Avengers fighting for Technology Justice

Last night I went to see Avengers Assemble 3D. I’ve been looking forward to it all week and it’s been one of the most eagerly anticipated films of 2012.

With Ironman, Captain America, Thor and The Hulk blended together with more special effects than seem necessary, I was looking forward to two-and-a-half hours of pure action. What I wasn’t expecting was to start thinking about Technology Justice.

If you haven’t seen the film yet, I don’t want to ruin it for you so I’m avoiding any spoilers – please read on. In summary, the storyline is the battle for ‘The Tesseract’ – a sustainable energy source with unknown potential. This battle would have torn the world apart if it weren’t for the band of super-humans and a demigod who stood in the way.

I’m not saying our world is at war over energy, but there certainly is an unbalance. Whilst I was sitting in a dark room with silly glasses on with 200 others, there were 1.3 billion people with no access to electricity. And yes, it’s a shame that they won’t be able to see the theatrical delight that is Avengers Assemble, but there are far more basic needs that these 1.3 billion people don’t have access to. What if someone needs seek medical attention after dark? Once they get to the medical centre, there may be no power for lighting or refrigeration to keep the medication cool, or to adequately light a surgery room.

That certainly seems like an injustice to me.

Now these 1.3 billion people don’t have a Hulk to fight for their technology justice. They have Practical Action, and we want to see a world where everyone has access to clean sustainable energy (not necessarily The Tesseract) by 2030. If you want to see a world of technology justice and want to be a superhero then check out http://practicalaction.org/energyforall.

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Blue Nile, Sudan on-going violence

Barnaby Peacocke, one of my colleagues, is just back from Sudan and gave an update at our ‘stand up’, staff meeting yesterday.

The fighting along the border between Sudan and Southern Sudan continues. This is impacting our work in the Blue Nile and the EU funded project is temporarily on hold. The likelihood is that this state of armed unrest will sadly continue.

We need to work out how in this new reality our work can continue. Our commitment is undiminished.

Listening to Barney I felt particularly moved as when I visited the Blue Nile area, two years ago now, people were talking about their hope following the end of the conflict with the South, they talked of the impact of the war, how some had been forced to fight, others had lost family members, all had struggled to get food, vital medicine, etc. Life had been very, very tough but now there was the hope of a better life and they were ambitious for peace and development.

Now things have changed and we have to continue, increase our work but do things differently.

Thankfully we have a ‘model’, ie.development speak for experience that shows us how it can be done.

In Darfur we’ve worked throughout the conflict; improving peoples farming techniques and yields, access to and quality of water, improving stoves so that they used less fuel – requiring women to make fewer dangerous journeys in search of wood or other fuel, helped people market their crops so that they had money for vital items such as medicine, helped communities preserve foods through techniques such as pickling etc.

After the kidnap of several of our staff and the attempted kidnap of others (thankfully eventually everyone was freed safely, but scared and their vehicles stolen or burned), we decided we had to find a different way of working. All our staff are local and so know the situation in detail – where ever it was reasonable safe for us and the communities we would continue our work directly (sometimes this changed day by day). Where it wasn’t safe for Practical Action people to travel or community gatherings could attract violence we worked with a brave group of people who so valued Practical Actions support they were willing to take extraordinary action.

Village Development Committees and the Women’s Development Associations. Networks we helped established to expand and continue our work. From each village one or two people travelling together, often using unusual paths or routes could get safely through to places no-one else could.

How it worked was that people from these groups would travel to a safe point, coming together they would meet with Practical Action staff. They would be trained in stove making, learn how to grow a new crop, receive seeds, be trained in water conservation, or other support. Help that on a day to day basis would improve their and their communities lives. They would then travel back to their villages and share their learning and/or support with their family, friends and community. Through these networks we were able to continue our work, throughout the conflict, even in some of the most difficult to reach parts of Darfur.

We worked with hugely courageous, brave people in Darfur – speaking to them when I visited their villages I was moved particularly the bravery of the women.

Having met the communities we’ve been working with in the Blue Nile, I believe we will find brave people there, too.

