THE MARALAL CAMEL DERBY

The Annual Maralal Camel Derby will be flagged off on August 1st 2008, starting 3 days of festivities in this remote desert outpost. The quiet town of Maralal, about 348 kms North of Nairobi, is considered the gateway to Kenya’s wild and arid North, and is a mecca for adventurers, nomads and camels.

This is real camel country, and the single humped dromedary camel is a vital part of life for many of Northern Kenya’s nomadic people. Each year, the Camel Derby brings colour and action to the streets of Maralal as the finest Camels in the North gather for the big race.

While most of Kenya’s camel rearing communities do not ride them- using them as pack animals- they are excellent handlers and judges of an animals strength and potential for speed.

Winning the Derby is a great local honour, and each year the title is hotly contested. But this by no means a purely local event. Maralal is a haven for nomadic cultures, and that includes travellers from all over the globe. The Town is a popular stopover for travellers looking for adventure in Kenya’s Northern Frontier District - one of Africa’s last great unspoilt wilderness areas.

For anyone visiting the area around this time, attending the Derby is a must. The three day race event is a chance to experience culture, colour, action and adventure first hand. This is not just a spectator sport - if you are going to attend the derby, why not saddle up and join in?

For more information, please Visit http://yaresafaris.co.ke or email the organizers :

yaresafaris@africaonline.co.ke

New coalition government, old cast in Kenya


This article appeared on page A - 17 of the San Francisco Chronicle

To be sure, there are signs that Kenya is returning to normal.
But there are signs that Kenya is heading for another political calamity.

Kenya has requested $1.1 billion from international donors to avert a looming food crisis caused by rising prices, and just 15 percent of the national budget has been allocated for development programs, according to the Mars Group, a Kenyan anti-corruption watchdog organization.

Moreover, the newly created Cabinet positions will cost at least $800 million in office space, staff, bodyguards and state-issued luxury cars, more than a tenth of the national budget. Another $30 million, nearly the amount of the entire education budget, has been set aside for water and power utilities at the presidential estate. And more than $100 million has been allocated for debt payments on so-called ghost projects, including $70 million for a naval ship that has never been delivered and $100 million for a nonexistent fertilizer company, according to the Mars Group.

Why? Parliament has yet to debate the budget. Instead, lawmakers have spent much of their time fighting a plan to tax their annual salaries of $160,000. In contrast, a U.S. senator earns $169,300.

"If they dillydally, and invoke political dishonesty as we have seen in the past - take advantage of power to reintroduce tribalism, corruption, and benefit a nucleus of friends - then there is a likelihood that this will not be a lasting peace," said Omar Hassan, a commissioner with the Kenya National Commission on Human Rights. "The portrayal that Kenya was a unified, dignified, peaceful country, that same myth will be challenged and deconstructed a second time."

Source: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2008/07/16/MNNU11JP4H.DTL

Pour ecouter :

http://www.fileden.com/files/2008/3/13/1811927/Laila%20Blue%20System.mp3

Only with you

by Dennis Wilson

Love is so many things that I feel
I have only felt with you
Only With You

And then there are the things that we do
That I've only done with you
Only With You

Before love had always had its up and downs
Until the love I finally found

I know one thing for sure I want to do
I want to spend this life with you
Only With You


Pour ecouter


http://www.fileden.com/files/2008/3/13/1811927/ONLY%20WITH%20YOU.wma

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Girls herd goats and sheep next to Kirisia Forest in Samburu West District where many children have also abandoned school due to poverty and insecurity.

from the Daily Nation....newspaper of Kenya


MAIS OU EST L'EGALITE DES CHANCES ???...Deux mondes dans un meme pays!!!

