Shrinking Aid, Rising Instability: The Future of Peacebuilding in Sub-Saharan Africa
Peacebuilding initiatives across Sub-Saharan Africa are facing a difficult moment. While many post-conflict societies have made significant progress toward stability, dwindling international aid and growing geopolitical rivalries now threaten to reverse these gains. Unless African states rethink how peace initiatives are financed and sustained, the continent risks experiencing recurring cycles of conflict relapse and negative peace.
Aid for Trade and Development Cuts: How Donor Policy Shifts Are Deepening the Climate-Conflict Crisis in the Sahel
In major global donor capitals, from Washington and Ottawa to London and Paris, a growing “trade over aid” narrative is taking shape, with potentially catastrophic implications for the global humanitarian systems, particularly in the climate and conflict-ravaged Sahel.
Running away from Heat, Hunger and Violence: Understanding the Sequencing of Climate-Conflict Dynamics in the Sahel
The Sahel has become emblematic of the emerging risks at the intersection of climate change, conflict, and human insecurity. Droughts, erratic rainfall, displacement, and violence increasingly overlap, often prompting common narratives that climate change directly causes conflict.
The Next Digital Divide: Why Africa Risks Becoming an AI Consumer Rather Than an AI Creator
Africa has made major progress in expanding digital connectivity, but artificial intelligence is reshaping the global digital economy. The next challenge is no longer just getting people online. It is ensuring Africa can participate in building and benefiting from AI, rather than relying on technologies developed elsewhere.
Africa’s Digital Infrastructure Is More Exposed Than It Appears
Africa’s digital growth relies heavily on international infrastructure beyond its control. Instability in the Middle East is beginning to expose this dependency, highlighting both the risks and the need to build more resilient, locally anchored digital systems.
From Data Cables to Conflict Corridors: How Middle East Instability is Reshaping Africa’s Security and Political Landscape
Africa’s growing reliance on digital infrastructure intersects with a volatile geopolitical environment extending from the Middle East. As instability intensifies in that region, its ripple effects are increasingly felt across African security, governance, and political alignments. Understanding this linkage is essential to anticipating Africa’s strategic future.
Empowering roots: Why the World Trade Organization (WTO) Agreement on Fisheries Subsidies matters for small-scale fisheries
Key highlights –The WTO Agreement on Fisheries Subsidies, adopted in 2022, provides opportunities for Global South countries to reassess and establish better institutional and legal fisheries policies. Through the WTO Fish Fund, countries can identify legislative, regulatory, and institutional gaps in implementing the agreements’ disciplines. Such a process provides opportunities for marginalized small-scale fisheries to engage in socio-legal audits and strategic policy planning. However, potential risk of compliance should not institute new hurdles for SSF actors who lack capacity and resources.
Shaping Development Policies in the Sahel through Evidence-Based Synthesis: Progress from a BAOBAB-CLARE Programme Funded Team
Since early 2025, the “Climate Sahel” team has been gathering and analysing relevant scientific and policy materials across the Sahel region to conduct an in-depth evidence-based research synthesis process to guide development policies in the Sahel. The Climate Sahel team is one of six synthesis research teams supported by the African Synthesis Centre for Climate Change, Environment and Development (ASCEND) within the BAOBAB project at the University of Cape Town with funding from the Climate Adaptation & Resilience (CLARE) Program.
Cameroon Hosted the WTO’s Ministers – Were LDCs Able to Reshape the Rules?
Blogs Cameroon Hosted the WTO’s Ministers – Were LDCs Able to Reshape the Rules? Christelle Nfor and Chris Begealawuh, PhD The world’s trade ministers just wrapped up four days of negotiations in Cameroon. Some agreements were reached; others were not. Here is what happened. From March 26 to 30, 2026, the World Trade Organization (WTO) […]
BBNJ and the High Seas ambitions in the Gulf of Guinea (GoG) region: The need for more attention
The March 2026 BBNJ Preparatory Commission (BBNJ Prep Com III) meeting at the UN Headquarters provides an avenue for policymakers and experts to continue discussions on the Conservation and Sustainable Use of Marine Biological Diversity of Areas beyond National Jurisdiction (BBNJ).
