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This 51-page report, published by the Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung, examines the sustainability, ethics, and quality, as well as the role of development co-operation, of citizen journalism in Africa. The study defines this kind of journalism as that produced by non-professionals and notes that it makes use of a wide range of tools including social media, the internet, and mobile phones to fill existing gaps in conventional news coverage. According to the study, new media platforms are changing how people communicate with each other around the world. However, computer ownership and internet access are still the prerogative of the wealthy in much of the African continent, but mobile internet access is on the rise and if current growth rates continue, African mobile phone penetration will reach 100 per cent by 2014. Both mobile phones and the internet provide exciting new opportunities for one-to-one as well as one-to-many communication. One concern raised in this context is the matter of quality standards and a code of ethics.

In November 2011 and March 2012, Women'sNet has been following and training a group of community media journalists to use online tools for reporting on climate changes and gender issues issues in partnership with the Media Diversity Development Agency. We were at the Conference of the Parties (COP17) to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change in Durban last November, you can see the results here.

The follow-up international meeting was held this week in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. The Rio+20 United Nations Conference on Sustainable Development, and the subsequent negotiations towards an agreement is already attracting criticism from many actors of civil society. Zonibel Woods reports on RH Reality Check:

Brazil, a country that in the past has championed women’s human rights, including reproductive rights, at the global level, has failed women in both Brazil and the world over.

During meetings to finalize the Rio+20 document, Heads of State will adopt in the next few days at Rio+20, delegates agreed on a plan short on vision and big on compromises. After three days of long, drawn-out negotiations, marked with lack of clarity about the process, a document to be signed off by heads of government was presented. Quickly gaveled through by the Brazilian chair, one after another government thanked Brazil for facilitating this document and largely expressed how this was the best they could do. By all accounts, despite the attempts to spin the outcome as a success, this document is neither “the future we want” nor what future generations deserve. In an effort to get consensus at whatever cost, Brazil forgot Rio: the vision and commitments of the Rio Earth Summit held 20 years ago.

After weeks of countrywide public hearings on which hundreds of thousands of taxpayers’ rands were spent, the department of justice and the select committee on security and constitutional development received a rude wake-up call on the controversial Traditional Courts Bill, reports City Press. Most of the provinces either rejected the bill or asked for massive changes. In what can be described as a victory for rural women, who have waged war against the bill since it was tabled in 2008, the department of justice will have to go back to the drawing board.