It’s been a long day at work and you finally have a chance to sit down with a bowl of chocolate ice cream in front of the television. While flipping through channels, you come across a news story about child slavery in the Ivory Coast, where 43% of the world’s cocoa is produced. You pause with a spoonful of creamy goodness on the way to your mouth and think, “Isn’t anything safe anymore? Can’t I just enjoy my chocolately treat in peace?”
At this point, you have two options: you can keep flipping the channels and focus on how tasty your ice cream is, or you can finish reading this post to discover where to buy fair trade, guilt-free chocolate. Although, it really isn’t much of a choice, now that images of child slaves are lugging bags of cocoa beans around inside your head.
Lucky for everyone involved, many companies are making the switch to Fair Trade cocoa. Fair Trade USA, a non-profit that certifies American products as Fair Trade, currently works with more than 800 companies to ensure that their products comply with all international Fair Trade standards. They certify a multitude of products, including tea and herbs, fresh fruit and vegetables, sugar, flowers, nuts, honey, and (thankfully) cocoa.
The following list consists of five companies that are using Fair Trade cocoa, as determined by Fair Trade USA. These are just a few of the many companies from which you buy chocolate that tastes great and makes you feel even better.
For your ice cream fix, go with Ben & Jerry’s. The Vermont-based company is in the process of converting all ingredients to Fair Trade and profiles their progress by flavor on their website. Their Chocolate Therapy flavor is currently made with 71% Fair Trade ingredients, so eat up!
If you need some dairy-free creaminess, meet NadaMoo. This delicious coconut milk ice cream is organic and Fair Trade Certified. With flavors like Java Crunch, Lotta Mint Chip, and Gotta Do Chocolate, you can enjoy pint-sized dairy-free and slavery-free yumminess.
When chocolate-covered treats catch your eye, look for a SunRidge Farms label. Their organic and Fair Trade Certified dark chocolate-coated almonds, cacao nibs, espresso beans, goji berries, and raisins are sure to satisfy your sweet tooth (or teeth).
Looking to build some muscle with chocolate-y goodness? Tera’s Whey Organic Fair Trade Certified Dark Chocolate Whey Protein is your answer. Your endorphin high combined with that warm fuzzy feeling from buying Fair Trade will leave you feeling fantastic.
For your baking needs, try SunSpire’s organic and Fair Trade chocolate chips and baking bars. When making its chocolate products, SunSpire doesn’t use refined sugars, hydrogenated oils, preservatives, or artificial colors or flavors. The company has also made a long-term commitment to its cocoa farmers through their Caring for Cocoa Communities program, which provides hands-on support for growers and helps to foster growth in their communities.
Now that you’re armed with information, it’s time to head to the store and support these companies using Fair Trade chocolate. Who knew doing the right thing could be so delicious?
– Katie Fullerton
Sources: Fair Trade USA, Ben & Jerry’s, NadaMoo, SunSpire
5 Companies Using Fair Trade Chocolate
It’s been a long day at work and you finally have a chance to sit down with a bowl of chocolate ice cream in front of the television. While flipping through channels, you come across a news story about child slavery in the Ivory Coast, where 43% of the world’s cocoa is produced. You pause with a spoonful of creamy goodness on the way to your mouth and think, “Isn’t anything safe anymore? Can’t I just enjoy my chocolately treat in peace?”
At this point, you have two options: you can keep flipping the channels and focus on how tasty your ice cream is, or you can finish reading this post to discover where to buy fair trade, guilt-free chocolate. Although, it really isn’t much of a choice, now that images of child slaves are lugging bags of cocoa beans around inside your head.
Lucky for everyone involved, many companies are making the switch to Fair Trade cocoa. Fair Trade USA, a non-profit that certifies American products as Fair Trade, currently works with more than 800 companies to ensure that their products comply with all international Fair Trade standards. They certify a multitude of products, including tea and herbs, fresh fruit and vegetables, sugar, flowers, nuts, honey, and (thankfully) cocoa.
The following list consists of five companies that are using Fair Trade cocoa, as determined by Fair Trade USA. These are just a few of the many companies from which you buy chocolate that tastes great and makes you feel even better.