Le ministère de l'éducation du Kenya utilisera ePals pour connecter les écoles du Kenyan avec le monde entier

- ePals fournira aux classes kényanes le plus grand réseau social destiné à un apprentissage constructif

Le ministère de l'éducation du Kenya offrira à ses étudiants et à ses éducateurs la possibilité de se connecter en toute sécurité à des écoles du monde entier grâce à ePals (http://www.epals.com), le réseau social le plus important et à la croissance la plus rapide destiné à un apprentissage constructif. Utilisant des outils d'apprentissage et de cybermentorat sûrs, protégés et collaboratifs disponibles via ePals, les étudiants et les éducateurs kényans peuvent se connecter à des classes de 200 pays et territoires, et procéder ainsi à des échanges interculturels, à une pratique d'apprentissage de la langue et à une collaboration basée sur des projets afin de développer les compétences du XXIe siècle nécessaires à la réussite dans le cadre d'une économie mondiale.

>, a déclaré Barnabas Sang, responsable des technologies de l'information et de la communication pour le ministère de l'éducation du Kenya. >

Grâce à des milliers d'échanges ePals en Afrique ainsi qu'à des projets pilotes en cours à Nakuru, au Kenya, les efforts continus de l'entreprise offrent aux étudiants et aux éducateurs africains la possibilité de créer des correspondances interculturelles et des programmes collaboratifs basés sur des projets dans un contexte sûr et protégé grâce à ePals et à son riche ensemble d'outils scolaires de communication de premier plan. ePals s'est également associée à National Geographic afin de proposer un contenu numérique riche au site ePals, offrant des projets en profondeur et augmentant la perspective internationale. De plus, la communauté d'apprentissage sécurisée d'ePals, les outils de connectivité et les programmes numériques d'alphabétisation donnent aux éducateurs la possibilité d'aider leurs étudiants à développer les compétences numériques d'alphabétisation et d'apprentissage du XXIe siècle. L'entreprise s'est aussi associée récemment à Intel afin d'offrir un accès à sa Communauté internationale d'apprentissage sécurisée et connectée aux utilisateurs du programme international Intel-powered classmate PC, y compris des écoles de toute l'Afrique.

>, a déclaré Tim DiScipio, cofondateur d'ePals. >

Pour aider les éducateurs à transformer l'apprentissage, ePals offre des occasions de développement professionnel aux éducateurs intéressés par l'intégration d'outils de réseau social pour un apprentissage significatif basé sur des projets. Barnabas Sang s'exprimera au cours d'une pré-conférence spéciale d'ePals au cours de l'Alan November's Building Learning Communities 2008 Conference, organisée par ePals. Cet événement d'une journée, qui se tient aujourd'hui à Boston, dans le Massachusetts, verra également les présentations de cadres, d'éducateurs et de directeurs des techniques modernes d'enseignement. Les intervenants aborderont l'apprentissage des langues, l'alphabétisation numérique, les projets de correspondants interculturels, la mise en oeuvre au niveau du quartier, la manière de diffuser des podcasts sur des blogs, et la manière de mettre en relation les familles avec les professeurs grâce aux blogs afin de contribuer à l'apprentissage à l'extérieur de la salle de classe. Pour de plus amples informations sur l'ePals Globally-Connected Classroom Conference, accédez au site http://www.epals.com/conference.

Pour de plus amples informations au sujet d'ePals et des activités au sein de la communauté internationale, veuillez consulter http://www.epalscorp.com.


Source :

http://www.prnewswire.co.uk/cgi/news/release?id=232614

Kenya to benefit from UN campaign against hunger

Provision of fertilisers and other agricultural inputs to small farmers is intended to encourage donors, financial institutions and national governments to support the scheme on a much larger scale.

Kenya is among countries that have been selected to benefit from a $21 million UN project to shield poor households from the rising cost of food and farm inputs.

Through the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) backed deal, a number of projects are to be established in 48 countries to help farmers access agricultural inputs starting this month.

Eighteen African nations will benefit from the project.

“The immediate aim is to ensure the success of the next planting seasons and, in the longer term, demonstrate that by increasing the supply of key agricultural inputs, such as seeds and fertilizers, small farmers will be able to rapidly increase their output,” the agency said in a statement.

FAO reckons that increased production would help cushion small farmers from the adverse effects of highly priced food because they often have to buy part of their food from markets.

“Hopefully, the initiative may lead to the production of a surplus that could be sold to increase their income and improve access to food among urban populations.