The conflict in the Blue Nile is dire and needs to be stopped. But, if as news reports say, it’s likely to continue for at least the next two years – we have to do all we can to help people caught up in this continue to build their lives.

Our commitment remains undiminished.

Im sorry for the ramble – Ive just dashed this off – but I didnt want to forget how moved I was by Barneys words thinking about the people I met and shared with in Sudan.

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Girls needed for Clean Energy jobs

”We need All of humanity not half of it to work on the clean energy revolution”

That’s the opinion of David Sandalow from the U.S. Department of Energy at the Women, Innovation and the Clean Energy Future reception held yesterday at Lancaster house, as part of the Clean Energy Ministerial.

Whilst there are some incredible women working in the clean  energy sector, such as Juliet Davenport, CEO of  Good Energy, these role models are few and far between.   Lack of understanding amongst young women of the opportunities available as well as a lack of women in middle management positions taking that next step up were discussed as the main reasons.

Yet it was felt by both the  women and men present that women do bring  a different perspective to the sector so should be encouraged to be a bigger part of it.

So please do encourage your female students to find out more about this interesting work that is key to our future.

To see how  members of Practical Action who work on clean energy and other technologies for the developing world got their dream jobs please visit our careers page for a poster and case studies.

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Sustainable energy – a great conversation

Today Practical Action, together with One and Christian Aid, organised what’s called a “civil society consultation” on UN Secretary General Ban Ki Moon’s Sustainable Energy for All initiative.

We had four members of the High Level Group, three members of the Technical Panel and about 50 representatives from charities, social enterprises, etc all working on energy access in the developing world.

Great conversation.

Helen Clark who runs UNDP kind of took the party line. She affirmed the Action Report they launched yesterday, given out to us today, but stated that we shouldn’t overstate the role of the private sector and should hold them to account. She also made the point that the key thing was implementation and this would happen in country.

Bunker Roy of Barefoot College and another member of the High Level Group came next. He held the report away from him, and for the first time ever I saw someone literally turn up their nose. He rubbished it! No real civil society engagement, incomprehensible to all but a few technocrats, top down, sustainability considered only in terms of business finance not impact, no thought of how parachuted in solutions would be maintained in the long term, no real mention or consideration as to the role of women and so on.

Andrew Steer from the World Bank, the third member of the High Level Group, navigated a route between the two previous speakers. I’d summarise what he said as: This is not ideal but if you trash it there is no hope of progress, we need to accept that this was a genuine initiative from the Secretary General, who himself grew up without electricity and go forward from here.

While the frankness was brilliant, on reflection it was quite unsettling. I’m not left with the feeling that we, as civil society trying to hold people to account, have a position to respond to that’s owned and supported.Is this final or just a first draft that we can all critique? I’d understood it was meant to be final.

What is clear is the need for much more engagement with communities who will be impacted and/or benefit from the initiative. Engagement too with Southern governments. And better communication – writing that people can understand and a timetabled process that’s transparent.

For me, it’s also about old lessons that need to be re-learned or remembered. Development must start with people. Sustainability is not just about finance. It’s about community support, ways of working that help things work for the long term. It’s about people having a say in things that affect them and a choice. It’s about our environment.

Forty years ago Fritz Schumacher called for a new form of development, development that started with people and technology because people matter.

Sustainable Energy for All is a great initiative. It is, I believe, genuinely motivated. As it goes forward it needs to listen to the lessons of good development.

Margaret Gardner
Marketing & Communications Director

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Energy lies at the heart – Clean Energy Ministerial

 I’ve just put up a blog railing at poor communicators –  now my team have come back to me and said I need to include some figures – without them people can’t get an idea of the scale of the problem.  Always happy to be critiqued – don’t … if you can’t take it etc.

One in every 5 people on our planet lives without electricity. Nearly 3 billion people use wood, charcoal or dung to cook.  According to the UN fumes from these cook stoves damage health and kill nearly two million people every year. I’ve also heard it said that 85% of those who die are under 5. 

95% of the people who lack energy and/or cook on deadly cook stoves are in sub-Saharan Africa or developing Asia.