For your ice cream fix, go with Ben & Jerry’s. The Vermont-based company is in the process of converting all ingredients to Fair Trade and profiles their progress by flavor on their website. Their Chocolate Therapy flavor is currently made with 71% Fair Trade ingredients, so eat up!
If you need some dairy-free creaminess, meet NadaMoo. This delicious coconut milk ice cream is organic and Fair Trade Certified. With flavors like Java Crunch, Lotta Mint Chip, and Gotta Do Chocolate, you can enjoy pint-sized dairy-free and slavery-free yumminess.
When chocolate-covered treats catch your eye, look for a SunRidge Farms label. Their organic and Fair Trade Certified dark chocolate-coated almonds, cacao nibs, espresso beans, goji berries, and raisins are sure to satisfy your sweet tooth (or teeth).
Looking to build some muscle with chocolate-y goodness? Tera’s Whey Organic Fair Trade Certified Dark Chocolate Whey Protein is your answer. Your endorphin high combined with that warm fuzzy feeling from buying Fair Trade will leave you feeling fantastic.
For your baking needs, try SunSpire’s organic and Fair Trade chocolate chips and baking bars. When making its chocolate products, SunSpire doesn’t use refined sugars, hydrogenated oils, preservatives, or artificial colors or flavors. The company has also made a long-term commitment to its cocoa farmers through their Caring for Cocoa Communities program, which provides hands-on support for growers and helps to foster growth in their communities.
Now that you’re armed with information, it’s time to head to the store and support these companies using Fair Trade chocolate. Who knew doing the right thing could be so delicious?
– Katie Fullerton
Sources: Fair Trade USA, Ben & Jerry’s, NadaMoo, SunSpire
Poverty in Sub-Saharan Africa – The Full Story
The World Bank estimates that more than 69 percent of the population of Sub-Saharan Africa lives on less than $2 per day, making it one of the poorest regions in the world. Though the region has experienced strong economic growth during the last two decades, poverty alleviation remains a pressing issue for African leaders.
The numbers appear promising. In its latest African Pulse analysis, the World Bank says that Sub-Saharan Africa’s economic growth should grow to more than 5 percent over the next three years. Foreign investment, rising commodity prices and global economic recovery will all contribute to the region’s rapid development.
Punam Chuhan-Pole, a lead economist in the Bank’s Africa department, said: “If properly harnessed to unleash their full potential, these trends hold the promise of more growth, much less poverty, and accelerating shared prosperity for African countries.”
But questions remain as to whether the region’s economic growth will help mitigate poverty. Statistically, economic growth does not automatically reduce poverty; many resource-rich countries, such as Gabon and Nigeria, have fared worse in terms of poverty reduction than neighboring nations with fewer resources. So, how can Sub-Saharan Africa convert economic gains into poverty reduction?
According the World Bank report, “Better governance will need to underpin efforts to make growth more poverty reducing.” Better governance means more efficient mineral and wealth management, agricultural development and methods for controlling urbanization. It must also include strategies to deal with the region’s growing income inequality, which likely stems from systemic government corruption and a weak middle class.
In 2010, six of the ten most inequitable countries in the world were in Sub-Saharan Africa. In Mozambique, the poorest 20 percent of the population earns 5 percent of total income while the richest 20 percent take home more than 50 percent. The World Bank points out that Mozambique’s oil and gas reserves will be huge economic drivers over the next few years, but, as it stands now, the neediest will benefit the least from any economic gains.
It is difficult to cast economic growth in a negative light. However, Sub-Saharan Africa’s recent expansion has done little to improve poverty and income inequality in the region. Without responsible government and a strong, participatory middle class, economic gains will continue to enrich a small segment of the population. The rest of the people will continue finding ways to subsist on $2 dollars a day.
– Daniel Bonasso
Sources: World Bank, UNDP, Overseas Development Institute
International Social Service USA
The International Social Service USA making a historic attempt to aid foreign countries in need is a perfect example of the benefits of foreign aid. The ISS has played a historic role in helping new immigrants, such as after World Wars I and II, when waves of immigrants struggled with adjusting to their new life in the USA after suffering shock and trauma. They also help with inter-country adoptions, helping children find safe and stable homes.
