South Africa

Creating a system that provides quality education and training for all -young and old, regardless of race, class, or gender-is probably the greatest developmental challenge facing the South African government today. Women (and girls), particularly those of African origin, have been largely excluded from analyses of South African education. This article seeks to address this gap in the literature by examining South Africa's educational progress generally and that of its women specifically, especially African women, along with a discussion of the factors affecting the education of women in South Africa and possibilities for future redress.

Less than half of southern Africa's girls complete primary school (46 percent, compared with 56 percent for boys), while 26 percent enroll in secondary school (33 percent for boys). Though the statistics for boys are hardly uplifting - 44 million aged six to 11 are denied an education, compared with 60 million girls - girls have long faced more barriers to education than boys.

Ms. Winfrey's school, a $40 million project that opened Tuesday, is one of the most recent and high-profile projects in a growing worldwide campaign to improve girls' education. Such female-focused aid yields perhaps the highest dividends for developing nations, say experts, though they are quick to point out that boys face challenges as well.

A cervical cancer vaccine has been given the go-ahead for use in South Africa, a pharmaceutical company has said. Glaxo SmithKline (GSK) said the vaccine had been approved and registered by the Medicines Control Council. An estimated 6 700 South African women develop cervical cancer every year.

The broad argument made in global and local discourse about microbicides centers around the concept of "female control" over HIV prevention via virginal inserted microbicides. This argument positions women as subordinate to men in sexual choice-making and in decision making about HIV prevention during sex- particularly a lack of control over choosing to use a male condom.

Whilst the argument of gender power imbalances maybe supported through research, it does not allow that the factor inherent in female disempowerment over sexual choice-making and HIV prevention are readily addressed by microbicides technology.

Although caring for children orphaned by AIDS is increasingly acknowledged as a priority area for HIV/AIDS and development programs, there is limited knowledge on caregivers. Rapidly growing numbers of children orphaned by AIDS warrants increased attention from researchers, policy makers, and program planners. This paper explores dominant theoretical and policy paradigms of care for children orphaned by AIDS. Then, drawing from an analysis of interviews with staff at nongovernmental organizations and community based organizations, and focus groups with caregivers gathered during fieldwork conducted between July 10 and September 8, 2006 in KwaZulu-Natal Province, Republic of South Africa, this paper contrasts local understandings of childcare with theoretical and policy notions of care. Findings from this qualitative study suggest that childcare practices are more diverse and complex than those currently recognized within existing theoretical and policy formulations. Such findings lead to the conclusion that current policy approaches towards care for children orphaned by AIDS face a potentially detrimental disconnect with local realities of care. Re-formulating policies to take into account how local practices of childcare are shifting in dynamic ways in response to the pandemic will be essential for the formulation of effective policies and programs.

The Southern African HIV and AIDS and Gender Baseline Study is the most extensive study of its kind ever to be undertaken in the region. A corner stone of the Media Action Plan (MAP) on HIV and AIDS and Gender, the baseline study involved monitoring 37 000 news items in eleven countries of Southern Africa for a one month period. Among the wealth of information generated by this study is the fact that HIV and AIDS constitutes only 3% of total coverage in the region and that People with HIV comprise a mere 5% of news sources on the topic. The baseline study, conducted by the Media Monitoring Project (MMP) that leads the monitoring and evaluation leg of MAP, and Gender Links, responsible for the policy sub-sector of MAP, provides a key rationale for an ambitious programme to assist media houses in developing HIV and AIDS and Gender policies. MAP is led by the Southern African Editors Forum.

Amidst South Africa's escalating epidemic, its rapid social, economic and political transition, and the changing roles of the state, civil society and international actors, there emerge a multitude of complex and yet unanswered questions. My doctoral research, the larger backdrop for this scoping study, focuses on one such area: little is known about the dynamics of community-level mobilisation, nor about the interface between these groups and national and international bodies. This report investigates, in a preliminary way, one component within this - what is happening within South African ‘communities' and why?
Social mobilisation is a growing theme among AIDS researchers in southern Africa. Indeed, as we become increasingly weary of attempts to measure and predict ‘impact' (which could mean anything from macro-economic effects to psychological traumas), and as the promise of technological interventions (such as circumcision, microbicides and vaccines) inevitably begins to wane, some researchers are increasingly shifting their gaze to learn from what those most affected are doing every day to respond to HIV/ AIDS - a shift in focus from formulaic or sequential views of impact to understanding differentiated, creative, and perhaps unpredictable collective responses.

Media development organisations have the opportunity, through the kind of work they do and topics they cover, to lead by example in showing that gender is intrinsic to free speech, citizen participation, and progressive media practice and content.

Slowly, but effectively, the Internet is empowering women in Africa to follow events as they have never witnessed before. The latest case in point is the women in Somalia who have been following their country's peace talks in neighbouring Kenya via Internet usage.

The purpose of this initiative is to assist with the development of a database, containing ICT SMMEs owned by black or women as well as to recommend Black and Women ICT SMME support programs, which will address skills and enterprise development within SMMEs.  It may be expected that such ICT SMME support programs will ultimately increase employment and competitiveness in South Africa through the provision of more employable ICT workers.