It has been nine years since Hillary Clinton proudly declared “women’s rights are human rights” at the United Nations Fourth World Conference on Women. Since then, world leaders have recognized that the key to economic, social and cultural development is rooted in the empowerment of women.
1. “More countries have understood that women’s equality is a prerequisite for development.”
— Kofi Annan, 7th Secretary-General of the United Nations, 2001 Nobel Peace Prize winner
2. “Everybody counts in applying democracy. And there will never be a true democracy until every responsible and law-abiding adult in it, without regard to race, sex, color or creed has his or her own inalienable and un-purchasable voice in government.”
— Carrie Chapman Catt, American women’s suffrage leader
3. “It is not gender which is destroying our culture…. it is our interpretations of culture which has destroyed gender equality.”
– A Cambodian civil society group
4. “This is no simple reform. It really is a revolution. Sex and race because they are easy and visible differences have been the primary ways of organizing human beings into superior and inferior groups and into the cheap labor in which this system still depends. We are talking about a society in which there will be no roles other than those chosen or those earned. We are really talking about humanism.”
— Gloria Steinem, American journalist
5. “Gender inequality, which remains pervasive worldwide, tends to lower the productivity of labor and the efficiency of labor allocation in households and the economy, intensifying the unequal distribution of resources. It also contributes to the non-monetary aspects of poverty – lack of security, opportunity and empowerment – that lower the quality of life for both men and women. While women and girls bear the largest and most direct costs of these inequalities, the costs cut broadly across society, ultimately hindering development and poverty reduction.”
– The Gender and Development Group -World Bank, from the report “Gender Equality and the Millennium Development Goals” (2003)
6. “The education and empowerment of women throughout the world cannot fail to result in a more caring, tolerant, just and peaceful life for all.”
— Aung San Suu Kyi, Daw Burmese-Myanmarese dissident and politician; Leader of National League for Democracy, Nobel Peace Prize Laureate
7. “No nation can ever be worthy of its existence that cannot take its women along with the men. No struggle can ever succeed without women participating side by side with men. There are two powers in the world; one is the sword and the other is the pen. There is a great competition and rivalry between the two. There is a third power stronger than both, that of the women.”
― Muhammad Ali Jinnah, founder of Pakistan
8. “Women will not simply be mainstreamed into the polluted stream. Women are changing the stream, making it clean and green and safe for all — every gender, race, creed, sexual orientation, age, and ability.”
— Bella Abzug, American politician, 1998 Defender of Democracy Award
9. “The connection between women’s human rights, gender equality, socioeconomic development and peace is increasingly apparent.”
— Mahnaz Afkhami, Iranian-American human rights activist
10. “Women’s chains have been forged by men, not by anatomy.”
–Estelle R. Ramey, American endocrinologist and psychologist
– Stephanie Lamm
Sources: Women’s Rights World, Better World Quotes, Goodreads
Photo: Politic365
Malaria 101 and Key Facts
Malaria is caused by the parasite called Plasmodium and is transmitted through four different types of mosquitoes. It occurs in tropical and sub-tropical areas, though it is most common in the African Region. Malaria causes high fever, chills and other flu-like symptoms. Plus, if left untreated, this parasitic disease can cause death. Many global health and humanitarian aid organizations are focused on fighting malaria in developing countries while significant scientific research investigations into possible cures for this parasitic disease are also being done.
The World Health Organization (WHO) reports that in 2012, there were 217 million malaria cases and 627, 000 malaria related deaths, mostly in African children. In fact, one child dies every minute from this disease in the African continent.
Where is Malaria Found?
Malaria is found in tropical and sub-tropical regions where there are warm temperatures, high humidity and lots of rainfall. In order for malaria to occur, the climate must be one in which anopheles mosquitoes can survive and multiply. The Plasmodium parasite must also be able to complete their life cycle inside the mosquitoes.
