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Cooperatives Can Get Women Out of Poverty
On July 3, Uganda joined the rest of the world in the celebrations to mark the 88th Annual Cooperative Day, a day which provides us with a chance to reflect upon the remarkable achievements of the Cooperative Movement. The theme for this year was Empowering Women, a section of society which has historically stood to gain the most from the movement, and continues to advance itself using cooperative tools. All over the world, women are choosing t...
- Region
- Sub-Saharan Africa
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Danone Expands Its Pantry to Woo the World’s Poor
RICHARD TOLL, Senegal-Twice a week after work, Senegalese webmaster Demba Gueye treats himself to a snack: a 10-cent tube of Dolima drinkable yogurt. It’s a splurge considering his two-dollar-a-day food budget, and the 50-gram sachets are "teeny." But the 25 year-old says they’re delicious. "I’m crazy about it," he says. The yogurt is an attempt by French food company ...
- Region
- Sub-Saharan Africa
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The AIDS Funding Dilemma
In the "AIDS exceptionalism" debate, emotions run high, and the options are difficult: Shift some AIDS funding to other care, or find billions in new support. Dr. Jerome Kabakyenga has just walked a pair of visitors through a pair of vividly different Ugandan hospital laboratories - one ultramodern, the other an outdated relic. ...
- Region
- Sub-Saharan Africa
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Can Ice Cream Help Pull Rwanda Out of Poverty?
Motorcycle taxis zip along the narrow tarmac road from Butare, Rwanda’s second largest city, to the National University on the outskirts of town. Along the verge, clusters of students mosey towards campus while men on bicycles laden with sacks of beans cruise past a backdrop of terraced hills. About halfway between town and the university, the students pause at a modest yet modern white-stucco storefront where a hand-painted banner announces the arrival...
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- Sub-Saharan Africa
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Menstruation Stigma Costs Girls Dearly: Development Group and MIT Create Affordable Sanitary Pads
Three days a month, Annalita is too embarrassed to go to school. The Rwandan teen, like millions of her peers worldwide, is menstruating. Her family can’t afford sanitary pads, so Annalita makes do with what few materials she can find including rags, bark and mud. But these makeshift pads are usually ineffective. Rather than focusing on her studies, Annalita spends her day anxious about a potential accident in front of her classmates. She also worries about embarrassment...
- Region
- Sub-Saharan Africa
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Innovation Provides Alternative Energy Source
Local handmade paper and products marketer and sales agent Phumani Paper is actively involved in assisting community-based enterprises to diversify their income base by introducing innovative products. One of these products is the ecofuel briquette. University of Johannesburg (UJ) associate professor in the Faculty of Art Design and Architecture Kim Berman explains that the fuel briquette is a round disc made of slightly decomposed and compressed plant matter,...
- Region
- Sub-Saharan Africa
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For Pennies, a Disposable Toilet That Could Help Grow Crops
A Swedish entrepreneur is trying to market and sell a biodegradable plastic bag that acts as a single-use toilet for urban slums in the developing world. Once used, the bag can be knotted and buried, and a layer of urea crystals breaks down the waste into fertilizer, killing off disease-producing pathogens found in feces. The bag, called the Peepoo , is the brainchild of Anders Wilhelmson, an architect and p...
- Region
- Sub-Saharan Africa
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Banking on Mobile Money: What Does It Mean For Kenya’s Economy?
Many technologists and entrepreneurs have argued that mobile phones can empower people in the developing world by providing civic and commercial resources where traditional infrastructure is lacking. But what actually happens when people start using such technologies? An MIT economist’s detailed new study from Kenya sheds light on the impact of a mobile phone-based money system in a developing economy. Kenya’s new mobile-money system, called M-PESA, really is ch...
- Region
- Sub-Saharan Africa
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