Scientists warn that if we continue on our current energy path our world could warm by on average 4 degrees this century – maybe more. Poor people will be hit first and hardest.

We can continue along this path – we can gamble with our planet and push even more people  into poverty.

Or we can do something different – we can commit to tackling climate change, we can commit to sustainable energy for all – we can commit to technology justice.

The Clean Energy Ministerial is important. Lets encourage our politicians to give a lead.

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Justice for the have nots

When I am not working at Practical Action’s headquarters in rural Warwickshire, I spend my time with my friends in Notting Hill in London. Yesterday, after a yoga class and a cup of coffee, I walked home, along Ledbury Road, one of Notting Hill’s most famous thoroughfares. It was a glorious springy sunshiney morning, much longed for after two weeks of seemingly endless rain. Towards one end of the road are huge white Victorian villas, with spring blossoms veiling the balconies and graceful Greek columns framing impressive porches. As the road progresses, the white elegance fades into brown dinginess. The other end of the road is home to council estate flats: small and drab. I smile at two little girls hopscotching in a yard that’s around 10 foot by 10 foot.

One of London’s greatest qualities is its diversity, yet all I could see during my walk along Ledbury Road was the injustice of the ‘haves and the have nots’.  This phrase – ‘the haves and the have nots’ was one I heard lots during my trip to Practical Action’s work in Kenya in August 2011.

While travelling to a project in the informal settlements outside Kisumu city in western Kenya, my colleagues pointed out the narrow road which divided the ‘have nots’ from the ‘haves’. All that separated the people without life’s essentials: food, water, sanitation, shelter, energy, health care, education, a livelihood, from the people who had them, was a mere dirt track.

Walking along Ledbury Road yesterday was a useful reminder that sometimes the physical distance between those who have enough and those who don’t is negligible. But bridging that gap can seem an insurmountable task.

Technology Justice is one movement that is needed to help with this challenge. At Practical Action, we envisage a world where there is a balance between meeting the practical needs of people with less, while satiating the technological appetites of those with more. A world where all people, regardless of geography or wealth, can choose and use the technologies that will help them to live the life they value, without compromising the ability of others and future generations to do the same. A just, fair and equitable world, with a smaller gap between the people who have lots and those who have less. Technology Justice isn’t really about technology, it’s about people – and doing what is right.

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Low cost toilet promotion

Still more than 50 per cent of people in Nepal defecate in the open.

When asked why they hadn’t built a toilet, people blamed financial constraints.

That is because people think only about costly cemented toilet blocks – even though their houses are built using straw, timber and mud. People think they need a corrugated galvanized iron roof for a toilet, even though they are living under hay roofs. They are not aware of low cost options for toilets.

Normally, the cost of simple toilet up to pan level or sub structure is around NPR 3,000 (£23). Actually, the part which increases toilet cost, discouraging poor people towards building toilet, is types of costly structures. That is why when working with communities to improve sanitation, Practical Action promote a ’7 B’ approach while constructing low cost toilets. 7 B stands for the 7 different toilet structures that can be built with locally available materials:

Bamboo

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Bag (Jute or plastic bags)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Bush (Hay)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Bricks

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Boulders (stone masonry)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Blocks

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Blend (mixture of two or more materials)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The core concept of reducing the cost is the use of locally available resources, including material and human resource. It also ensures ownership, sustainability and easy promotion. The other main concept is to ensure people get into the habit of using the toilet. Improving the condition of toilet then comes in the second phase.

Among the 7B options, normally bricks, blocks and boulders are more expensive. However, it is not always true. First class brick is not required for building toilets; it can be built with second class or even built with brick bats. Blocks with higher cement sand ratio can be used for making toilets cheaper. Also, if boulders are locally available, it can also be a cheaper option.

You can find more information about the work we do in Nepal here and on water and sanitation here.

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What is water worth?

It rained all day here in Warwickshire yesterday, but one of the top stories on the news was the hosepipe ban in the south and east of England. We take an instant supply of clean water for granted, because most of the time we have more than enough rain in the UK. How would we feel if we had to carry every drop into our homes ourselves? I for one would think twice before taking a bath!