For example, the most severe strain of malaria cannot be transmitted in temperatures under 68 degrees Fahrenheit because the parasites themselves cannot complete their life cycle inside the mosquitoes. The warmest climates close to the equator thus have the highest rates of malaria transmission. In effect, this parasitic disease occurs year-round in endemic levels within sub-Saharan Africa, New Guinea and South America.
How is Malaria Spread?
Malaria is typically spread through the female anopheles mosquitoes. This particular mosquito is a “dusk-to-dawn” mosquito, meaning it only comes out at night, which is why people in warm climates are encouraged to use sleeping nets. When the mosquito bites someone already infected with malaria and ingests their blood, the parasite is taken in as well, developing inside them and infecting their saliva. Once the parasite has completed a full life-cycle within the mosquito, the disease will be spread to the subsequent humans bitten by the mosquito.
What are the Symptoms of Malaria?
Symptoms can range from mild flu-like symptoms to severe disease and death. However, if this parasitic disease is caught and treated effectively and promptly, it is usually not severe. Malaria is split into two categories, complicated and uncomplicated. Symptoms of uncomplicated malaria include fever, chills, sweating, headaches, body aches, nausea and vomiting as well as fatigue. In countries where malaria is not common malaria is, in fact, often misdiagnosed as influenza.
Complicated malaria occurs when the organs, blood or the metabolic system are impaired. This can cause severe anemia, acute respiratory distress, low blood pressure, acute kidney failure or cerebral malaria which then causes abnormal behavior, seizures and loss of consciousness.
How is Malaria Treated?
The WHO recommends all suspected malaria cases be tested using parasite diagnostic testing. The most common treatment for malaria is the artemisinin-based combination therapy (ACT); however, resistance to antimalarial drugs is a recurring problem. Furthermore, access to testing and drugs often does not reach the poor communities where this parasitic disease is more prominent.
Who is Vulnerable?
People with delicate immune systems are the most vulnerable to malaria; this includes young children, pregnant women and people infected with HIV. International travelers traveling to warm climates are also particularly susceptible, as are the friends, family, neighbors and co-workers of people who immigrate from countries where malaria is endemic.
– Elizabeth Brown
Sources: CDC, Public Health Agency of Canada, World Health Organization
Photo: Global Biodefense
Film Synopsis: It’s a Girl
In many countries today, the worst words you can hear as a mother are “it’s a girl.” Due to gendercide, as many as 200 million girls have been killed, aborted or abandoned. Evan Grae Davis explores the many forms of gendercide common in China and India today due to cultural preferences and China’s one child policy.
The movie speaks to many women who have been forced to undergo sex-selective abortions or abandon their female babies out of financial necessity. These women insist they have nothing against girls, but the dowry system common in India and rural China means girls put a strain on the family income.
Boys will grow up to receive a wife with a dowry and take care of his parents, while a girl will leave the family to marry, taking much of the family’s wealth with them.
Though India has outlawed the dowry, it is hard to eliminate a cultural custom. In the film, a woman explains that the court system has ignored her case of abuse based on an unfit dowry. Another women said she has tried for years to prosecute her husband who left her because she had daughters but no sons. Though laws are put in place to prevent female infanticide, there is little evidence those laws are enforced.
In China, Davis explored the impact of the one child policy. If a family’s first child is a girl, they may try again for a boy. Families must apply for a birth permit, and if a woman is seen pregnant with a second child other villagers are encouraged to report her. Women who are pregnant with their second child must show proof the child is a boy.
Many women who are pregnant with a second girl are forced to get an abortion or else they must pay a fine up to 10 percent of the family’s income for 14 years. The second child will not have citizenship rights or attend school. There is no future in China for a second female child.
The film explores the implications of a male preference system. Child trafficking has gone up dramatically since the implementation of the one child policy. The shortage in girls, leads many parents with sons to steal female children. This ensures their child will have a wife in the competitive marriage market. China has the highest female suicide rate of any country. Human rights experts believe this is because they are left to question their worth and morality after they are forced to kill their baby girls.
