Oct 13
When it comes to development, is GDP the only thing that matters? The Organization for Economic Co-Operation and Development (OECD) says no. The OECD released a new report that looks at a variety of statistics with the hope of finding new measures for assessing well-being that go beyond Gross Domestic Product. The authors of the …
Oct 11
In my last post I discussed the Global Conference for Social Change that I attended last week here in New York. With one day focusing on women and girls, the second day was all about leaders of change. Guests ranged from business to business (B2B) organizations such as DSM, to the department store Marks and …
Oct 04
Two years ago, I was backpacking though Asia, I found myself in Seoul, South Korea visiting friends and watching the World Cup finale. Against direct orders from my parents, I decided to take a tour up to the Demilitarized Zone (DMZ) along the North Korean border. Having known a substantial bit of history about the …
Sep 30
Anyone having read aid literature is familiar with the stories about underfunded and overcrowded disease clinics throughout Africa. Where patients don’t have the means to pay for treatments, and often medications are in too short supply. These grueling stories tug at the heartstrings of foreign donors, and because they are so far removed from a …
Sep 30
Today I thought I would talk to you about an interesting twist on responsible tourism that I stumbled upon: the Youth Career Initiative (YCI). The YCI was launched in 1995 in Bangkok as part of a community initiative by the Pan Pacific Hotels Group, and was intended to “give back” to society by teaching disadvantaged …
Sep 27
On November 28th 2011 the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) is set to hold their next Presidential elections, and despite having ten candidates vying for the position, current President Joseph Kabila is set firmly as the front-runner. Kabila has been in office since 2001 after his father Laurent-Désiré Kabila was assassinated. The platform that Kabila …
Sep 27
Líbano es un país relativamente rico en recursos naturales. No tiene desiertos, las tierras de cultivo son fértiles, tiene las cuatro estaciones del año y es el país árabe que tiene más agua. Pero a pesar de estos atributos naturales, Líbano es un país dependiente de las importaciones de alimentos, que representa 70% de su …
Sep 23
Uganda Skimming over the New York Times this morning, I noted that the first article in their global edition was regarding the outrage that Oxfam is uncovering about Ugandan settlers being displaced on behalf of the Ugandan government and an international organization. Despite being a catchy headline on a leading newspaper, unfortunately these practices are …
Sep 22
What if your home was no longer yours? What if you were a guest in a place you once called your own? As I prepared for a fact-finding trip to Colombia in May 2010, I tried to do my homework. I looked up demographic and country data, information on the people I was meeting with …
Sep 22
It’s officially fall now, which means the Arab Spring has now entered its third season, and, unfortunately, the economic situation that partially contributed to the uprisings in many of the countries has not improved at all. In many cases it is even getting worse. Institutions like the International Monetary Fund and the European Investment Bank, …
