Practical Action Publishing
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Motors as Generators for Micro-hydro Power
This is a guide to the use of induction motors for electricity generation in remote locations. It is written as a practical handbook for engineers and technicians involved in designing and installing small water-power schemes for isolated houses and communities. This revised edition brings in new co...
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Negotiating the Seed Treaty
The International Seed Treaty came into force in 2004 was the culmination of over 20 years of negotiation. The need for a treaty arose out of a growing awareness that crucial plant genetic resources are being irretrievably lost. This book describes the complex process by which a wide range of partie...
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A New Weave of Power, People and Politics
Lisa VeneKlasen, Valerie Miller
This field manual provides a well-tested approach for promoting citizen participation. It breaks down the traditional boxes separating human rights, rule of law, development, and governance, and reconnects them in order to create an integrated approach to rights-based political empowerment. A New We...
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Digital Poverty
Hernan Galperin, Judith Mariscal
This book represents the first publication of the Regional Dialogue on the Information Society (REDIS-DIRSI), a regional network of leading researchers concerned with the creation and dissemination of knowledge that supports effective participation in the Information Society by the poor and marginal...
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Fuel for Free?
This book covers the use of wastes in firing clay bricks via case studies in Zimbabwe, Sudan, Sri Lanka, and Peru. With respect to both livelihoods and the environment, energy efficiency in brickmaking is critical. Not only does increasing energy efficiency serve to reduce brickmakers’ fuel costs an...
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Hygiene Promotion
Indispensable for fieldworkers on projects or programmes aiming to reduce the incidence of water-and sanitation-related diseases, it will also be useful for other relief and development workers, particularly those working in the fields of community development, health, and engineering. The authors d...
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The Sustainability Handbook for Design & Technology Teachers
Most people are now aware of their eco-footprint and the need to cut carbon emissions. Local councils have set up recycling schemes and people are encouraged to reduce travel emissions, but this is not enough. Designers need to incorporate sustainability considerations into their work, and this book...
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Trail Bridge Building in the Himalayas
A co-publication with Helvetas in their Experience and Learning in International Cooperation series, this publication describes the rural infrastructure support work conducted by Swiss development agency Helvetas in Nepal and Bhutan where over 4000 trail bridges have been built in the last 40 years....
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Village Savings and Loan Associations
While many banks and microfinance institutions provide valuable services to the poor in the developing world, they are most successful in economically dynamic urban or peri-urban areas. 30 years since the start of the microfinance revolution, poor people who live in many rural areas and urban slu...
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Voices from the Margins
Roger Lewins, Stuart Coupe, Francis Murray
Describes the work of Practical Action in introducing consensus-based planning approaches in villages that are poor even by Bangladesh standards, where 90 per cent of people live under the poverty line and over 60 per cent are illiterate. These methods work on raising the voice and confidence of the...