Clinton To Meet With South African Leaders

Main Category: HIV / AIDS
Also Included In: Aid / Disasters;  Public Health;  Nutrition / Diet
Article Date: 10 Aug 2009 - 1:00 PDT

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After arriving in South Africa on Thursday as part of her 11-day African tour, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has "encouraged South Africa to take a leadership role on the political crisis in neighboring Zimbabwe," Bloomberg reports. "South Africa is very aware of the challenges posed by the political crisis in Zimbabwe, because South Africa has 3 million refugees from Zimbabwe," Clinton said (Zacharia, 8/7). On Friday morning, Clinton met with South Africa's Minister of International Relations and Co-operations Maite Nkoana-Mashabane at the Presidential Guest House in Pretoria to "establish a new formal counsel between the two countries," IOL reports (Mashego, 8/7). Also on Friday, she will meet with former South African President Nelson Mandela and address business leaders, VOA News reports (8/7).

During her time in the country, Clinton is scheduled to meet with Deputy President Kgalema Motlanthe, according to the BBC. She will "attend a conference with Health Minister Aaron Motsoaledi before attending National Women's Day events" in Pretoria (8/7). "She will also tour a clinic handling South Africa's AIDS epidemic and head Saturday to the coastal city of Durban for talks with President Jacob Zuma," Agence France-Presse reports (Tandon, 8/7).

According to the Seattle Times' blog, "Business of Giving," the U.S. Working Group on the Food Crisis has "used a visit by Clinton and Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack to the Kenya Agricultural Research Institute (KARI) to raise the question of whether U.S. tax dollars for food-related aid to Africa are being spent wisely." The blog examines some opinions that U.S. food security policies take a "narrow approach" and put "too much emphasis on biotechnology," and includes information about a report commissioned by the World Bank and U.N. to evaluate how agricultural methods affect hunger and poverty, rural livelihoods, health and sustainable development. It also examines the Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa, which is a grantee of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation (Heim, 8/6).

This information was reprinted from globalhealth.kff.org with kind permission from the Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation. You can view the entire Kaiser Daily Global Health Policy Report, search the archives and sign up for email delivery at globalhealth.kff.org.

© Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation. All rights reserved.

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