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Tag: GreatLakesNews

  • Egyptian Firm Eyes EAC Poultry Market

    {{Wadi Group, an Egyptian agri-business firm has announced plans to enter the Kenyan poultry market, with the establishment of hatcheries in several semi-arid regions.

    Speaking during the African Food Security Conference in Nairobi, Wadi Group Chief Executive Officer, Tony Freiji, said the investment will see Kenyan poultry farmers in semi-arid and arid counties receive specialised training in best poultry-rearing practices to meet local demand for high-quality animal proteins as well as produce for export.}}

    ”We know the Kenyan government is very keen and serious in putting the necessary measures and fundamentals for achieving food security by providing fast-growing, disease-free day-old chicks, as well as well-balanced feed for a solid and profitable poultry industry,” Freiji said.

    Wadi Group said it hopes to start operations in Kenya by April next year to provide local farmers with high-quality breeding stock by setting up state-of-the-art poultry farms and incubation facilities, provide high-quality feed and advanced technical services.

    This is expected to increase productivity, make poultry farming more profitable and spur economic growth in semi-arid counties.

    Among areas targeted by Wadi Group include Mombasa, Mogotio, Kwale and Garissa.

    Wadi Group has been a key player in the development of the poultry industry in Egypt where it has been in operation since 1984. It has also set up operations in Lebanon, Syria, Jordan, KSA and Sudan from scratch on a fast track, by expanding vertically and horizontally in other industries that serve the poultry sector.

    Over the years, Wadi Group has acquired the capacity and expertise in moving poultry consumption in arid countries from subsistence to industrialisation in more than six countries.

    In those countries, Wadi Group has played a major role in educating the farmers through their free veterinary and husbandry services, which empowered them to develop their own poultry enterprises and grow to profitability.

    Wadi Group has interests in other poultry farming related ventures such as manufacturing of chicken feed, cooling pads, grain handling, and logistics among others.

    “Food security is a legitimate right for every developing country; you neither have to be timid about it nor intimidated by pressure upon you,” concluded Freiji.

    While in Kenya, the Wadi Group delegation will also meet senior officials at the ministries of Agriculture and Industrialisation and Enterprise Development, the Investment Authority, as well as the Veterinary Authority.

    They will also meet County Governors for Marsabit, Mogotio, Garissa, Isiolo and Kitui to establish the legal and other logistical requirements for rolling out operations.

    wirestory

  • Al-Shabaab Militia Kills 4 Kenyan Police Officers

    {{Four Kenyan administration police officers were Friday evening killed and another one injured in a daring militia attack in a tail-end border division in Garissa County bordering the war-ravaged Somalia.}}

    According to the residents and government officials, the militia suspected to be members of the dread Somali Islamist group; Al-Shabaab raided Galmagala Police Administration post in Fafi district 10 kilometres from Somalia border at 6.30pm and killed the officers manning the station.

    The attack also saw scores of residents missing.

    Confirming to The Standard, the Garissa County Commissioner Mr Rashid Khatour said the armed attackers totalling about 40 descended unexpectedly on the camp before starting indiscriminate attacks using mortars, rocket propelled grenades and gun fire.

    “Our officers engaged the bandits in fierce gun fight. However, the officers who were at the station at the time were outnumbered by the attackers,” said the commissioner.

    The injured officer was rushed to Garissa General Hospital where he is undergoing treatment and would be transferred to Nairobi for a better medication.

    Khatour noted that scores of people who had been scared by the deafening gun shots and bursts of the explosive thrown at the administration police camp fled into the bushes and were currently being searched for by security personnel and the local people.

    The administrator said the attackers who the security agency believes are members Al-Shabaab were targeting the security camp as they direct all their attacks on the camp selectively.

    He said: “These criminal were out to dismantle the camp and kill all our security officers, but their evil terrorist plans were thwarted by our gallant security men who fought hard despite being overwhelmed by their attackers”.

    The administrator confirmed that part of the iron made camp was destroyed by the raining mortars and rocket propelled grenades.

    Source: {standard}

  • Kidnapped children rescued from DR Congo militia

    {{More than 80 children, some as young as eight years old, have been rescued from an armed group in the southeastern Democratic Republic of Congo and are being reunited with their families, the UN said Friday.}}

    The 82 youngsters, including 13 girls, had been recruited by force by the Mai Mai Bakata-Katanga militia who are active in the restive province of Katanga, the UN peacekeeping mission in DR Congo (MONUSCO) said in a statement.