Davis says the solution is much more complex than ending the one child policy or enforcing anti-dowry laws. If girls are to receive the same opportunities and rights as boys, the culture of male preference must be changed.
– Stephanie Lamm
Sources: It’s a Girl, IMDB
Photo: OHM
10 Quotes on Women’s Rights
It has been nine years since Hillary Clinton proudly declared “women’s rights are human rights” at the United Nations Fourth World Conference on Women. Since then, world leaders have recognized that the key to economic, social and cultural development is rooted in the empowerment of women.
1. “More countries have understood that women’s equality is a prerequisite for development.”
— Kofi Annan, 7th Secretary-General of the United Nations, 2001 Nobel Peace Prize winner
2. “Everybody counts in applying democracy. And there will never be a true democracy until every responsible and law-abiding adult in it, without regard to race, sex, color or creed has his or her own inalienable and un-purchasable voice in government.”
— Carrie Chapman Catt, American women’s suffrage leader
3. “It is not gender which is destroying our culture…. it is our interpretations of culture which has destroyed gender equality.”
– A Cambodian civil society group
4. “This is no simple reform. It really is a revolution. Sex and race because they are easy and visible differences have been the primary ways of organizing human beings into superior and inferior groups and into the cheap labor in which this system still depends. We are talking about a society in which there will be no roles other than those chosen or those earned. We are really talking about humanism.”
— Gloria Steinem, American journalist
5. “Gender inequality, which remains pervasive worldwide, tends to lower the productivity of labor and the efficiency of labor allocation in households and the economy, intensifying the unequal distribution of resources. It also contributes to the non-monetary aspects of poverty – lack of security, opportunity and empowerment – that lower the quality of life for both men and women. While women and girls bear the largest and most direct costs of these inequalities, the costs cut broadly across society, ultimately hindering development and poverty reduction.”
– The Gender and Development Group -World Bank, from the report “Gender Equality and the Millennium Development Goals” (2003)
6. “The education and empowerment of women throughout the world cannot fail to result in a more caring, tolerant, just and peaceful life for all.”
— Aung San Suu Kyi, Daw Burmese-Myanmarese dissident and politician; Leader of National League for Democracy, Nobel Peace Prize Laureate
7. “No nation can ever be worthy of its existence that cannot take its women along with the men. No struggle can ever succeed without women participating side by side with men. There are two powers in the world; one is the sword and the other is the pen. There is a great competition and rivalry between the two. There is a third power stronger than both, that of the women.”
― Muhammad Ali Jinnah, founder of Pakistan
8. “Women will not simply be mainstreamed into the polluted stream. Women are changing the stream, making it clean and green and safe for all — every gender, race, creed, sexual orientation, age, and ability.”
— Bella Abzug, American politician, 1998 Defender of Democracy Award
9. “The connection between women’s human rights, gender equality, socioeconomic development and peace is increasingly apparent.”
— Mahnaz Afkhami, Iranian-American human rights activist
10. “Women’s chains have been forged by men, not by anatomy.”
–Estelle R. Ramey, American endocrinologist and psychologist
– Stephanie Lamm
Sources: Women’s Rights World, Better World Quotes, Goodreads
Photo: Politic365
Sierra Leone: Freedom & War
Sierra Leone, home to over 6.1 million people, is a West African nation ravaged by a 11-year civil war. The country was prone to military coup de’tats, resulting is an ever-revolving door of presidents, dictators, military juntas and overall political chaos.
The political crises that have befallen the diamond resource rich nation is in stark contrast to its prominent past as a settlement for freed slaves, particularly its capital, Freetown. Sadly, the civil war, which was condemned for human rights violations such as the use of child soldiers, created a situation where poverty became rampant among the populace.
