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	There are at least 67 million domestic workers worldwide by International Labour Organization, agencies   Domestic workers comprise a significant part of the global workforce in informal employment and are among the most vulnerable groups of workers. They work for private households, often without clear terms of employment, unregistered in any book, and excluded from the scope of labour legislation.   Currently there are at least 67 million domestic workers worldwide, not including child domestic workers and this number is increasing steadily in developed and developing countries. Even though a substantial number of men work in the sector - often as gardeners, drivers or butlers - it remains a highly feminized sector: 80 per cent of all domestic workers are women.   Their work may include tasks such as cleaning the house, cooking, washing and ironing clothes, taking care of children, or elderly or sick members of a family, gardening, guarding the house, driving for the family, and even taking care of household pets.   A domestic worker may work on full-time or part-time basis; may be employed by a single household or by multiple employers; may be residing in the household of the employer (live-in worker) or may be living in his or her own residence (live-out). A domestic worker may be working in a country of which she/he is not a national, thus referred to as a migrant domestic worker.   At present, domestic workers often face very low wages, excessively long hours, have no guaranteed weekly day of rest and at times are vulnerable to physical, mental and sexual abuse or restrictions on freedom of movement. Exploitation of domestic workers can partly be attributed to gaps in national labour and employment legislation, and often reflects discrimination along the lines of sex, race and caste.   http://www.ilo.org/global/topics/domestic-workers/lang--en/index.htm http://idwfed.org/en http://www.scmp.com/week-asia/society/article/3002942/domestic-workers-are-slaves-modern-day-asia-are-hongkongers http://www.scmp.com/week-asia/society/article/3002856/starved-beaten-hammer-slept-dog-worst-domestic-worker-abuse-cases http://www.freedomunited.org/news/force-fed-vomit-and-death-threats-singapores-appalling-case-of-abuse/ http://www.freedomunited.org/speak-free/fired-for-having-cancer-baby-jane-allas/ http://idwfed.org/en http://www.wiego.org/informal-economy/occupational-groups/domestic-workers http://www.ohchr.org/EN/NewsEvents/Pages/DomesticServitude.aspx   * 2018 Report of the UN Special Rapporteur on contemporary forms of slavery, discusses the impact of slavery and servitude on marginalized migrant women workers in the global domestic economy: http://bit.ly/2HYTAie
	African farmers urgently need climate-proof investment for food security by UNDP, Global Commission on Adaptation, agencies   Sep. 2019   Let's talk climate change in Africa, by Mimi Mefo. (DW)   Africa is the continent most vulnerable to the impacts of climate change, according to the United Nations. This could take the form of extreme droughts, flooding and storms. With their high rates of poverty and reliance on traditional agriculture, African countries are less able to adapt to climate change.   47 out of 54 African countries have signed the Paris climate agreement, but the campaign to fight effects of climate change is yet to gain momentum. African has been hardest-hit by drought, floods and water scarcity. Is it really doing enough? Listen to some young people and climate change activists.   http://www.dw.com/en/lets-talk-climate-change-in-africa/av-50565758 http://www.dw.com/en/global-climate-strike-africa-roundup-live/a-50507620   May 2019   Global Hunger is threatening Families because of Climate Change, writes Siddharth Chatterjee - United Nations Resident Coordinator to Kenya.   There is barely a corner of human life that will not be affected by climate change, and some of its impacts are already being felt. Consider this, 821 million people are now hungry and over 150 million children stunted, putting the global hunger eradication goal at risk.   Today, is the United Nations International Day of Families and the theme for this year is, 'Families and Climate Action'.   The wellbeing of families is central to healthy societies, but is threatened by climate change, especially in the poorest parts of the world.   Across the world what we understand by 'family' takes many forms, but it remains the fundamental unit of society. It is where from our earliest days we learn to share, to love, to reason, to consider others, to stand up for ourselves and to take responsibility.   But families face challenges on many fronts and - particularly in the developing world - climate change is perhaps the greatest of these as it is exacerbating hunger and food insecurity.   The focus on families and climate has most resonance in Africa, where it is estimated that climate change could reduce yields from rain-fed agriculture by 50 percent by 2020, jeopardizing the welfare of seven in ten people who depend on farming for a living.   When crops are wiped out by flood or drought, families are robbed of livelihoods and food security. Parents who are already financially vulnerable then struggle to meet the costs of housing, feeding and schooling their children, and of paying for medicines when they are sick.   The greatest killers of children - malnutrition, diarrhoeal disease and malaria - will worsen because of climate change. Children living in developing countries face the greatest risks of all, not always because climate change effects will be worse there than in other countries, but because poverty limits their ability to respond.   Increased competition for dwindling natural resources results in political instability, social upheaval, conflicts, forced migration and displacements and once again, children are the main victims. Forced from their homes, many are denied an education, further denting their prospects and threatening social and economic development in some of the poorest areas of the world.   Africa's biggest threat from climate change will remain the inter-generational downward spiral into deeper poverty that is brought on by decreased farm yields.   Increasing resilience to climate-related shocks in Africa's agriculture will result in a rise in farm productivity. It will mean women, who make up the largest share of the continent's small-holder farmers, will have better incomes. Women allocate more of their income to food, health and education for their families, therefore it would also translate into greater gains for children and future generations.   Ending hunger and poverty is the prime mission of the UN's Sustainable Development Goals, and will demand dramatic shifts in what and how we consume, and above all it will demand cooperation and collaboration on a regional and global scale. It will not be easy, but for the sake of every family, everywhere, we cannot fail.   http://reliefweb.int/report/world/global-hunger-threatening-families-because-climate-change   Mar. 2019   African farmers urgently need climate-proof investment for food security, by Winnie Byanyima.   The world is letting down Africa's smallholder farmers and governments across the globe urgently need to more than double their spend on helping them adapt to the brutal daily realities of a climate that is already changing.   