    The youngsters, aged eight to 17, were separated from the militia on August 11 and 15 thanks to the joint effort of local child protection agencies in the province, MONUSCO added. The children had reportedly been recruited over the past six months.

    Forty of the rescued children “were immediately reunited with their families, while the remaining are receiving interim care pending reunification,” the statement read.

    MONUSCO head Martin Kobler said the UN was “extremely concerned” about ongoing reports of active recruitment by armed groups in eastern DR Congo.

    “Children face unacceptable risks when they are recruited for military purposes,” he said.

    “The recruitment of children, particularly those under 15 years of age, could constitute a war crime and those responsible must be held to account.”

    MONUSCO estimates that 163 children, including 22 girls, have been separated from Mai Mai Bakata-Katanga fighters since the beginning of the year.

    france24

  • Kenyan in Moscow hat-trick Delight

    {{Kenyan Olympic champion Ezekiel Kemboi cemented his status at the greatest steeplechaser of his generation by emulating his countryman Moses Kiptanui and securing a hat-trick of World titles with yet another supreme competitive performance.}}

    For much of 2013 he had to play second fiddle to his countryman, the 18-year-old rising star Conseslus Kipruto.

    Yet when it mattered most, once again, it was the veteran Kemboi who delivered the goods to triumph in this battle between young and old. Once more Kemboi was king.

    It was a ruthless display by the 31-year-old, who secured not only his third straight gold but also plundered a remarkable sixth successive steeplechase World medal after winning silvers in the 2003, 2005 and 2007 editions.

    Kipruto, who had boasted a two out of two winning record against his fabled countryman this season prior to today, had to concede defeat with the silver medal today, but surely his day will come.

    Back in bronze for a second successive World Championships was French athlete Mahiedine Mekhissi-Benabbad who enjoyed another consistent championship performance.

    When the gun went for the start of the race many eyes in the stadium were fixed on an absorbing men’s High Jump competition rather than the 15 finalists in the steeplechase. The main protagonists all raced to the front Kenyans with Kipruto making a move to the head of the field.

    With a familiar forward-leaning style the teenager looks a little awkward when running and he passed the 1km mark in 2:45.96 from his countryman Paul Kipsiele Koech, the third fastest man in history, who so rarely has been given the chance to show his ability on the championship stage.

    The fourth Kenyan Abel Mutai, the Olympic bronze medallist was also prominent as was Uganda’s Jacob Araptany and Evan Jager of the USA.

    {CapitalFM}

  • UN Says Polio outbreak in Somalia Worse

    {{Aid workers in war-torn Somalia are struggling to contain a dangerous outbreak of the crippling polio virus, with rampant insecurity hampering efforts, the United Nations said Friday.}}

    Six years after the Horn of Africa nation was declared free of the virus, at least 105 cases have been confirmed in Somalia, the “worst outbreak in the world in a non-endemic country,” the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs said in a statement.

    “The polio outbreak plaguing Somalia has spread despite significant efforts to curb the disease,” OCHA added.

    While some four million people have been vaccinated, getting drugs to more than 600,000 children in southern and central Somalia — areas partly under control of the Al-Qaeda linked Shabaab, who block vaccination efforts — is “extremely challenging”, it added.

    “The inability to fully access these areas constitute a major threat to the control of the outbreak,” the statement read, warning that “Somalia remains one of the most difficult and dangerous environments in the world for aid workers.”

    While over 100 cases of children have been recorded, “the fact that this number of children show symptoms of paralysis means that there are probably thousands more with the virus, who do not have symptoms, but are capable of spreading it,” OCHA added.

    Around 10 cases have also been reported in northeastern Kenya, which hosts almost half a million Somali refugees in sprawling camps.

    In Somalia, while the bulk of cases are in the southern and central regions, the outbreak has also spread to self-declared independent Somaliland in the northwest.

    Polio is spread by person-to-person contact, exacerbated by poor sanitation and a lack of clean water.

    Multiple armies are fighting for control of southern Somalia, including rival warlords, Islamist extremists and a rag-tag national army backed by a 17,700-strong African Union force.

    Aid workers report growing attacks on their staff.

    {Nation}

  • Sudan Says Floods Situation Doesn’t Amount to “Disaster”

    {{The Secretary General of the Arab League Nabil Elaraby called on member states to provide urgent humanitarian relief to the victims of floods and heavy rainfall that hit large parts of Sudan this month.}}

    in a statement issued Thursday, Elaraby appealed to Arab countries and their affiliated organizations as well as the local NGOs to send aid on a rush basis to the Sudanese government to help it provide the basic needs of more than 150,000 people affected by the floods which led to mass displacement and destruction of more than 26,000 homes.