Provision of fertilisers and other agricultural inputs to small farmers is intended to encourage donors, financial institutions and national governments to support the scheme on a much larger scale.

Reviving systems
The organisation said that countries most affected, especially in Africa, will in the in 2008-09 period need about $1.7 billion to start reviving agricultural systems that have been neglected for several decades.

“The unprecedented hike in food prices, which rose 52 per cent between 2007 and 2008, has had severe effect in poor countries,” FAO said.

This situation has been worsened by high prices of agricultural inputs such as fertiliser that are increasingly becoming a major obstacle to developing countries’ efforts to increase agricultural production.

Huge volumes
In Kenya the State intends to import up to two million bags of maize this year to try and mitigate the effects of violence witnessed in most production areas following the disputed 2007 elections that left huge volumes of produce destroyed.

The Government has also offered to import fertiliser in bulk through the National Cereals and Produce Board (NCPB) and pass it on to growers at affordable rates in a bid to boost their productivity.

Its prices have risen this year with a bag going for Sh2,000, up from Sh900 last year.

Student nurse to aid Africans

Needy Samburu drawing help

Emily Donoghue will be getting a different kind of education this summer.

Later this month, the MassBay Community College nursing student will travel to a remote region of northern Kenya, where she will be living and working with the Samburu people as part of a humanitarian aid and community service program sponsored by Kenya Aid and Relief Effort.

Ms. Donoghue was invited to come on the trip by her anatomy professor, Tina Ramme, who is president of the relief organization.


“Emily was selected to participate because she demonstrated compassion, integrity, and a willingness to sacrifice her personal comfort in order to assist some of the most marginalized people in East Africa,” Ms. Ramme said.

Ms. Ramme traveled to Kenya initially to help protect the lions, but changed her focus to the Samburu people when she learned about their plight.

“The Samburu District has recently been devastated by one of the worst droughts and famines in a century, resulting in the deaths of hundreds of people and the loss of over 85 percent of the region’s livestock, the only form of income in this area,” Ms. Ramme said.

Ms. Donoghue and seven other volunteers will be living and working with the Samburu assisting with emergency food distribution, critical health care services and clean drinking water projects, and helping to rebuild a local primary school.

In addition to working to repair the school, Ms. Donoghue said, she will present the school with school supplies she has collected before her trip.

“I have all kinds of materials to bring with me,” she said. “I’m bringing backpacks, posters, crayons and pencils.”

As part of their efforts, Ms. Donoghue said, the volunteers will be bringing food and water for the tribe from Nairobi.

“We are collecting money and will use it to buy rice and beans and water to distribute when we get there,” she said. Money also is being collected for a communal fund to assist the tribe during emergency situations, such as when food and water are scarce.

“We’re also raising money to buy solar panels to be used on solar ovens,” Ms. Donoghue added. “The women do all the cooking over open fires in their huts, with no ventilation, and many of them have respiratory problems. So we’re trying to provide them with a communal hut to cook in.”

Ms. Donoghue may get to see first-hand the effects of the open fire cooking as well as other tribal ailments because she also will be working in the tribe’s health clinic, assisting patients with malaria and other conditions.

“It’s a huge deal for them to have a clinic,” Ms. Donoghue said. “They’re in such a remote region.”

Ms. Donoghue said she is accepting tax-deductible donations of any amount to assist the Samburu people. Donations may be sent to the Lion Conservation Fund, Conservation KARES Program, P.O. Box 380 170, Cambridge, MA 02138.


http://www.telegram.com/article/20080712/NEWS/807120334/1008/NEWS02

Rural Kenya gets first zero emission community power centre

The first power-generating centre using environmentally friendly hydro and solar power has been inaugurated in a Kenyan village 150 kilometres north-east of Nairobi by the United Nations Industrial Development Organization (UNIDO).

Apart from generating electricity, the new centre in Kibai village in Kenya's Kerugoya division, promotes the use of Light Emitting Diode (LED) lamps to replace kerosene lamps that contribute to respiratory illnesses in children and women who use them on a daily basis, according to a statement issued in Accra on Wednesday by the UN Information Centre.