The organization’s international status allows all the national branches of the International Social Service to work together to optimally help the populations of countries with unsafe environments. After the 7.0 magnitude earthquake in Haiti in 2010, the U.S. branch stressed the importance of ceasing the adoptions during the critical time. Helping rebuild Haiti was the primary focus, and the ISS felt it was important not to interrupt or interfere with that process. They also felt that after suffering such trauma (both physical and mental), it would be better to let the children recover before they could be potentially adopted.
The ISS also is involved in helping to find missing family members or tracing birth families. The ISS-USA newsletter tells of Andrea von Barby Patterson’s search for her birth mother. Adopted at a young age from Germany by a family in Colorado, she was too late to meet her birth mother, who passed away, but was able to find other relatives including a half-sister, thanks to the organization.
While the ISS doesn’t directly impact poverty, the organization certainly does help people in extreme poverty find homes in better conditions. Global poverty in different countries are similar in the big picture—children are considered a burden to parents who can barely take care of themselves. Basic necessities like water and food are unfulfilled, and having a child is an added burden. More often than not, the parents (and in some cases, it’s a single parent) are unable to take care of the child. This leads to high infant mortality and also high rates of child kidnapping and trafficking. In nations rampant with poverty, smuggling and kidnapping are other monsters to fear. Children are offered to be smuggled into other countries, or even kidnapped to be trafficked into other countries. In cases like these, the ISS also helps out a great deal by reuniting families. The ISS also helps childless couples in wealthier nations adopt these needy children.
Since the 20th century, the USA branch of the International Social Services has been helping improve the conditions of children all over the world by helping them get adopted, helping them connect with birth families, and helping track down missing kidnapped or smuggled children. The much valued institute has contributed greatly to the global population with its charitable social work and continues to do so today.
– Aalekhya Malladi
Sources: International Social Service USA, ISS-USA Newsletter
Photo: International Programs
FLOW-AID – Maximizing ‘Crop Per Drop’
As the world population continues to shoot upwards, pressure increases on the environment and farmers across the globe to provide enough food and water to support the growing population. With droughts becoming more common, efficient methods of utilizing water in agriculture could make a significant impact in the access to food and water for the world.
The Farm Level Optimal Water Management Assistant for Irrigation Under Deficit, or FLOW-AID, brings researchers, engineers, and scientists together together to develop innovative new technologies to improve irrigation methods with the purpose of saving water. Their latest project maximizes water usage by decreasing the need for water use by up to 60 percent and simultaneously lessening fertilizer usage up to 30 percent.
FLOW-AID provides water-saving technology, which uses inexpensive wireless detectors that run on solar energy and give data to farmers about which areas of the crops need more or less water. This practice not only maximizes the efficiency of irrigation, but also improves plant health by producing the exact amount of water needed.
Farmers in Lebanon, Jordan, Turkey, Italy, Spain, and the Netherlands currently utilize FLOW-AID technology. These test countries were chosen partially based off the varying natures of their climates, to determine how to adapt FLOW-AID to meet the different environmental needs of varying regions. Developers of FLOW-AID state that the technology is prepared to handle even the dryer climate of many nations in Africa. They have also pledged to keep the cost of the technology low enough for developing countries to adopt.
According to the United Nations, over 780 million people exist without any access to clean water, and 2.5 billion lack properly sanitized water. The number or people suffering from hunger and undernourishment falls around 870 million people based off the United Nation’s data, mirror the number of people without access to water. With creative technology, such as FLOW-AID, the world could maximize its resources and gain access to more food and water, working to reduce the strains on society from the world’s burgeoning population.
– Allison Meade
Sources: Treehugger, Cespevi, United Nations
Photo: Gizmag
New Hope for the Deaf and the Blind in Kenya
This year, Sense International, an organization targeting sensory disabilities in developing nations, launched its first deaf-blind curriculum in Kenya. The program will formalize education and promote specialized home care for over 17,000 deaf and blind children in a country with no precedent for disability education.
Sense International Kenya has been at work since 2005, when teachers began protesting in earnest to the Kenyan Institute of Education about the lack of programs and metrics to guide and measure deaf-blind education.
Kenya currently has 10 centers of education for the deaf-blind—in a country with a population of 42 million. The great demand for specialized care coupled with a total lack of curriculum has left many classrooms in chaos. Teachers with the best intentions, but no tools, have no recourse.
But the problems have roots far deeper than a lack of curriculum. For many families, the distance is just too great or boarding fees too expensive to enroll their children in the few special learning centers.
