company Westinghouse unveiled plans on Thursday for a small modular reactor to generate virtually emissions-free electricity that could replace coal plants or power water desalinization and other industries. Small modular reactors (SMR) are meant to fit new applications such as replacing shut coal plants and being located in more remote communities. They noted that Russia took the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant in Ukraine, the site of repeated shelling. That year, former President Donald Trump's administration issued restrictions on exports of nuclear technology newer than the AP1000 due to nuclear proliferation concerns. Baranwal said if the U.S. government deems AP300 to be a subset of the earlier reactor technology "then we can start entertaining the possibilities" of exporting it to China.

☆ Ethiopia to offer up to five banking licenses to foreign investors
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-03 | by ( Dawit Endeshaw | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +1 min

ADDIS ABABA, May 3 (Reuters) - Ethiopia will issue up to five banking licenses to foreign investors in the next five years, part of plans to open up the financial services sector to foreign competition, a senior central bank official said on Wednesday. "We will give three to five licenses within five years," vice governor of the central bank Solomon Desta told reporters. Ethiopia's banking industry is dominated by state-owned Commercial Bank of Ethiopia, and the sector has 29 players, all of them locally owned. Desta said foreign investors would have different options to enter the industry, including forming joint ventures with domestic players, or establishing local subsidiaries. Foreign investors have long eyed sectors including banking, telecoms, transportation and aviation in Ethiopia, a country of more than 100 million people and one of the biggest economies in Sub-Saharan Africa.

☆ World Bank set to launch more robust, transparent business climate rankings
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-01 | by ( Andrea Shalal | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +4 min

WASHINGTON, May 1 (Reuters) - The World Bank will announce on Monday a new methodology for assessing the business climate in up to 180 countries after embarrassing revelations of data irregularities and favoritism toward China forced it to cancel the "Doing Business" rankings two years ago. "Business Ready improves upon and replaces the World Bank Group’s earlier Doing Business project. It reflects a more balanced and transparent approach toward evaluating a country’s business and investment climate," the bank said in a statement. "The main thing that went wrong was the data integrity of Doing Business was compromised," Norman Loayza, director of the World Bank's Indicators Group, which leads the project, told Reuters. But World Bank officials were still debating whether to revive the business climate rankings that were at the heart of the "Doing Business" controversy or produce an overall index, Loayza said, with a decision expected prior to the first report.

☆ Cleopatra wasn't a Black woman, Egypt tells Netflix in a feud over new drama-documentary
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-29 | by ( Bethany Dawson | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +2 min

Egypt has accused Netflix of misrepresenting Cleopatra by framing her as a Black woman. Dr. Mustafa Waziri of the Supreme Council of Archeology said it's a "blatant historical fallacy." The drama-documentary "Queen Cleopatra" is set to air on May 10, with Adele James cast as the queen. "Queen Cleopatra," the soon-to-be-released drama-documentary on the famed Egyptian queen, portrays her as a Black woman. Waziri said that depicting Cleopatra, a legendary beauty, as a Black woman is a "falsification of Egyptian history and a blatant historical fallacy."

Its peak sales forecast is of more than $2 billion annually together from the maternal vaccine and an RSV shot for older adults. The case highlights how equitable global access will require better advance planning by drugmakers, governments and health organizations, health officials say. "They could have tried sooner," said Erin Sparrow, WHO's technical officer for the RSV vaccine, referring to Pfizer. Pfizer has yet to take a number of steps needed to make the vaccine available in developing countries, according to global health officials and the company. She still expects it to be several years before the RSV vaccine is launched in lower-income countries.