Kibai villagers have begun using the centre for phone and lamp charging as well as accessing the internet, a rare phenomenon in rural Kenya, where only 10 per cent of the population has electricity.

The statement said UNIDO was calling on communities without access to electricity to submit proposals for similar initiatives in Kenya for consideration by international donors.

The project is part of the "Lighting Up Kenya" programme led by UNIDO and other UN agencies with the objective of eliminating kerosene from home lighting, and using electricity for income generation

Article paru dans la presse kenyane de ce jour...un probleme sensible au Kenya et dans toute l'Afrique


EU plan to woo health workers from Africa extremely callous

The European Union plan to develop a “Blue Card” to attract highly-qualified migrants to meet its labour needs raises several urgent concerns, particularly for African governments grappling with critical shortages of health workers.

The International Organisation for Migration says Africa has already lost one third of its human capital and continues to lose skilled personnel at an increasing rate, with an estimated 20,000 doctors, university lecturers, engineers and other professionals leaving the continent annually since 1990.

The organisation estimates that currently, 300,000 highly-qualified Africans are in the diaspora, yet at the same time Africa spends $4 billion annually to employ 100,000 Western experts.

The effects of this brain drain are felt directly in key social sectors in Africa, particularly education and health.

Ten years ago, there were 1,600 doctors in Zambia; only 400 are left now. In Kenya, 90 per cent of the medical personnel migrate to the West every year.

There are more Ethiopia-trained doctors practising in Chicago alone than in the whole of Ethiopia, and more Malawian-trained doctors practising in Manchester than in their motherland.

Largely as a result of this massive haemorrhage of personnel, Africa has only three per cent of the global health workforce, despite bearing 25 per cent of the world’s diseases.

The health workforce is undoubtedly the driver of health systems. Immigration of this precious resource from Africa has resulted in severely weakened health systems that can barely provide services, leave alone pursue the aspirations of the Millennium Development Goals.

The proposed EU Blue Card, a special residence permit granted to immigrants, is only bound to aggravate the situation, legitimising labour movements to Europe at the expense of low-income countries in sub-Saharan Africa.

An exodus of health professionals will create even greater global imbalance, with host countries creating reservoirs of healthcare professionals to replenish their ageing workforce, while African countries have to put increasingly greater pressure on health systems that are already stretched to breaking point.

Ultimately, further depletion of Africa’s intellectual property will reverse gains made in eradicating extreme poverty and hunger, reduction of child mortality, improvement of maternal health, and the fight against HIV and Aids, malaria and other diseases.

The EU must consider the moral and ethical implications of its proposal before introducing the Blue Card. I would ask the EU to have an exclusion clause for health professionals.

But free movement is a human right, and African health professionals will move to Europe anyway, with or without the Blue Card.

Moreover, we cannot ignore globalisation, and the need for African health professionals to contribute to ameliorating the global burden of disease while enjoying the fruits of their hard work.

The challenges of stemming the brain drain are daunting, but certainly not insurmountable. But the efforts must be collaborative between African and Western governments and institutions that recruit from Africa.

To contain the health workers still on the continent and attract others from the diaspora, African governments must vigorously address the “push” factors that lead to migration.

They must provide health professions with employment, competitive salaries and incentives such as good housing, and career development, and health facilities with the necessary basic requirements.

Europe, too, must be proactive in ensuring that African health systems are not robbed of valuable human resources without compensation and restitution.

Support could be extended to programmes that train health workers for the African context, such as Amref’s’ Diploma in Community Health course, and the eLearning Programme that trains nurses virtually, allowing them to learn and work at the same time.

If Europe must recruit from Africa, it should invest in building the capacity of training institutions to enable Africa to train enough health workers for itself and to meet Europe’s needs.

With expanded physical and fiscal space, the EU could contract individual African countries to produce health workers for them.

Ultimately, both the EU and African governments must implement policies that address health workforce densities, the weakened African health systems and resultant inequities, and the global diseases burden.

written by : Dr Ngatia, Director for Capacity Building at the African Medical and Research Foundation (Amref)