Seasonality is the observation that rural livelihoods in developing countries undergo regular, predictable, and often massive, changes according to the pattern of the seasons. In particular, the annual rains bring about - or bring to a peak - all sorts of effects - and most of them adverse if you are poor. These include starvation, energy depletion, increases in sickness, migration, shortage of money and going into debt.
It was a regular... Read more
It's not a new price plan for mobile phones or even a new smartphone app. But, it is smart and it is mobile. Vodafone's recent Connected Agriculture report is all about sharing information to help smallholder farmers grow more and grow better. And ultimately helping them grow their productivity and income.
The report, co-published by Vodafone and Accenture with a foreword from Oxfam GB, suggests that mobile... Read more
Kindles, iPads and other gadgets have been appearing in the office all this week as we test our exciting new venture - Oxfam's first ever eBook.
The digital edition of the Growing a Better Future: Food justice in a resource constrained world report launches today to coincide with GROW week - a week of activism highlighting the world's broken food system that sees one billion people going hungry each day.
... Read more
16 October is World Food Day and the theme for 2011 is food prices - very fitting in light of Oxfam's recently launched GROW campaign.
In this year's address for World Food Day, Jacques Diouf, Director-General of the FAO (Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations), has called for serious reflection on what causes swings in food prices, and on what needs to be done at national, regional and global levels to... Read more
This weekend marks two days that - like it or not - should be of increasing relevance to us all: World Food Day, on Sunday 16 October, reminds us how upswings in food prices are hitting the poorest hardest. And Saturday, World Food Day's eve, is International Rural Women's Day.
The running together of these two days is no accident - celebrating rural women before highlighting trends in world food production... Read more
250 farmers from all over Pakistan, with the support of Pakistani NGOs and Oxfam have launched a Farmers' Charter of Demands urging the government to adopt agricultural reforms to better protect poor and landless farmers.
Key demands of the twelve point Farmers' Charter include calls for the reform of existing tenancy acts to allow workers to establish unions, demand fair wages and receive land titles supporting their legal rights... Read more