JAKARTA (The Jakarta Post) -- Two women activists, Aleta Ba'un from East Nusa Tenggara and Mutmainah Korona from Central Sulawesi, were presented with the Saparinah Sadli Award Friday in recognition of their leadership roles in their local communities.

Aleta was awarded for her brave efforts in defending the rights of tribal communities in Soe regency against a mining company, while Mutmainah was honored for successfully pushing for gender-sensitive regulations in villages in Donggala regency. Melani Budianta, who headed the panel of judges that selected the award recipients, said the two women were selected from 100 nominees from across the country.
@H=Women best teachers
@T=KAMPALA (allAfrica) -- Pupils taught by female teachers perform better than those taught by male teachers, according to a report released by UNEB on Friday.
The report based on a national survey says schools headed by female teachers performed better than those headed by their male counterparts. In addition, the survey discovered that Ugandan pupils lose at least 21 lessons each term because their teachers go shopping on market days during class hours. The survey, carried out by the National Assessment and Progress in Education (NAPE), on behalf of the Uganda National Examinations Board (UNEB), covered a sample of 405 randomly selected schools countrywide.

@H=Overweight women less likely to keep breast-feeding
@T=NEW YORK (Reuters) -- The heavier a woman is when she becomes pregnant, the less likely she is to stick with breast-feeding long-term, a new study from Denmark shows.
While U.S. studies have also shown that heavier women are less likely to nurse their infants, the current investigation took place in a country where breast-feeding is nearly universal and receives plenty of social support, suggesting that there is some biological mechanism by which excess weight interferes with breast-feeding success, the study's authors say. ""It's some sort of hormonal imbalance, potentially, we don't know for sure,"" Dr. Jennifer L. Baker of Copenhagen University Hospital, the study's lead author, told Reuters Health, pointing out that one study found that secretion of the hormone prolactin was blunted in overweight nursing women. But the findings also show, she added, that with plenty of assistance even very obese women can breast-feed successfully.