In a trip that has seen him visit Kenya, Tanzania, Mozambique and South Africa, Mr. Brown has launched a sort of Marshall Plan for Africa, a campaign to persuade rich western countries to ease the burden of debt on the continent's poorest developing countries. This he hopes to achieve by using Britain's presidency of both the European Union and the G8, the eight richest countries of the world excluding Russia.

The Chancellor's belief in the power of African women to transform their continent, according to the BBC's Mark Mardell, was brought about by several experiences, the first of which was a meeting members of a women's credit union.

They told him they have to work because they can't trust their husbands to come home with the money. And he was impressed that young women were willing to talk openly in front of thousands of people about being forced into prostitution by economic circumstances.

All the people he's met who are taking real local initiatives are women, Mr Brown said. And then he met up with Luisa Diogo, his opposite number in Mozambique - their finance minister. Well, not quite his opposite number. She manages to also combine the job with being prime minister.

14 January 2005