Small-scale farmers, herders and fisher-folk, who produce the majority of the world's food, are living with increasingly extreme weather. From unpredictable seasons and violent droughts, to floods and storms wreaking havoc on their crops and harvests, they live on the frontline of a crisis they did the least to cause.   The price of the world's top polluters failing to curb their emissions of greenhouse gases is greater poverty and loss of life among the most vulnerable.   Greatly increased spending on adaptation measures can help small-scale farmers in Africa and across the world to strengthen the resilience of their communities.   A decade ago, world leaders promised $100 billion per year by 2020 to help developing countries combat global warming. Yet today adaptation receives under 20 percent of the total funds given and in the case of the poorest nations even less.   We need all countries to dedicate at least 50 percent of their public climate finance to adaptation, to build more resilient communities for a better world.   Adaptation is a life-saving necessity for many small farmers. It covers solutions that might draw on traditional knowledge of hardier seed varieties or on new technologies like solar-powered water pumps, to offer practical solutions for climate-hit smallholders.   Investment in adaptation doesn't just avert crisis; it builds a stronger economy and greater food security. This is critical in regions such as Africa, where small and medium-sized farms produce up to 77 percent of all nutrients.   Globally hunger is once again rising - close to a decade of progress has been wiped out in the last three years - with new climate extremes a leading cause. Climate change could force up to 122 million more people worldwide into extreme poverty by 2030, as well as make it impossible for agriculture to meet the needs of a world population predicted to reach 9.6 billion by 2050. The alarm bells are ringing, but still not enough is being done.   Africa's smallholder farmers have adapted to changing weather for generations. In many ways they are the definition of resilience. But the scale and severity of today's challenge has moved them beyond what they can do alone. We need a global response to a global problem.   Critically that response must put women's rights at the centre. Women make up nearly 50 percent of the agricultural labour force in sub-Saharan Africa, and around 43 percent globally, as well as providing hours of unpaid care work - from fetching water to raising children. They are the backbone of our food system and yet they face the gravest risks in a changing climate.   In many countries, women are denied the right to own or inherit land, meaning they are less likely to be able to access capital to invest in adaptive measures. They may be forced to waste yet more precious hours walking further to collect water. When droughts strike, we know it is nearly always women who are last to eat.   The Global Commission on Adaptation is rising to this challenge. Over the next 18 months we will be working to make the case for a massive increase in support for adaptation to climate change in Africa and around the world.   We seek to reduce fragmented adaptation efforts, supporting countries to access the funding needed for national strategies, and to press those with the responsibility for causing the crisis and the capacity to help to step up with new commitments.   We are determined to give adaptation to climate change the priority it needs among politicians and business leaders worldwide. We are convinced there are opportunities to capture in building a more resilient global economy.   But we also know that if we do not act now, climate change will super-charge the global gap between the haves and the have-nots. Africa's smallholders are critical to building more resilience into our food system. It's time they receive the support their contribution demands.   Dec. 2018   Preparing Africa for the impacts of climate change. (UNDP)   Africa is at a 'tipping point' as global warming increases, and urgent action needs to be taken across the continent now, to mitigate risks and safeguard a decade of social and economic gains, according to a new report by the United Nations Development Agency (UNDP).   Ahunna Eziakonwa, Director of UNDP's Africa Bureau argues that 'climate change, droughts, floods, changing rainfall patterns and conflict have the potential to unravel efforts to reduce hunger and achieve the goals outlined in the Paris Agreement, and the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development'.   The UNDP study shows that, should the world fail to limit global warming to less than 2C, families will find it harder and harder to feed themselves, and the risk of famine and increased poverty will rise along with temperatures.   Higher levels of poverty would further limit the capacity of communities to manage climate-related risks, according to the report, placing further stress on already overstretched coping mechanisms, and could translate into more risky migration patterns, serious epidemics such as the 2014 Ebola outbreak across West Africa, and greater political instability.   Drawing on years of data from projects geared to enabling communities to adapt to a changing climate and build resilience, the report shows that as emissions continue going up, support for climate adaptation initiatives must be increased urgently and accelerated across the continent, especially across the 34 African 'least developed countries'.   'They are among the most vulnerable to climate change, yet the least able to adapt. In many cases, they lack the technical, financial and institutional capacity to identify the best ways to build resilience', said Gustavo Fonseca, from Global Environment Facility, an institution that has been funding many climate adaptation projects in Africa.   Hunger rising along with temperatures   According to recent estimates from the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), for the first time in over a decade, world hunger is on the rise, affecting 11 per cent of the global population. This is in part due to extreme droughts induced by an abnormally strong El Nino cycle, which led close to 40 million people in Africa to be in need of humanitarian assistance.   'Taking reactive approaches to food security and disaster recovery costs the people of Africa billions of dollars in lost GDP, and syphons off government resources that should be dedicated to education, social programmes, healthcare, business development and employment', said UNDP's Ahunna Eziakonwa. 'It cannot be an afterthought'.   Measures to enable communities to adapt to the changing climate will require financial assistance. It will require developed nations to make good on their 2015 Paris Agreement commitments to dedicate $100 billion annually to supporting climate action in developing nations.   The report analyses a number of noteworthy successes in climate change adaptation in Africa over the past decade, including projects aimed at improving food security in Benin, Mali, Niger and Sudan; supporting governments in having improved climate information and early warning systems to save lives from fast-acting storms; and empowering women to be effective climate action champions. http://bit.ly/2PJlhMj   http://www.undp.org/content/undp/en/home/librarypage/climate-and-disaster-resilience-/climate-change-adaptation-in-africa.html Visit the related web page
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