It looked like an ordinary little drugstore. A reasonable supply of medication on the right, and man behind a small desk in the middle.
But what was on the desk was not ordinary: a netbook laptop and a fingerprint scanner. And on the left were boxes, all the same medication, with names written on them. “Try it,” Neema said. “Scan your finger.” I did and the screen turned yellow. “You have never been here yet” said Neema, “I cannot give you any medication.”
These are some of the views and reports relevant to our readers that caught our attention this week.
OpenAid
This is how aid transparency could look like
"People who argue for more transparency in development cooperation are often eager to point out all the merits of transparency. Unfortunately, often we are not very sure whether our claims are well founded. Even worse, there are very few examples who can illustrate how exactly, "more transparency" could look like. The International Aid Transparency Initiative which will be implemented by the first donors in 2011 is a concrete example of governmental and multilateral donors representing a large percentage of global ODA making aid information available and accessible.
Also, in non-governmental development cooperations efforts are underway to increase accountability and transparency. The UK-based NGO OneWorldTrust even created a website to map over 300 NGO accountability initiatives around the world. But there are few concrete examples of making the information about work of more than one NGO transparent and easily accessible."
You've probably been hearing a lot about COP 16 in the news—the United Nations climate conference, currently taking place in Cancun, Mexico. In case you're feeling kind of far removed from all the action, this video gives you an inside peek. It shows the exhibition area, where different NGOs are displaying what they are doing to address climate change in their home countries.
 |
| The International Advisory Group in action at Ban Sop On, one of the resettled villages at Nakai Plateau. |
A visit to the vast Pacific Ocean can make anyone feel insignificant. Yet despite its immense size, we've learned over the years that the old saying, "the solution to pollution is dilution," doesn't quite hold water (sorry for the pun) when it comes to trash, such as plastic bags. Garbage dumped in the ocean doesn’t just go away, it washes up on beaches or amalgamates in so-called "trash vortexes" in the Pacific.
An organization in Nairobi, Kenya, called UniquEco has been working to make good use out of a surprising type of debris that is apparently quite a nuisance there – flip flop-style sandals. Thousands of flip-flops that wash up on the East African shoreline every month apparently originate in Asia (link translated to English by Google – see the original page in Spanish here).
The organization, which also calls itself the "Flip-Flop Recycling Company", is taking the discarded footwear and having local artists turn handmade pieces of art and other products. They then resell some of the products to tourists and residents in Nairobi, while exporting the majority of the goods to distributors around the world, according to their website. Their online store has some pretty neat-looking items, including bags, wallets and even a chess set.
It's a pretty inventive and neat way to turn floating garbage into a useful form of revenue.
One morning two weeks ago I learned that, three floors above me, World Bank President Bob Zoellick was in animated teleconference with superstar Shakira on education issues (Shakira heads her own foundation called Pies Descalzos --Barefoot).