Sierra Leone now has one the lowest life expectancies in the world, with an average person expected to live to only 48. It ranks fairly low in the Human Development Index at 180th out of 187 countries. Particularly distressing is that over “60 percent of the population” lives on about “$1.25 per day.” Consequently, the nation boasts a high illiteracy rate, and deals with a increasingly volatile health crisis, with a majority of the population unable to attain proper medicine and health services.
Despite the problems, the country has made positive strives since the end of the civil war. Since 2002, positive changes have occurred. The central government has become stronger and democracy has flourished quite prominently in the wake of the civil war. The nation has also seen an uptick in economic development.
Unemployment and underemployment of the youth population are major reasons for the civil unrest within the nation. Around 70 percent are out of work or critically underpaid, resulting in strikes that are routinely suppressed by the government. Disillusionment with political elites and inequality of wealth in the country has led to a huge divide among political groups.
Current President Ernest Bai Koroma and his All People’s Party have been criticized for their actions, but at the same time praised for helping the nation “transition from a failed state” to a “fast-growing economy.” The economic growth of the nation is contrasted by the rampant poverty faced by a majority of the nation.
Sierra Leone has had an arduous history in regards to women’s rights. The country is home to many customary practices, such as “female genital mutilation” and forced marriages. Amnesty international reported that the Sexual Offences Act, though pushed through in 2013, was never truly enacted, and discriminatory policies against women were still heavily occurring in the nation.
Human rights violations are particularly evident in post-civil war Sierra Leone. Peaceful demonstrations are still violently suppressed, and opposition media are continually jailed for dispelling information against the ruling regime. An April demonstration against working conditions at a local mine resulted in police officers killing 12 workers. The Human Rights Commission of Sierra Leone found the police culpable for their actions, and pushed for an investigation into the matter. Sierra Leone has not indicted or prosecuted any of those involved in the killings.
Can Sierra Leone make a change? Unless the government makes a more proper investment in its population and respects human rights, civil unrest is a common possibility. The lack of oversight for respecting human rights and drastic poverty is an increasingly damaging problem for the nation that was once a safe-haven for those escaping slavery.
– Joseph Abay
Sources: Amnesty International, New York Times Blogs, BBC, BBC, UNDP
Photo: UWO
Small-Scale Solar Energy: 2 Women Light a Village
In a remote Cameroon village, two elderly women installed solar panels to shed light in a neglected region. The village, Muyengue Trouble, sits isolated behind Mount Cameroon and off the national electricity grid.
Without access to electricity, poor rural women suffer the most. These women must walk miles to gather fuel wood, yet nearly two million die annually from the indoor pollution this wood produces.
The people of Muyengue Trouble relied heavily on wood, kerosene, gas and fuel, reports Nelly Shella Yonga Tchaptchuet of the Rural Women Development Center (RUWDEC.)
Though functionally illiterate, these women developed a strong understanding of solar technology and helped light their village.
The RUWDEC offered Francesca Moki and Helen Ntuengue the opportunity to study solar electrification at the Barefoot College in India. The Global Environment Facility (GEF) partnered with the college to fund their training.
For six months, these women attended the college before returning to Cameroon. Today, Moki and Ntuengue assemble and mount solar panels in houses, as well as chargers, controllers and batteries. These woman have installed the panels free of cost for more than 500 people in 98 households.
Hydropower in Malawi: Affordable to All?
This success offers hope for expansion. Najat Rochdi, the United Nations Resident Representative in Cameroon, reports: “We are going to discuss with RUWDEC on how to move the project forward and possibly scale it to other regions.”
Joyce Banda, the Malawian president, recently declared: “Let there be light in every home.”
Today, only one percent of the rural population benefits from the national power grid. The power grid relies on hydroelectric power plants along the Shire River, but aquatic weeds and sedimentation limit the flow. As a result, those in rural Malawi use alternative sources of energy.
The use of alternative sources threatens agricultural sustainability in the region. Without access to electricity, locals must depend on wood and charcoal. This forces a damaging cycle of cause and effects: farmers rely on deforestation for more land, and soil erosion and increased run-off further degrades the land.