    Elaraby said that the Arab League will continue to be in touch with Khartoum to get updates on items it needs to deal with the floods and the resulting humanitarian crisis.

    Yesterday, Kuwait joined a string of countries which announced that it will dispatch $2.5 million in relief supplies to Sudan as decided by cabinet meeting.

    “The decision was taken after assessing hard conditions of the brotherly Sudanese people, as a result of the floods and heavy rains that inflicted extensive losses,” the Minister of State for Cabinet Affairs and Minister of Health, Sheikh Mohammad Abdullah Al-Mubarak Al-Sabah in told Kuwait’s official news agency (KUNA on Wednesday.

    “The cabinet has instructed Kuwait Red Crescent Society to coordinate with the Foreign Ministry to secure the relief supplies as soon as possible,” Kuna reported.

    So far the United States, Japan, Qatar, Egypt and Ethiopia have sent aid to Sudan though more help is believed to be needed.

    On Thursday, the Sudanese interior minister Ibrahim Mahmoud Hamid told reporters that his ministry’s figures show that 53 people were killed, 77 inured, 40,578 families affected, 20,207 homes completely collapsed and 21,999 partially damaged, 3,000 heads of livestock perished and 251 public buildings were impacted that were primarily schools.

    But the minister insisted that the losses so far do not warrant declaring Sudan a “disaster area” which would potentially help solicit more external aid and stressed that the situation is under control.

    Hamid added that the Nile river levels at the Murgan station in Khartoum registered 17.4 meters.

    The governor of Khartoum state Abdel-Rahman al-Khidir today disclosed his state was hit by 2 billion cubic meters of water stressing that it could have inflicted significant damage if it wasn’t for the existing drainage points.

    Sudan’s chief weather forecaster warned on Thursday that more floods should be expected in the coming days.

    “According to our information there is heavy rain in Ethiopia, and we expect flooding in the coming days,” Abdallah Khiar told reporters according tto Agence France Presse (AFP) .

    Rains in Ethiopia feed into the Blue Nile river which runs to Khartoum, Sudan’s capital.

    He called on imams to urge citizens and young people to contribute to discharging water in residential neighborhoods and contribute to the fund established by the state to support those affected.

    Al-Khidir hailed the role of national organizations, particularly the Red Crescent, saying it is playing an active role in correlation with the state to account for those affected and help in delivering aid to them.

    The International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC) said on Thursday that it launched an emergency appeal for 918,554 Swiss francs ($983,670) to help 35,000 people in Khartoum and River Nile states..

    Eight states in Sudan have been hit by flooding triggered by heavy rains that started in early August, damaging schools, health clinics, shops, markets and sanitation facilities, IFRC said.

    “The hardest hit areas include the states of Khartoum, Gezira, Northern and River Nile,” the IFRC added.

    “Some displaced families, mostly women and children, are camping along the tarmac road, others have found shelter staying with relatives who have homes on higher ground,” the group added.

    Source: {Sudantribune}

  • Kenya Fuel Prices Rise

    {{Kenyans will pay more for fuel after the energy regulator raised retail petrol, diesel and kerosene prices following increased global oil prices, higher import cost and the inclusion of rail levy.}}

    The Energy Regulatory Commission (ERC) on Wednesday directed the price of petrol to be increased by Shs803 [Ksh2.74] per litre to Shs3,277 [Ksh112.26] and that of diesel by Shs46.3 [Ksh1.58] to Shs3,070 [Ksh104.44] per litre in Nairobi.

    The prices of kerosene in the City have increased 5.5 per cent to Shs2,450 [Kshh83.93] per litre.

    This is likely to pile pressure on poor households who mostly use kerosene for lighting and cooking.

    The new prices will took effect on yesterday, and will be in force for a month.

    This is the second time in four months that motorists are paying more for fuel.

    In a statement on Wednesday, the regulator attributed the hike in fuel price to rising global oil prices, higher import cost and the inclusion of the 1.5% Railway Development Levy introduced by the government in June.

    Though the import cost for petrol fell marginally by 1%, this did not stop its prices from increasing due to the rail levy.

    {NMG}

  • Kenya Airport Head Removed After Blaze

    {{The contract of the managing director of Nairobi airport will end in October, the Kenya Airports Authority (KAA)’s board has announced, a week after a devastating fire destroyed a large section of the capital’s Jomo Kenyatta International Airport (JKIA), East Africa’s largest.}}

    In a statement released on Thursday, the board said Stephen Gichuki would “proceed on his terminal leave in accordance with the state corporations and regulations provisions”.

