The note examines regional planning, and future participatory methods for economic development in West Africa, based on the work carried out by the Club du Sahel - a branch of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) - responsible for coordinating northern donor agencies,...

At a time when the fate of national representative government in Senegal, still hangs in the balance, a variety of grassroots organizations is seemingly, and unexpectedly laying some of the groundwork for future change. Notions of "democracy" - adapted to local Senegalese conditions - are being...

The note looks at the intellectual property rights connected with the use, and value of medicinal plants, which has become a metaphor to describe indigenous ownership of traditional knowledge, generating options for contractual mechanisms to ensure benefits return to source cultures, and...

While many of the languages in Africa may be related, and inter-comprehensible, it is also a multilingual continent, where a relatively high proportion of the population speaks, or understands more than one language. However, the distribution of languages is not uniform. The reasons are both...

In spite of the cultural, traditional taboo on the subject of pregnancy in most African households, the success of the Africare's Child Survival Project in Mali, documents the increased communication, and behavior changes in health seeking during pregnancy. Africare is a US-based private,...

The note examines the practical, and literate skills that students acquire at different levels in West African Koranic schools. It is a long-standing parallel system of education, yet, relatively unknown to development planers, thus seldom taken into explicit account in their policies, and...

The note identifies how an informal partnership between indigenous healers - with their ritualistic therapies - and donor-assisted programs - with emphasis on the family, and social adjustment - can provide a model of how indigenous, and Western scientific approaches can be pursued to provide...

In the early 1990s, the village associations (AV) in the Koutiala regions of southern Mali had an issue to sort out with the Malian Textile Company (CMDT) and won the case. Encouraged by the success, they united efforts again to address other problems and evolved into a union (SYCOV). The SYCOV...

The natural reserve of Ker Cupaam, is located along the Atlantic coast in Senegal, a fragment of a former national forest, basically for the protection of endangered species. Both the flora, and fauna had been severely damaged as a result of drought, grazing, and firewood harvest. Though...

The note reviews the efforts begun in 1979 by an illiterate farmer from Nwodua, Ghana, to bring instruction in the ways of a modern society to his community. The success led to further opportunities in functional literacy, and soon a full scale adult primary school was opened, which became the...