Without care or intervention, struggling families often can’t help but marginalize their deaf-blind children. Thousands of disabled people live shuttered, lonely lives due to a lack of education.
Sense International addresses these problems on several fronts. First, it recently pioneered a deaf-blind education program in Kenya, fully equipped with material and performance gauges on every academic level. It built the curriculum based on studiously researched input from parents and teachers of the deaf-blind, as well as established practices from its operations around the world in countries like Romania, Peru, India, and Uganda.
Sense also works with community organizations to ramp up specialized care for children with severe disabilities. They provide home-based education and therapy, train parents to care for their disabled children, and connect families with experts and organizations that offer advanced support.
Yet, perhaps most important of all, Sense advocates for policy geared toward the deaf-blind. For example, Tanzania, one of its countries of operation, currently subsidizes transport costs for disabled children to and from special learning centers. Sense is pressuring Kenya to adopt similar practices.
The notoriously bureaucratic Kenyan government presents another problem in itself. To combat this, Sense is cutting away at the red tape prohibiting reform by maintaining constant contact with leaders on sensitive issues.
“This project has shown just what can be achieved with political will and the expertise of organizations such as ourselves,” reports Edwin Osundwa, the country representative of Sense International Kenya. “We are proud of what has been achieved and are now keen to repeat the process for home-based education.”
– John Mahon
Sources: Sense International, The Guardian
Photo: The Guardian
Solar-Powered Steam Sanitation Technology
Scientists are developing a solar powered device which quickly produces steam, and could be used to sanitize things quickly and easily in places where a lack of clean water for washing makes it difficult to keep things sanitary.
Lack of proper sanitation continues to be a major problem in the developing world, with 2.5 billion people living in dangerously unhygienic conditions. For many people, toilets, safe and reliable waste disposal, and sinks for hand-washing are luxuries rather than the norm. Without access to these basic technologies, which those in the developed world often take for granted as mundane and commonplace, billions of people go about their daily routines with high risk of contracting deadly bacterial diseases. Proper waste disposal systems saved burgeoning Western cities like London from recurring cholera epidemics at the turn of the 20th century. But today 2.1 billion people in the world still rely on unsafe waste disposal systems, and contaminated drinking water continues to plague the world’s poorest places.
For more information on steam sanitation technology, check out this video from the Rice University website to see the system in action, as it converts water and sunlight into bacteria-killing steam.
– Jennifer Bills
Sources: Rice University, Fast Co Exist
Photo: Gizmag
Charity Navigator 3.0
Charity Navigator is a preeminent non-profit watchdog organization well-known for its consistent and easily understood ratings. With the impending rollout of Charity Navigator 3.0, the organization aims to set the bar even higher by adding new criteria to their formulas.
Charity Navigator focuses on the heavyweights of US-based philanthropy. The charities they evaluate must receive at least $500,000 from the public annually, and their total annual revenue must be over $1 million. They must be public institutions that are tax-exempt and file a Form 990, from which Charity Navigator gathers significant information.
Currently, Charity Navigator uses two primary criteria to generate their ratings: financial health, and accountability and transparency.
Financial health is evaluated based on financial efficiency and capacity. Measures of financial efficiency judge a charity’s management of expenses throughout the year. These measure include fundraising efficiency, or the cost of generating $1 in donations, as well as percentages of total functional expenses spent on programs, administration, and fundraising. Expected percentages vary based on the type of charity. For example, museums are expected to spend more on overhead expenses and less on programs than most non-profits.
Meanwhile, financial capacity is a measure of the charity’s ability to maintain its work even when faced with difficult times. Indicators of strong financial capacity include consistent growth in revenue and programs, and a high working capital ratio. Growth of both revenue and programs is necessary for a charity to effect long-term, systematic change. Consistent development in both areas also instills confidence in givers by sustaining public support for charities’ work.
Charity Navigator calculates growth in revenue and program expenses using data from the four most recent fiscal years. Working capital ratio refers to the length of time a charity could survive financially in the absence of new revenue. This is a reflection of the charity’s preparedness for downward economic trends.