Yet these farmers cannot use modern technology to farm sustainably without electricity.
And if the government successfully generates hydropower, could the poorest Malawians afford it? Most rural Malawians cannot afford the fees to connect. As the director of solar energy firm contends, hydroelectric power in this region leaves rural homes in the dark.
Small-scale Energy Development
Depending on the government to allocate energy efficiently and fairly may fail; equipping locals with the tools to deliver it may not.
A nongovernmental organization recently installed solar-powered energy kiosks in Malawi. This allows local men and women to rent “battery boxes” at a low cost. In addition, a new company MEGA offers micro-hydropower to rural regions of the country.
Though ambitious, top-down solutions may not benefit the remote villages, small-scale interventions both empower women and offer a sustainable solution.
Access to electricity divides the rich and poor worldwide. To those in Cameroon and Malawi, electricity means light for children to read at night. Electricity means growth in local business. Electricity means equity.
– Ellery Spahr
Sources: Sci Dev Net Analysis Blog, Sci Dev Net, International Food Policy Research Institute
Photo: Sci Dev Net
Male Victims of Sexual Violence During Conflict
When most people think of sexual violence during armed conflict, they picture the rape of women and girls. While sexual violence against women is an enormous human rights issue, sexual violence against men frequently occurs but is not often talked about.
Men all around the world suffer from sexual violence during war and conflict. Victims can be military or rebel groups, and perpetrators can be men or women. While men are sometimes raped, they are also subject to an array of other horrific indecencies.
Castration, beating and mutilation of the genitals, undressing men and making them remain naked while in prison and even forcing men to rape their own family members have been documented.
The United Nation Commission of Inquiry reports that the extreme sexual violence against both men and women has occurred in detention centers during the current Syrian conflict. There have also been reports of sexual violence against men in the Democratic Republic of the Congo and the Central African Republic. An academic study found that that 23.6 percent of men in the eastern part of the Democratic Republic of the Congo had experienced sexual violence.
Another study by the Journal of the American Medical Association found that 32.6 percent of the males surveyed had been victims of sexual violence during the conflict in Liberia. While many people were aware of the rape of Bosnian women during the 1992 conflict in the former Yugoslavia, a report from the Peace Academy accounts that rape and sexual torture also happened to men during this war.
The extent of sexual violence in armed conflict varies significantly between regions and between armed groups. Some armed groups permit sexual violence in war and others do not. However, wartime sexual violence occurs across all geographic regions and ethnic groups. State forces are more likely to be named as perpetrators of sexual violence than rebel groups.
In addition, perpetrators of sexual violence are not always armed forces at all; often sexual violence is committed by civilians. Wartime rape and sexual violence is not often ordered or planned but rather tolerated by commanding officers.
Feminist and women’s rights groups have pushed for awareness, education and intervention around wartime sexual violence against women. Because of this there has been significant research and policy work into preventing sexual violence against women. There are also many organizations that exist to support and treat women who have been victims to sexual violence during armed conflict.
There has been little research on male victims of sexual violence in conflict, although it is increasing.
Few human rights groups openly speak about wartime sexual violence against men, this may be because of gender stereotypes and taboos such as the belief that “real men are unreadable.” It is important that researchers, practitioners and the public alike begin to realize that sexual violence is not gender-bias and that men and women can be both victims and perpetrators.
Is it urgent that organizations that support and aid female victims of sexual violence need to equally expand their services to include men.
– Elizabeth Brown
Sources: CNN, Peace Academy, United States Institute of Peace
Photo: Tumblr
Call for Second Green Revolution
PUNJAB, India – A declining Indian economy and growing food insecurity has policy and environmental experts calling for a Second Green Revolution since one of the best solutions would be heightened research and investments in the agricultural sector to increase the production and yields of small farmers.