In the Mukuru settlement in Nairobi, Kenya, residents pay more than 5 times as much for water as we do in the UK – and they don’t have the luxury of a piped supply into the home. Water has to be collected in containers from a communal tap – often some distance away. And, in times of scarcity, water prices inevitably rocket. In many rural areas of Africa, women and children walk for miles to collect water from wells.

In the UK we struggle to reduce our use of water and government water saving advice mainly covers non essential activity such as washing the car and watering the garden.

In contrast, according to this article, Kashmiri children resort to shaving their heads when water is short so that their hair doesn’t appear unkempt. I can’t see this being a popular piece of government advice here!

Practical Action has innovative ways of helping people gain access to clean water. By developing a partnership between local people and the utility company, improved access to clean water has been achieved for many thousands in the Mukuru settlement. Restricting our supply may help us to appreciate just how good (and comparatively cheap) our water is and encourage us to do a bit more to help the 1.3 billion people who lack access to safe water.

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Once upon a time…

….there was a little girl who loved stories. As a little slip of a thing, she used to stand and swing on the garden gate, waving to passers-by in the hope that she could chat to them and ask them questions to find out their stories (she was a very curious little girl). A few years later, her very patient, very wonderful mother would read her favourite Maurice Sendak stories Outside Over There and Where The Wild Things Are to her every night. When she was at school, she’d set her alarm super early so she could wake up and read Enid Blyton books before going to lessons. English was always her favourite subject, and characters such as Elizabeth Bennett, Scout Finch, Jo March and Scarlett O’Hara were as familiar to her as her oldest friends. And then she studied the art of telling a story – for it is an art – during an English Literature degree at university.

Now that little girl (who’s not so little anymore) works for Practical Action.

I am that girl. And I work at Practical Action because I want to change the world. But my passion is storytelling: both discovering a good story, and then telling it in the best possible way. But how do you change the world with a story?

Well, this week, we at Practical Action launched our next five year strategy. It is bold and ambitious and exciting – but challenging too. The targets, both in terms of fundraising and impact at scale, are high.

But that’s because there are huge problems to solve. Right now 1.3 billion people across the world don’t have clean, safe water. 1 billion people don’t have enough food to eat. 2.6 billion people don’t have adequate sanitation. And 1.6 billion people don’t have access to modern energy. Too many people live in abject poverty. It is a world of great technology injustice.

There is no question that this needs to change. So over the next five years we will work towards four universal goals:

1. Sustainable access to modern energy service for all by 2030
2. Systems which provide food security and livelihoods for people in rural areas
3. Improved access to drinking water, sanitation and waste services for people living in towns and cities
4. Reduced risk of disasters for marginalised communities

And by the end of this next strategy period, in 2017, we will have transformed the lives of 6 million people.

That is an exhilarating prospect for me.

Because 6 million people = 6 million stories to find and tell.

Each of those 6 million is not just a ‘project beneficiary’ but a living, feeling, thinking human being with their own unique life story. And those 6 million life stories are 6 million more reasons to support Practical Action, today and for the future.

I can’t wait to get started.

 

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Challenges of urban sanitation

Practical Action has launched a project to improve sanitation situation in the slum areas of Ronda and Kiptembwo in Nakuru, Kenya, which will benefit 190,000 women and men.

Both the slums have very poor status of sanitation, with no toilets available and where they are available, they are used by at least 50 people.

Both the slums have areas where open defecation is common. This creates serious health risks. The project will be pioneering the approach of Community-Led Total Sanitation (CLTS), in an urban context.

Practical Action will be working with Umande Trust on this project and supported by the Municipal Council of Nakuru. The project will use participatory approaches through community health workers to enable tenants and landlords to improve their sanitation system.

This process of demand creation will then be supported by introducing affordable technologies and financial systems. A commercial bank has already shown interest to support the project through soft loans. Currently the project is carrying out baseline surveys and developing monitoring indicators. The project is well supported by the local water company, the Ministry of Health and other NGOs working in Nakuru.

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