The second primary criterion currently used by Charity Navigator is accountability and transparency. Accountability refers to an agency’s willingness to explain its actions, especially financial ones, to its stakeholders. Meanwhile, transparency refers to an agency’s willingness to ensure the availability of critical data concerning the organization. Charity Navigator gains information for this criterion from two sources: the charity’s Form 990 and their website.
The Form 990 includes data points such as the presence or absence of an independent board, misappropriation of assets, independently audited financial statements, and payments to CEOs and board members. Charity Navigator expects organizations’ websites to list key staff and board members, publish audited financial statements and their Form 990, and have a clear and easily accessible donor privacy policy.
Charity Navigator is in the process of creating a third criterion: results reporting. This new step is meant to emphasize the need for results-driven work. The additional facet of evaluation would focus primarily on “the way charities come to know, use and share their results with stakeholders including donors.”
Specifically, Charity Navigator aspires to examine five elements of results reporting: consistency of spending with stated mission, reasonability of charities’ goals and their intent to measure their progress, validation from outside organizations, feedback from beneficiaries, and regularly published evaluation reports. By adding these criteria to their formula, Charity Navigator aims to encourage charities to demonstrate their efficacy by collecting more data and making that data readily available to the public.
To ensure fairness and consistency, Charity Navigator will not use this data in their evaluations until the necessary information has been gathered for every charity currently in their databases. Given crucial funding and other resources, Charity Navigator expects this effort to be completed in 2016.
– Katie Fullerton
Sources: Non-Profit Quarterly, Charity Navigator
What is Poverty Alleviation?
Poverty alleviation aims to improve the quality of life for those people currently living in poverty. Another term that is often used is poverty reduction.
Innovation Leads Poverty Alleviation
Rudy De Waele, CEO of Nyota Media, a growth agency for entrepreneurs and start-ups in Africa, recently gave a speech at the Mobile Innovations at the OCE Discovery event in Toronto, Canada. His speech, “How Mobile Technology is Transforming Africa” discussed the WOW Generation, mobile energy solutions and 3D printing, among other successful innovations happening on the continent of Africa. He spoke of how the WOW Generation is a new generation of young, talented and driven social entrepreneurs who are not only in it for the money, but who are taking into account a positive return to society as well. WOWers have already helped thousands by working with local entrepreneurs to solve local problems with low-tech solutions.
De Waele also covered a number of mobile energy solutions currently in effect. Angaza Design is a company based in Palo Alto that is currently working in Tanzania, Kenya and Zambia. Using solar panels, Angaza Design has developed pay-as-you-go technology to provide energy that will charge mobile phones in rural areas.
Another project De Waele mentioned does not necessarily alleviate poverty, but does improve the daily lives of people living with a particularly harsh disease in Kenya. The Happy Feet project uses 3D printing to create customizable shoes in an attempt to solve the jigger problem. A jigger, also known as a sand flea, is a small insect that bites and feeds on humans, cats, dogs and domesticated livestock. Though a single bite is not likely to cause damage, complications can arise when a female jigger burrows into the foot of a person. Due to the pain, victims of the sand flea are unable to walk, which means they are also unable to work. In cases of serious infestation, it is possible to lose a nail, in the best case, or whole digits from the hands and feet in the worst case. The worst cases appear in places of poverty.
By creating and using new and inexpensive mobile technologies, there is potential for increased economic growth in developing countries. Not only is there growth, but the positive changes are impacting those living in the worst conditions. While 3D printed, customized shoes will certainly help with jiggers and their detrimental impact on those living in Kenya, projects like Angaza Design?s mobile phone charger will give independence to those living in poverty.
However, like most things, poverty alleviation is not a simple act. The United Nations Development Programme states that simple economic growth will not reduce or alleviate poverty, improve equality or produce jobs, unless said growth is inclusive of all individuals in the economy.
For example, a recent study by the African Economic Outlook showed that economic growth in Nigeria has not resulted in poverty alleviation or the creation of jobs. Despite policies for inclusive growth and employment generation, the report showed a 3 percent increase in unemployment between 2010 and 2011. The report explained that this was because the oil and gas sectors, the areas increasing economic growth, do not have much potential to create jobs.
Though Nigeria projects a 6.7 percent growth in 2013 and a 7.3 percent growth in 2014, there are potential problems. Security problems arising from religious conflicts in certain states, as well as the continued cost of flooding, all constitute potential drags on projected economic growth. The report also said that current reforms that have resulted in price and exchange rate stability should be increased by the Nigerian government to see continued progress in economic growth, a key component of poverty alleviation.