This new Revolution would focus on the next generation of agricultural modernization since the original movement in the 1960s. “Food security became a major cause for concern in the 1960s,” says The National, “when it caught the imagination of India’s policymakers and spawned the green revolution, an ambitious plan to transform the country’s agricultural land via high-yielding crops, increased use of fertilizers and a raft of land reforms.” That is to say, as a result of population growth, political upheaval and massive socio-economic shifts throughout the world, the world endeavored to overhaul the current agro-environmental systems.
The main goal of the first Green Revolution was to supply enough food for the growing populations as cost efficiently as possible. “Fearing global upheaval, the developed nations initiated a deliberate strategy to supply cheap, abundant food to prevent political unrest,” states Kenny Ausubel, author of Restoring the Earth. However, the plant seeds used to develop and economize food production were expensive, and the equipment needed to produce the seeds were costly as well. “While initially the “miracle high-yielding” seeds did produce bigger crops,” Ausubel notes, “this gain proved to be at the expense of the environment and small farmers.”
Moreover, the first Revolution privileged corporations and big agribusiness, leaving small, rural and hometown farmers in the dust. Experts from agriculture, economics and policy agree that a Second Green Revolution is needed “to improve the yield of crops grown in infertile soils by farmers with little access to fertilizer, who represent the majority of third-world farmers.” Small farmers are the key to food production in many countries around the world – not just India – and must be protected from being bought out by large agricultural corporations.
As such, research and development initiatives need to be undergone in order to generate more cost-effective and easily accessible resources for small farmers. Advancements in plant biology seem to be promising, as genetic modifications within crops could significantly yield larger harvests. As J.P. Lynch from the college of Agricultural Sciences states, “population growth, ongoing soil degradation and increasing costs of chemical fertilizer will make the Second Green Revolution a priority for plant biology in the 21st century.”
Food security is a necessary factor to global economic and development systems. Despite the advances made in the initial agricultural movement, more action is necessary in order to modernize and economize production for the world’s thousands of small farmers. “While the first Green Revolution was aimed at undertaking mass production,” declares Dr. N.G. Hedge of BAIF Development Research Foundation, “the second Green Revolution should be to promote production by the masses.
– Mallory Thayer
Sources: BAIF, The National, Penn State, Urban Habitat
Photo: Tree Hugger
3 Facts on Child Marriage from Tall as the Baobab Tree
One in three Senegalese girls are married before the age of 18, while the number worldwide nears 14 million. These girls are at a higher risk for abuse, health complications and dropping out of school. Tall as the Baobab Tree is being screened in villages in Senegal to promote dialogue and understanding between generations. This internationally acclaimed film is set in the Senegalese village Sinthiou Mbadane and follows two sisters who are the first from their family to attend school.
1. Respect for Elders vs. Dreams for the Future
In the film, the older sister, Coumba tries to save her younger sister, Debo, from being sold by their father into an arranged marriage. New and old worlds collide as the sisters struggle with whether respecting their elders has to mean betraying their own future. In countries like Senegal where education is becoming more accessible, it is important to engage in dialogues about the dangers associated with child marriage.
2. Dialogue can Positively Influence Attitude
The dialogues about child marriage have the potential to change the attitudes of village elders and leaders, who play an important role in determining the fate of children in the community. The film and the surrounding dialogues help girls in Senegal to realize that they are not alone in their struggle. The dialogues presented by the film are respectful towards girls and families, with the ultimate goal of bridging the generational misunderstanding.
“The main experience that this film focuses on is educating versus early marriage, which seems, in my experience, to be the single biggest challenge that this younger generation faces, coming from these traditionally conservative, rural villages,” said director Jeremy Teicher.
3. Grow Roots at Home to Strengthen Your Community
Because of poverty, a family may feel obligated to either send their children from a village to a large city to find work, or to marry off their daughters to older, wealthier men. With the help of Plan International (https://plan-international.