☆ Tunisia retrieves 41 drowned migrants as death toll soars
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-28 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +1 min

[1/2] Dead bodies, lying in bags, which according to hospital official belong to migrants, are pictured at the entrance of Habib Bourguiba hospital morgue in Sfax, Tunisia April 26, 2023. The bodies were in a decomposed state, suggesting they had been in the water for several days, said Houssem Eddine Jebabli told Reuters. The cumulative total of fatalities was unprecedented over such a short period, he said. Tunisia is struggling to contain the surge, and some morgues are running out of space to bury the victims. Reporting by Tarek Amara; Writing by Tala Ramadan in Dubai; Editing by Jon BoyleOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

☆ Where to watch Man City vs. Arsenal live stream online from anywhere
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-26 | by ( Brendan Griffiths | Senior Commerce Director | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +5 min

It's the biggest game of the Premier League season and could well decide the title, so here's where to watch a Man City vs. Arsenal live stream online today. Where to watch Man City vs. Arsenal live stream (US)Watching a Man City vs. Arsenal live stream online in the US via Peacock is the only option today as it's not being broadcast on TV. If you want to take advantage of the super cheap live stream of Man City vs. Liverpool that US viewers get, but you're not in the US right now, you'll find online geo-restrictions will block access to your usual Peacock live stream. How to watch Man City vs. Arsenal online with a VPNSign up for a VPN if you don't have one. Is there a free Man City vs. Arsenal live stream option?

☆ Investors can discount IMF’s emerging-market gloom
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-21 | by ( Felix Martin | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +6 min

Historically, monetary tightening in the United States has been kryptonite for emerging-market investors. Most important of all, many emerging-market central banks learned the lesson of previous cycles and raised rates early. By the end of 2021, two-thirds of the major emerging-market central banks were tightening monetary policy. Perhaps the 2020s will bring a Highly Indebted Rich Countries initiative in which emerging-market countries return the favour. But when it comes to considering the investment case for the majority of emerging-market sovereigns, investors should not be swayed.

☆ Oxford malaria vaccine rollout could have 'major' implications in sub-Saharan Africa, economist says
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-21 | by ( Elliot Smith | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +4 min

The University of Oxford Jenner Institute, which developed the vaccine, estimates that malaria kills around 800,000 people per annum. These casualties occur predominantly in sub-Saharan Africa, where one in five childhood deaths is associated with the disease. The WHO assessed that 241 million clinical cases of malaria occurred in 2020, resulting in 627,000 deaths, mostly among children in Africa. A health worker vaccinates a child against malaria in Ndhiwa, Homabay County, western Kenya on September 13, 2019 during the launch of malaria vaccine in Kenya. Brian Ongoro | AFP | Getty ImagesIn 2021, the WHO signed off on GSK's RTS,S malaria vaccine for rollout across sub-Saharan Africa, following pilot programs in Ghana, Kenya and Malawi, which tracked 800,000 children since 2019.

☆ Ukraine’s corn and wheat exports are set to plummet. Here’s what that means for the world's food supply
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-20 | by ( Lucy Handley | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +7 min

Both Ukraine and Russia were among the world's top producers of commodities such as wheat and barley before the war broke out in February 2022. But the conflict saw the price of U.S. wheat and corn futures hit decade highs (with one benchmark wheat contract hitting an all-time high) and sparked volatility in global wheat prices throughout the year. 2023/24 Ukraine grains exports (corn + wheat) might be 27-30mmt, down 15-18mmt from 2021/22," he added. Global food tradeThe war in Ukraine has contributed to rising food prices, with inflation above 5% in more than 80% of low-income countries, according to World Bank figures. Climate change causing extreme weather is already damaging the food system, according to Alexander, a senior lecturer at Edinburgh University's Global Academy of Agriculture and Food Systems.

☆ Hippo attacks: How to avoid one of Africa's most dangerous animals
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-12 | by ( Forrest Brown | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +22 min

“Hippos attack not to eat people, but to get them the hell away from them,” Lewison said. Larger vessels can offer more protection from a sudden hippo attack. photocech/Adobe StockGet to know the signs of disturbed hippos, Muruthi advised, in case you wander too closely. … If you slap the water, the percussion 99.9 times out of 100 will turn the hippo,” Templer said. Remember to suck in air if on the surface.”Another hippo attack survivor in this National Geographic video also was able to conserve her breath.

