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"What is known about the laws and policies that shape children's lives globally? Previously, few global maps showcased children's rights in countries around the world. The Children's Chances website allows you to view maps of key policies for children's healthy development, and answer pressing questions such as: Can children in your country go to school? How many countries protect children from child labor? In which countries is child marriage legal? Does your country prioritize child health? Can parents in your country meet the needs of their children? How do the unemployed or underemployed fare across different countries? In which countries do children of different genders, religions or ethnicities have equal rights? Which countries support the education and inclusion of children with disabilities?"

"Syria has disappeared from the internet. That's not an exaggeration either, nearly the entire Middle Eastern country has been cut off from the web. A post from research company Renesys reveals that what effectively amounts to all of Syria's internet connectivity shut down earlier today: Starting at 10:26 UTC (12:26pm in Damascus), Syria's international Internet connectivity shut down. In the global routing table, all 84 of Syria's IP address blocks have become unreachable, effectively removing the country from the Internet. We are investigating the dynamics of the outage and will post updates as they become available. A more detailed post reveals that 77 networks, representing 92% of the routed networks in the country experienced an outage. The outage comes among increasing violence in the country. According to the Daily Star, the government cut off internet as well as cell phone activity amid increasingly fierce clashes between government troops and rebels."

"What kills people around the world - and how does it vary by country? The Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation have published their latest report in to the global burden of disease today and alongside the release have launched a range of visualisations showing how the data breaks down by country. Explore one of the new interactives below and see how causes of death have changed over time. Use the drop down menu to view data by a specific country and to change indicator"

"McDonald's may seem to be everywhere, but there are still 105 countries without the fast food giant, from Ghana to Jamaica to Yemen to Tajikistan. And in six countries, McDonald's once had a presence, but due to economics, and sometimes politics, the franchises closed. Still, Jack Russo, a consumer goods policy analyst with the financial services firm Edward Jones, tells The Salt that McDonald's is well-represented overseas. "Two-thirds of their total revenue is outside of the U.S.," Russo says. The company has 34,480 restaurants in 119 countries, including Cuba and France, where it's especially beloved, even by foreigners."

"f you traverse the South American nation of Bolivia, from the heights of the Andes Mountains to the Amazon Jungle to the urban streets of Santa Cruz, you'll never once find a Big Mac or a McNugget. They don't exist there-and haven't for about a decade. McDonald's couldn't survive in the mountainous country, so in 2002 the global fast-food chain closed its last store."

The index has been developed by the risk analysis company Maplecroft for governments, NGOs and business to use as a barometer to identify those countries which may be susceptible to famine and societal unrest stemming from food shortages and price fluctuations. This map shows the results of evaluating the availability, access and stability of food supplies in 197 countries, as well as the nutritional and health status of populations

"0.85 - the amount in degrees Celsius that the world's land and oceans warmed between 1880 and 2012. 3.7 - the amount in Celsius of extra global surface warming we will likely get between 2081 and 2100 if greenhouse gas emissions stay roughly on their current path. 14 - the number of chapters in the full Climate Change 2013: The Physical Science Basis report. Australian scientists feature as authors in 11. 19 - the amount in centimetres the world's oceans have risen between 1901 and 2010. 36 - the number of pages in the summary document. 39 - the number of countries represented in the list of authors and review editors for the full report. 40 - the percentage rise in the concentration of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere between the years 1750 and 2011. 55 - the number of countries represented in the list of expert reviewers. 63 - the amount in centimetres of extra sea level rise we will likely get between 2081 and 2100 if greenhouse gas emissions stay roughly on their current path. 90 - the percentage of the extra energy in the climate system between 1971 and 2010 that has been taken up by warming oceans. 209 - the number of lead authors who worked on the full report. 600+ - the number of contributing authors to the full report. 1089 - the number of self-appointed expert reviewers of the full report. 1250 - the number of figures (that's charts, graphs and other eye candy) contained in the full report. 2000+ - the number of pages in the full draft of Climate Change 2013: The Physical Science Basis. 9,200 - the number of scientific publications cited in the full report. 54,677 - the number of comments made on the full report by the group of self-appointed expert reviewers. 1,400,000 - the number of words in the full report. 2,000,000+ - the amount in gigabytes of numerical data gathered from computers running models of the world's climate systems. 30,000,000,000 - the tonnes of ice that "likely" melted from the Antarctic Ice Sheet on average each ye

"Explore new estimates of migration flows between and within regions for five-year periods, 1990 to 2010. Click on a region to discover flows country-by-country."

"By Christmas Eve, the Philippines will have spent $1bn (£0.6bn) paying foreign debts in the seven weeks since typhoon Haiyan devastated much of the country. It will have spent a total of $8.4bn on foreign debt in 2013, and faces a further $8.8bn in 2014. While a little more than $100m has been pledged by international donors for relief work, more than 800 times that amount of money leaves the country every year to pay debts"

"Throughout the 20th century, and continuing into the 21st century, governments have tried to develop the world's poor countries. Development efforts have sought to increase national income, lift poor people out of poverty and improve their quality of living. However, people have had different ideas about how to best develop poor countries.  This resource considers six of those approaches."

"Hans Rosling shows how measurement reveals incredible progress in saving the lives of children in what were once labeled "developing countries." If the few countries that still have high child mortality"

"For five years in a row, Iceland has been rated the country with the world's smallest gender gap by the World Economic Forum (WEF). The rating means Iceland is the country where women enjoy the most equal access to education and healthcare. It is also where women are most likely to be able to participate fully in the country's political and economic life."

If you can spare 5 mins have a look at this. Click on the country to find out how much we owe??? I thought Greece was in trouble. Look at the US as well

sir, if we owe the US 578.6bn and they owe us 834.5bn why cant they just cancel out our debt and the US pay the difference? seems silly,accounting for debt that both countries owe.

"Millions of tonnes of old electronic goods illegally exported to developing countries, as people dump luxury items"

Very clever gaphic. Can you spot interesting examples of how Developed economies help pooere countries.

China: snapshot of a decade As the country prepares for its 10-year power handover, we look at how it has changed. Also, we debate what should be the main priority for new leader Xi Jinping. Share your suggestions

In particular, the OECD's projections for 2060 (at constant purchasing-power parities) show the impact of fast catch-up growth in underdeveloped countries with big populations. Economic power will tilt even more decisively away from the rich world than many realise. In 2011 the current membership of the OECD made up 65% of global output, compared with a combined 24% for China and India. By 2060 the two Asian giants will have a 46% share of world GDP, the OECD members a shrunken 42%. India's economy will be a bit bigger than America's, China's a lot.

"Human Development Index HDI is advanced as being a better indicator than "GDP per capita" in measuring the progress of Nations. HDI is calculated by UNDP from indicators for health, education and living standard (income/person). The methodology is quite complicated but it well documented http://hdr.undp.org/en/statistics/hdi/ BUT look at a plot of the correlation between HDI and GDP/capita or all countries in Gapminder World www.bit.ly/XxQw0B "

"Brazil has announced that it will cancel or restructure almost $900m (£600m) worth of debt with Africa. Oil- and gas-rich Congo-Brazzaville, Tanzania and Zambia are among the 12 African countries to benefit. The move is seen as an effort to boost economic ties between the world's seventh largest economy and the African continent."

"Ghanaian authorities have arrested 124 Chinese citizens for illegal gold mining in the resource-rich west African country, highlighting the social and environmental challenges posed by China's growing presence on the continent."