The Week with IPS 1/30

	Dumped, Abandoned, Abused: Women in India’s Mental Health Institutions Shai Venkatraman Following the birth of her third child, Delhi-based entrepreneur Smita* found herself feeling “disconnected and depressed”, often for days at a stretch. “Much later I was told it was severe post-partum depression but at the time it wasn’t properly diagnosed,” she told IPS. “My marriage was in ... MORE > >
	Missing Students Case Also Highlights Racism in Mexico Emilio Godoy The mother tongue of Celso García, a 51-year-old indigenous Mexican, is Mixteca. As a boy, García, the father of one of the 43 students forcibly disappeared four months ago, had to learn Spanish to make his way in mainstream society in this country where most people are of mixed-race ... MORE > >
	Good Harvest Fails to Dent Rising Hunger in Zimbabwe Busani Bafana With agriculture as one of the drivers of economic growth, Zimbabwe needs to invest in the livelihoods of smallholder farmers who keep the country fed, experts say. Agriculture currently contributes nearly 20 percent to Zimbabwe's gross domestic product (GDP), due largely to export earnings from ... MORE > >
	Kurdish Civil Society Against Use of Arms to Gain Autonomy Fabiola Ortiz A rupture inside the movement for the creation of an independent state of Kurdistan has given new impetus to the voices of those condemning the use of weapons as the way to autonomy. The 40 million Kurds represent the world’s largest ethnic group without a permanent nation state or rights ... MORE > >
	Conflict-Related Displacement: A Huge Development Challenge for India Priyanka Borpujari The tarpaulin sheet, when stretched and tied to bamboo poles, is about the length and breadth of a large SUV. Yet, about 25 women and children have been sleeping beneath these makeshift shelters at several relief camps across Kokrajhar, a district in the north-eastern Indian state of Assam. The ... MORE > >
	Teenage Girls in Argentina – Invisible Victims of Femicide Fabiana Frayssinet The murder of a young Argentine girl on a beach in neighbouring Uruguay shook both countries and drew attention to a kind of violence that goes almost unnoticed as a cause of death among Argentine adolescents: femicide. In most Latin American countries, the lack of broken-down official data on ... MORE > >
	When Ignorance Is Deadly: Pacific Women Dying From Lack of Breast Cancer Awareness Catherine Wilson Women now face a better chance of surviving breast cancer in the Solomon Islands, a developing island state in the southwest Pacific Ocean, following the recent acquisition of the country’s first mammogram machine. But just a week ahead of World Cancer Day, celebrated globally on Feb. 4, many ... MORE > >
	U.S. Ally Yemen in Danger of Splitting into Two - Again Thalif Deen When North and South Yemen merged into a single country under the banner Yemen Arab Republic back in May 1990, a British newspaper remarked with a tinge of sarcasm: "Two poor countries have now become one poor country." Since its birth, Yemen has continued to be categorised by the United Nations ... MORE > >
	U.S.-India Partnership a Step Forward for Low-Carbon Growth David Waskow and Manish Bapna India garnered international attention this week for its climate action. As President Barack Obama visited the country at Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s invitation, the two leaders announced a new U.S.-India agreement on clean energy and climate change.3 The agreement will help turn India’s ... MORE > >
	Zimbabwe Battles with Energy Poverty Tonderayi Mukeredzi Janet Mutoriti (30), a mother of three from St Mary’s suburb in Chitungwiza, 25 kilometres outside Zimbabwe’s capital, Harare, frequently risks arrest for straying into the nearby urban forests to fetch wood for cooking. Despite living in the city, Janet’s is among the 20 percent of the urban ... MORE > >
	Renewables Can Benefit Water, Energy and Food Nexus Wambi Michael With global energy needs projected to increase by 35 percent by 2035, a new report says meeting this demand could increase water withdrawals in the energy sector unless more cost effective renewable energy sources are deployed in power, water and food production. The report, titled “Renewable ... MORE > >
	Not Without Our Daughters: Lambada Women Fight Infanticide and Child Trafficking Stella Paul At 11 years of age, Banawat Gangotri already has four years of work experience as a farm labourer. The child, a member of the nomadic Lambada community from the village of Bugga Thanda in India’s southern Telangana state, plucked cotton and chillies from nine a.m. until 5 p.m. for about a dollar ... MORE > >