    The statement, published on KAA’s website, did not say Gichuki was being sent on leave in connection with the fire but it said the authority had decided to “follow due process” in hiring a new managing director.

    It added that the position would be advertised in the local media.

    Lucy Mbugua, who has been KAA’s general manager for marketing and business development, was named managing director in acting capacity, the statement said.

    A huge fire engulfed JKIA’s arrival hall on August 3, destroying the arrivals hall and causing the cancellation of dozens of flights.

    The airport reopened for domestic and cargo flights on the day the fire broke out, but only resumed international flights a day later after firefighters put out the blaze, which began as a small fire before it swelled into an inferno.

    {agencies}

  • Ethiopia’s Aman Steps into Rudisha’s Shoes

    {{Mohammed Aman was outmuscled and jostled, but belied his diminutive size to produce a devastating sprint and claim a first-ever medal of any colour for Ethiopia in the world 800m by winning gold on Tuesday.}}

    The two-lap event had sadly been shorn of the sublime talents of the injured David Rudisha, the Kenyan who broke the world record in winning the Olympic title last year.

    But, in his absence, Aman, the 19-year-old world indoor champion who has twice got the better of Rudisha, stepped into the void with some style.

    “I’m the first Ethiopian to win a 800m gold medal!” Aman said. “This gold medal is a big thing for me and my country.

    “It was not easy, a world championships final is such a hard race. All the athletes in the race were very strong and it’s a double pleasure to be first in such company.”

    Aman added: “I was confident because I have speed on the last 100 metres and also nervous because it is the worlds and one has to be careful and smart.

    “I didn’t want to be boxed in like the semi-final so I just stayed patient when Symmonds and Solomon kicked off.”

    The race was bunched for all but the final 200 metres, fancied American Duane Solomon bossing his way into the front as Frenchman Pierre-Ambroise Bosse almost sideswiped Aman coming out of the first corner run in lanes.

    At the bell, American Nick Symmonds came racing through, Aman again muscled out of the way and then boxed in behind the leading American duo.

    The field spread with 200m to go in the run-in to the home strait. Symmonds went wide around Solomon, but Aman worked to go wider and outsprinted the American to the line for victory in 1min 43.31sec.

    Symmonds held on for silver in 1:43.55, with a fast-advancing Ayanleh Souleiman claiming bronze in 1:43.76, a first medal for Djibouti since Ahmed Salah won silver in the marathon in the 1991 Tokyo worlds.

    “I’m happy with my performance,” said Symmonds. “I had a chance for gold and I hope some day I’ll win it.

    “The competition without Rudisha was like a gift on a silver plate and nobody wanted to waste the chance.”

    Souleiman said that “tonight all of Djibouti will celebrate because there hasn’t been any medal since 25 years”.

    “I’m still in the 1500m on Wednesday and God willing I will win.”

    Solomon, who finished fourth in the London Olympic final in a time that in all previous finals would have seen him win a medal, faded to sixth behind Poland’s Marcin Lewandowski and fifth-place Briton Andrew Osagie.

    {wirestory}

  • Women above 30 more Likely to Have Babies with Heart Defects

    {{A woman who gives giving birth at older age, above 35 years, has higher chances of her having babies with heart problems.}}

    This is because there are increased health risks associated with later-age pregnancies, according to Dr. Twalib Aliku, a paediatric cardiologist at the Uganda Heart Institute,

    “Taking of excessive amounts of alcohol, or having chronic medical diseases like diabetes can result in congenital heart problems,” he adds.

    According to Dr. Sulaiman Lubega, a paediatric cardiologist, the major cause of heart defects among children is unknown. Even mothers who are very cautious during pregnancy, for instance by staying away from alcohol and smoking, can still have a child with a heart defect.

    Aliku says some heart conditions may not be noticed during pregnancy and can cause death of the baby a few days after birth. A heart condition can also result from an infection such as streptococcus. “But some infections can be avoided,” Lubega adds.

    Aliku says premature birth also affects the growth of a baby’s organs like the heart; the blood vessels may not have developed fully resulting in a congenital heart disease called patent ductus arteriosus. A mother having infections like HIV, rubella, syphilis or even malaria can cause pre-term birth, predisposing the babies to heart disease.

    “When a pregnant woman takes strong medication like epilepsy drugs, it may damage the heart of the unborn baby,” he adds.

    {Newvision}