A new executive agency, which will manage the forest resources in the country on behalf of the government, will be established under the recently launched Tanzania Forest Conservation and Management Project (TFCMP).

Between 3000 to 4000 children mostly from developing countries die every day in the world because their mothers are not empowered or supported to breastfeed their babies, a global meeting on Challenges of Breastfeeding in the 21st Century was told in Arusha.

Researchers measured the impact of maternal syphilis on pregnancy outcome in the Mwanza Region of Tanzania. Women with high-titer active syphilis were at the greatest risk of having low-birth-weight or preterm live births, compared with women with other serological stages of syphilis. Among unscreened women, 51 percent of stillbirths, 24 percent of preterm live births, and 17 percent of all adverse pregnancy outcomes were attributable to maternal syphilis.

The Burundian army is reportedly preventing civilians who are fleeing fighting between rebels and government forces from crossing the border into Tanzania, a spokeswoman for the UN refugee agency, UNHCR, told IRIN last Friday.

In Tanzania, a pioneering project seeks to empower farmers and strengthen rural economies through e-business. The Business Information Services (BIS) Project aims to position itself as a reliable source of information of business value to farmers and small and medium-scale enterprises in the rural areas. The Project intends to harness information and communication technologies (ICTs) to narrow the digital divide between urban and rural areas where for example mobile phones - that people in town take for granted - are scarce or non-existent.

More than 1,000 fearful Burundian refugees have fled their tiny central African nation for Tanzania over the last two weeks, sparking fears that the intensifying conflict between Burundian military and rebel forces could drive out larger numbers.

It is the elderly that suffer from the death of their children as a “significant proportion” of adults suffering AIDS return to their parents’ home shortly before they die. This is according to a survey in north-western Tanzania in 1991- 94 comparing the activities and wellbeing of the elderly in households before and after the death of a prime-aged adult with those of the elderly in households that did not experience the death of an adult.

Following a recent increase in fighting in Burundi, over 300 refugees have crossed the border into western Tanzania over the last three days, a humanitarian agency told IRIN last Friday.

A leading Tanzanian health official has warned religious and civic leaders against "infighting" and "finger pointing" in the war against HIV/AIDS in the country.

High adult mortality has resulted in the delay of the enrolement of children in primary school in parts of Tanzania, a new study has found.

Burundi government officials and representatives of the biggest rebel group in the country have begun peace negotiations in Tanzania's commercial city Dar es Salaam.

Government officials say a controversial song, in the national language Swahili, contains a verse that has been inciting people to go out and catch the disease. Music lovers insist the song was meant to scare people from forced marriages, a practice prevalent among the Wazaramu ethnic group living in Tanzania's coastal region.

Following recent confusion over the potential side effects of a new malaria drug - Sulphadoxine-Pyrimethamine (SP)- the Tanzanian health ministry has reiterated its faith in the drug as the most effective method of treating the deadly disease.

Tanzania's authorities insist that they need a new presidential jet despite reports that the World Bank has demanded an explanation.

Tanzania's land laws and ownership rights will have to be reformed if the country is to succeed in encouraging investment in agriculture, the presidents of the World Bank and Tanzania agreed last week.

Overcrowding in primary school classrooms might not be a cause for alarm in Tanzania but a group of visiting young politicians from the US were dumbfounded to learn that some classrooms in primary schools in Dar es Salaam accommodate as many as 270 pupils at a time.

A Tanzanian parliamentary committee has urged the government to speed up the repatriation of more than half a million people who sought refuge in the country after fleeing civil strife in neighbouring countries.

When large numbers of people are displaced from their homeland, neighbouring countries can find themselves shouldering a disproportionate share of the refugee burden. Yet, mass influxes of refugees, as happened in Tanzania after the Rwandan genocide, can also bring security threats and economic and legal problems for the host country.

Burundi's defence minister has accused neighbouring Tanzania of aiding anti-government rebels in their offensive. The claims came as Burundi's Tutsi-led army said it had killed 45 ethnic Hutu rebels in the south of the country this week.

An increasing number of Burundian refugees in camps in western Tanzania are "dropping out" of the repatriation process, despite having registered for it with the office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR).