General

Hunger on the Rise in Africa—UN

Published

7 years ago

14/02/2019

By Dipo Olowookere

A new United Nations report reveals that hunger is on the rise in Africa following years of decline due to a number of reasons, including difficult global economic conditions, adverse climatic conditions due to El Niño and soaring staple food prices.

Titled The 2018 Africa Regional Overview of Food Security and Nutrition Report, the joint UN Report reveals that the prevalence of undernourishment continues to rise and now affects 20 percent of the population on the continent, more than in any other region.

After years of decline, recent statistics from the joint report of the Economic Commission for Africa (ECA) and the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) show that there are 821 million undernourished people in the world.

Of these, 257 million are in Africa, of which 237 million in sub-Saharan Africa and 20 million in Northern Africa. Compared to 2015, there are 34.5 million more undernourished people in Africa.

Nearly half of the increase is due to the rise in the number of undernourished people in Western Africa, while another third is from Eastern Africa.

In her speech during the launch of the report, ECA’s deputy Executive Secretary, Giovani Biha, said the report sounds alarm bells for the continent, adding at this rate, Africa does not seem to be on track to achieve sustainable development goal number 2, which is zero hunger

“Interestingly, African economies grew at impressive rates often exceeding five per cent over the past decade spanning from 2004 to 2014. However, poverty and hunger are still hanging in as significant economic growth has not been integrated and inclusive,” she said.

She said to achieve the SDGs by 2030, including SDG 2, Africa needs to enact reforms that would help build resilience, and raise potential growth and its inclusiveness.

Achieving this would require policies to enhance the continent’s structural transformation efforts through the facilitation of the reallocation of labour and capital towards more productive sectors of national economies, including modernizing the agriculture sector.

Food insecurity in some countries in Africa has been worsened by conflict, often in combination with adverse weather, which has left millions of people in need of urgent assistance.

For her part, Ms Maria Helena Semedo, Deputy Director-General, FAO, said it is sad that after years of progress, the continent was regressing in its efforts to improve food security.

“Policy-makers must work towards scaling-up actions to strengthen the resilience of people’s livelihoods, food systems and nutrition to climate variability and extremes,” she said, adding the FAO will continue to work with its partners in an effort to combat hunger on the continent.

Based on ECA research, countries need to address food and nutrition insecurity within a holistic approach, one built around six main lines of action that involve dealing with water, energy and food stress, with a view to managing natural resources sustainably to secure land and water rights and creating a macroeconomic environment that promotes the efficient use of natural resources; integrating food security into rural and agricultural transformation programmes, with the aim of enhancing the resilience of rural residents; developing pro-poor policies that enhance the purchasing power of poor people; developing national approaches to food and nutrition security that are resilient to shocks and other stresses; encouraging and facilitating a multi-sectoral approach to food security and resilience through coordinating plans and programmes across line ministries; and orienting national food security policies towards more domestic food self-reliance, within a sub-regional/regional economic community perspective.

General

Kwara Governor Removes Deputy Chief of Staff, Others in Minor Shake-up

Published

8 hours ago

29/06/2026

Business Post Contributor

By Aduragbemi Omiyale

The Governor of Kwara State, Mr AbdulRahman AbdulRazaq, has removed his Deputy Chief of Staff and the Principal Private Secretary.

In a statement on Monday by his Deputy Chief Press Secretary, Mr Mashood AbdulRafiu Agboola, it was disclosed that the Governor also removed all Special Advisers, Advisers, Senior Special Assistants, and Special Assistants in the “minor cabinet shake-up.

It was explained that the action was to extend opportunities to more party members and inject fresh energy into the administration.

Mr AbdulRazaq directed them to hand over all government properties in their custody to the Office of the Secretary to the State Government.

He thanked the affected appointees for selfless service to the state and his administration, wishing them well in their future endeavours.

“His Excellency expresses his gratitude to all the appointees for their priceless service to the state. He wishes them the best in their future endeavours,” the statement noted.

General

Xenophobia: FG Evacuates More Nigerians as South Africa Protests Loom

Published

8 hours ago

29/06/2026

Adedapo Adesanya

By Adedapo Adesanya

The federal government has announced that another batch of Nigerians will be evacuated from South Africa on Tuesday as part of ongoing efforts to safeguard citizens ahead of planned anti-immigrant protests in the country.

Anti-immigrant groups in South Africa have set a June 30 deadline for immigrants to leave the country, planning widespread demonstrations on that date and threatening a national shutdown if the country’s government does not take significant action on immigration.

According to the spokesperson for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Mr Kimiebi Ebienfa, an Air Peace aircraft departed Nigeria on Monday and is expected to return to Lagos on Tuesday morning with another group of Nigerians who opted for voluntary evacuation.

