B Lab Africa today launches the seventh cohort of its Resilient Sustainable Business (RSB) Program, the pan-African training initiative designed to help small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) build sustainability into how they operate, compete and raise capital. Applications for the cohort close on 9 September 2026. It is open to businesses across the continent, with core markets in Kenya, Mauritius and South Africa.

The announcement follows the graduation of the program’s sixth cohort in a closing session in Nairobi on 7 August 2026, which brought together participating businesses alongside financial institutions, investors and development partners.

Since its launch in 2025, the RSB Program has grown from a single cohort to an Africa-wide initiative. 211 participants from 195 businesses across 9 countries have now completed the program, with 17 going on to pursue full B Corp certification.

SMEs account for the overwhelming majority of African enterprise and employment, yet increasingly have to incorporate sustainability infrastructure designed for large corporates in order to attract investment capital and to grow. They face the same pressures – climate risk, rising insurance and input costs, tightening buyer and lender requirements, and export markets increasingly governed by European due diligence and carbon border rules – without the support of compliance teams, consultancy budgets or reporting systems that larger firms take for granted. (Press Release)

Fighting erupted early Thursday between government forces and militias on the outskirts of Somalia’s southwestern city of Baidoa, with reports of heavy gunfire and civilians fleeing their homes. Somalia’s Defense Ministry said government forces were responding to an attack by fighters loyal to former South West state President Abdiaziz Hassan Mohamed Laftagareen. … The clashes are the latest escalation in a political and security dispute between Somalia’s federal government and Laftagareen over control of South West state. Federal forces took control of Baidoa on March 30, after which Laftagareen resigned. He had governed the state since 2018. Clashes stopped in the early afternoon, but there was no official information on casualties or the extent of the fighting. Government troops patrolled the streets, ambulances rushed to the victims, and residents ventured out assessing damage and clearing out bloodied clothes from the pavement. (AP)

The United Nations Independent International Fact-Finding Mission for Sudan has identified Ethiopian nationals among foreign fighters serving with the Rapid Support Forces (RSF), while urging the Ethiopian government to engage with its investigation into illicit activities linked to the Sudan conflict. In its report titled “Fuelling Sudan’s conflict: weapons, fighters and external support networks,” submitted to the UN Human Rights Council on 1 September 2026, the mission said witnesses reported fighters from Ethiopia, South Sudan and Chad serving primarily in frontline roles with the RSF. The fighters, including women, were reportedly identified in El-Fasher and elsewhere based on language, accent and, in some cases, uniforms. The report, however, does not suggest that the Ethiopian nationals identified as fighting alongside the RSF were recruited, deployed or otherwise involved in the conflict at the direction of the Ethiopian government. Nor does it make a specific finding that the Ethiopian government supplied the RSF with weapons, financing or other forms of military assistance. … According to the report, the mission sent Ethiopia a request for information on 11 June 2026 but received no substantive response. It subsequently listed Ethiopia, alongside Libya, South Sudan and Somalia, among states it considers “non-responsive.” The mission encouraged their governments to engage with it, particularly in light of evidence of illicit activities stemming from their territories documented in the report. (Addis Standard)

A public limited company (PLC) is a corporation whose shares are publicly traded and regulated, allowing it to raise capital from the public.