– Haley Sklut
Sources: The Guardian, Tall as the Baobab Tree, Voice of America
Photo: View of the Arts
Poverty and Happiness Coexisting In Panama
Panama is one of the poorest countries in the world. Why are people there so happy?
1. Positive Attitude
Latin American countries focus on positives such as friends, family and religion despite the difficulties they may face in their daily lives. With the economic boom, including more jobs, resulting from the success of the Panama Canal comes increased traffic and crime. However, Panamanians choose to focus on the positives. People in the happiest, yet poorest, Latin American countries find joy in moral satisfaction more than in material goods, a mentality that is often not found in citizens within developed countries.
“Overall, I’m happy because this is a country with many natural resources, a country that plays an important role in the world,” Carlos Martinez said. “We’re Caribbean people, we’re people who like to celebrate, to eat well and live as well as we can. There are a lot of possibilities here, you just have to sacrifice a little more.”
2. Health Care
State-of-the-art equipment, highly skilled doctors and reasonably-priced health insurance are just a few benefits of living in Panama. As a result of a good healthcare system, life expectancy is quite high in Panama – 74 years for men and 80 years for women.
3. Favorable Climate
The temperature remains at about 80 degrees Fahrenheit year-round. Furthermore, the country does not experience dry and rainy seasons. The weather, along with a developed pension system, draws retirees to the country. In 2005, Panama won first place in the global index of the most comfortable countries in the world. According to the American Association of Retired Persons and the organization “International Living,” the United States recognized Panama as one of the world’s four best countries to live in outside the United States.
– Haley Sklut
Sources: Live Science, Daily Mail, World Mathaba,
Photo: News
Clean Streets: Road to Entrepreneurship in Haiti
Throughout the developing world, infrastructure insufficiencies often create barriers for aspiring entrepreneurs. However, these shortcomings can also provide the platform for innovative and sustainable business opportunities.
Such is the case for entrepreneurs like Edouard Carrie, who started his company Environmental Cleaning Solutions S.A. (ECSSA) as a way to clean up Haiti’s streets and generate income. Founded in 2010, the company’s mission is simple yet profound: “to change a nation through recycling.” Via its material recovery facility in Port-au-Prince, ECSSA aims to collect over 80 tons of recyclable products per day.
Not only does it positively impact the environment, increased waste management also helps Haiti’s lowest income citizens.
For example, individuals can increase their income by collecting recyclable materials and thus afford schooling for their children, healthcare or other necessities. In addition, the various collection centers create jobs around the region.
The start-up has had great success in the three years since its conception. According to USAID, “ECSSA has grown to provide extra cash to over 6,000 Haitians who deposit bags of discarded bottles at 65 collection points throughout the Port-au-Prince region.” Furthermore, the company has shipped nearly 300 million plastic bottles to other countries for additional processing to create other products.
ECSSA’s growth would not have been possible without the support of both USAID and the Pan American Development Foundation (PADF).
PADF sponsors the Leveraging Effective Application of Direct Investments (LEAD) Business Plan Competition, a grant program that assists small and medium enterprises in finances, business development and access to capital. LEAD operates in Cap-Haitien, Saint-Marc and Port-au-Prince with a targeted focus on “industries and businesses with the greatest potential to create jobs, including construction, tourism, agribusiness and alternative energy.”
Outside assistance – such as that from LEAD and USAID – has allowed ECSSA to thrive and transform the landscape in Port-au-Prince.
“My company now has the capacity to increase its individual collectors from 6,000 people to up to 20,000,” Carrie said. “Additionally, the increase in collection points and processing capacity provide entrepreneurs the opportunity to grow their own businesses by serving as intermediary plastic collectors and suppliers for ECSSA.”
Not only cleaning the streets, ECSSA is clearing the way for sustainable environmental and business development throughout Haiti’s capital city.
– Mallory Thayer
Sources: USAID, Leveraging Effective Application of Direct Investments, Environmental Cleaning Solutions S.A.
Photo: United Nations Photo