LUSAKA, April 12 (Reuters) - Zambia is planning to finish tests that simulate real-world cryptocurrency usage by the end of June to help it create regulations that balance citizens' safety with innovation, science and technology minister Felix Mutati told Reuters. The southern African country also needs digital infrastructure, including digital identities, before cryptocurrencies can be introduced, Mutati said in an interview on Wednesday. "Our main goal in the area of cryptocurrency is to strike a balance between innovation in terms of digital payments ... against citizens' safety, particularly given that cryptocurrency is very volatile," Mutati said. "What we are seeing is increased appetite to invest in Zambia," Mutati said, when asked whether any investments under his purview had been delayed, suspended or cancelled due to Zambia's long-delayed debt restructuring. Mutati said the way Chinese loans were contracted during his tenure as finance minister between 2016 and 2018 depended on the project.

☆ At least 20 migrants missing after a boat sinks off Tunisia
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-08 | by ( Tarek Amara | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +1 min

TUNIS, April 8 (Reuters) - At least 20 African migrants were missing on Saturday after their boat sank off Tunisia as they tried to cross the Mediterranean to Italy, a judicial official said, amidst a sharp rise in migrant boats from the North African country. The coast guard rescued 17 others off the southern city of Sfax from the same boat, two of whom are in critical condition, Sfax court judge Faouzi Masmousdi said. In recent weeks, dozens have gome missing and died in repeated drowning accidents off the Tunisian coast. Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni said on Friday that Europe risks seeing a huge wave of migrants arriving on its shores from North Africa if financial stability in Tunisia is not safeguarded. Tunisia had received equipment from Italy in the past years, but Ammar said it was outdated and not sufficient.

LUSAKA, April 6 (Reuters) - Zambia is being "punished" for a failure to complete debt restructuring that is not its fault, but its two main creditors, China and international bondholders, both want a resolution, the country's finance minister told Reuters. Zambia was the first African country to default in 2020 after the COVID-19 pandemic battered the global economy. Many Western officials have blamed delays in agreeing the debt relief on the largest bilateral creditor, China, something it denies. "The Chinese are asking questions, the bondholders are also asking questions ... but constructive questions, so that's no problem," Musokotwane said. Bondholders say they want a resolution to this, the Chinese say they want a resolution to this."

In turn, transmission lines that can ferry large power loads over long distances with minimal load loss will be key arteries that will enable transition efforts. Roughly 66% of current UHV capacity is in Greater China (36%) and the Indian subcontinent (30%), and around 10% is in North America. Ultra high voltage (UHV) line capacity by regionLatin America looks also set to rapidly increase UHV capacity, especially after 2035, to connect the region's planned solar and wind installations across Brazil, Chile, Peru and Mexico. MIDDLE EAST, AFRICA AND PACIFICWhile currently overshadowed in terms of capacity development by China, India, Europe and North America, other regions will step up their construction of transmission line capacity after 2030. In turn, that extra grid capacity should provide a powerful boost to energy transition efforts in every region, and allow global energy systems to capitalize on growing volumes of renewable energy generation.

BOAO, China, March 31 (Reuters) - The Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB) will stick to its mandate as an apolitical multilateral lender and won't get dragged into political disputes, even as multilateralism is severely tested, its president, Jin Liqun, said on Friday. "But on the other hand, we need to protect the bank in terms of its credit worthiness," he added. As of November, the AIIB had financed 194 projects totalling $37 billion, up from $29 billion in October 2021, according to S&P Global Ratings. "We now have projects in Rwanda, Ecuador, we have projects in central and eastern European countries," he said. Reporting by Joe Cash in Boao Editing by Mark PotterOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

Search resuls for: "SAHARAN AFRICA"

25 mentions found