– Jordan Bradley
Sources: The Next Web, UNDP, Camps International
Photo: OxFam
What Is Management Sciences for Health?
Management Sciences for Health (MSH) has one mission: to save lives and improve health of the world’s poorest and most vulnerable by closing the gap between knowledge and action in public health. This global health non-profit organization uses proven approaches to help leaders, health managers, and communities in developing countries create stronger health systems for a greater health impact. Since its founding in 1971, MSH has left its mark in over 150 countries working with policy makers, health care consumers, and health professionals to improve the overall availability, affordability and quality of health services.
The work of MSH is centered on four core beliefs and values: effective local leaders and local institutions are key to creating lasting health impact; health is a basic human right, realized through healthy living conditions and access to health care for all; healthy people and communities are more able to contribute to economic growth and political stability; and better evidence to scale up current methods and technologies will fuel widespread health impact.
Since it’s founding, MSH’s operations have been based on the 3,500 year old Tao (Way) of Leadership, working shoulder-to-shoulder with local partners and colleagues and empowering them to succeed. In the 1960s, MSH’s founder Dr. Ron O’Connor, was taught the principles of the Tao of Leadership by Dr. Noobora Iwamura, a mentor and friend. Dr. Iwamura, as the only survivor of his high school class in the Hiroshima bombing, decided to lead a life of service in the remote, rural areas of Nepal. Through his work he discovered that creating sustainable changes meant much more than medical care on its own: it meant engaging communities actively in their own health needs.
The mission and work of MSH is based on Dr. Iwamura’s concern that communities be empowered with the knowledge of solutions to basic health problems and challenged to take control of their own health. These values are resonated today in MSH’s staff of over 2,400 based in over 65 countries. MSH focuses its efforts on strengthening health systems in the priority health areas: HIV & AIDS; tuberculosis; family planning and reproductive health; maternal, newborn, and child health; malaria and other communicable diseases; and chronic diseases.
In the organizations’ 2012 Annual Report, MSH outlined universal health coverage (UHC) as the framework for maximizing health impact. More than 50 countries have achieved universal health coverage, with an additional 50 countries working towards the same goal. MSH is contributing to this UHC movement through its coordination with local communities to develop health system innovations, such as the scaling up of community health shops, and by directly building local ability to deliver health services through training health workers and staff. There is much work to be done, but MSH is pushing to make effective healthcare available to anyone in need.
– Ali Warlich
Sources: MSH,WHO
Rise of Photojournalism in Afghanistan
American directors Mo Scarpelli and Alexandria Bombach are working on a new documentary about photojournalism in Afghanistan called Frame by Frame. The directors joined Afghan war photographer and Pulitzer Prize winner, Massoud Hossaini, in his home country to document the rise of journalism in a place where taking a photo was once a crime.
A new culture of Afghan reporters and photojournalists has been growing ever since the ban on photography was overturned just over a decade ago. The documentary features the stories of four photographers, including Farzana Wahidy, whose work is uncommon for her gender in Afghanistan.
These four photojournalists and more have made great strides in the documentation of life in Afghanistan, the war, and the issues that are important to them. The necessity of journalism from the source is “to build democracy and independence, to check and limit those in power, to drive social and political change,” according to filmmaker Mo Scarpelli.
Local reporters have access to places and people which rarely welcome international reporters. Freedom of the press has improved since the people have gained the right to take photos and share the realities of day-to-day life with the world, but some are concerned about the future of such freedoms. With international forces leaving the country over the next year, international press will also be exiting. Defense, governance, and journalism will all be exclusively in the hands of the Afghan people, who face the threat of the Taliban reverting the country back to the time when snapping a photo was a crime.
The project was started in 2012, which was funded completely by the filmmakers themselves, one of whom drained her bank account entirely and even sold her car to make it all the way to Afghanistan. Frame by Frame is unfinished as of now, and the directors are relying on donations through Kickstarter to raise the funds needed to send them back to Afghanistan to fill-out footage for the film. Backers who want to see the film to completion have until August 28th to make a a pledge.
– Jennifer Bills
Sources: Humanosphere, Kickstarter, Frame by Frame
Photo: Boston