The latest operation comes as anti-immigration groups prepare to stage demonstrations from June 30. The government has continued its evacuation programme for Nigerians who have indicated a willingness to return home.

Providing details of the latest flight, Mr Ebienfa said, “Nigeria will resume the evacuation of our nationals from South Africa today.

“Air Peace aircraft will depart Nigeria today, Monday, June 29, 2026, at 3:00 pm and is expected to arrive in South Africa at approximately 9:00 pm local time.

“The return flight is scheduled to depart South Africa at 12:00 midnight and is expected to arrive at Murtala Mohammed International Airport, Lagos, on Tuesday morning.”

He added that 271 Nigerians are expected to arrive on the evacuation flight.

President Tinubu approved the voluntary evacuation programme earlier this month to enable Nigerians willing to leave South Africa to return home safely.

Earlier in June, the federal government disclosed that five Air Peace evacuation flights had been approved after more than 500 Nigerians were screened for repatriation. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs said the flights were intended to ensure that all registered Nigerians who wished to return would be evacuated safely.

Before the latest operation, 328 Nigerians had already been repatriated in two batches. The first flight, which landed on June 11, brought back 262 returnees, while a second batch of 66 arrived in Lagos on June 25.

The evacuation exercise is being coordinated by the Federal Government in partnership with Air Peace and other relevant agencies.

General

Why Ad Platform Policy Changes Are a Hidden Risk in Every Outsourced Paid Media Relationship

Published

11 hours ago

29/06/2026

Dipo Olowookere

The rules governing digital advertising landscapes are never set in stone. Major platforms like Google, Meta, and TikTok frequently update their privacy frameworks, compliance requirements, and algorithmic bidding logic without giving agencies much time to prepare. When a marketing team decides to delegate its active campaigns to an external production partner, these sudden policy shifts can introduce a major element of vulnerability into the relationship. Integrating a professional white label ppc management structure allows your business to scale production and tap into high-level optimization talent without building a massive internal department. However, if your fulfillment partner is not built to monitor, interpret, and rapidly deploy adjustments in response to changing platform guidelines, your clients risk facing sudden account suspensions or massive spikes in customer acquisition costs.

Decoupling Technical Adaptability from Account Ownership

When an advertising platform changes its rules, the changes need to be made away in the live ad accounts. This is so the ads do not stop working. Sometimes there is a problem when one team thinks another team is taking care of making sure the ads follow the rules. The team that is supposed to make sure everything is working thinks the other team is doing this job. This can cause problems like missing information and ads that do not work. To keep your clients happy, you need a plan that says who is in charge of checking for rule changes, who updates the ad information, and who updates the ad text rules when the advertising platform changes its rules. You need to know who does what so everything runs smoothly. Advertising platforms and ad accounts are important for your clients.

Managing the Financial Fallouts of Compliance Delays

The real-world financial cost of failing to adapt to sudden policy changes can ruin an agency’s reputation and cause high client turnover. If an automated ad platform updates its rules for a specific industry—such as healthcare, real estate, or finance—and your campaign structure fails to adjust within the grace period, entire accounts can be paused overnight. While your backend team works to fix the errors, your client loses valuable inbound leads while their fixed overhead costs remain. Agencies must make sure their fulfillment partners don’t just focus on basic optimization but also maintain a proactive stance toward platform compliance to prevent budget waste and operational downtime.

Maintaining Strategic Alignment Through Platform Shifts

Relying on a partner to manage the daily execution of your paid media means you must remain highly aligned on how macro-level platform changes alter your broader strategy. When networks restrict traditional targeting methods, your backend white label ppc management team must quickly pivot to alternative solutions, such as first-party data loops or contextual targeting systems. If your vendor operates on autopilot without adjusting to these shifts, your campaigns will slowly lose efficiency as the old targeting methods become obsolete. Regular strategy sessions are essential to confirm that your optimization partners are actively adjusting their setups to remain effective beneath the latest network rules.

Building a Resilient Operations Partnership

To do well with ad networks, you need to work together with your partners and be able to change quickly. You also need to be open with each other. Ad agencies can not just set up their paid media. Forget about it. They need to keep an eye on it and make changes when needed. If you work closely with the company that provides your white-label service, you can protect your business from losing money. You should expect this company to tell you about changes to the network rules and to take action. The best partnerships are the ones where people work together all the time and make changes fast. This helps your clients make money consistently from their investments even when the rules of the ad networks change. Modern ad networks are always changing, so you need to be able to change with them to do well. Modern ad networks require a lot of work to navigate successfully.