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(Journal Article) Impact assessment of commodity standards: towards inclusive value chains
01.03.2017
Voluntary commodity standards are widely used to enhance the performance of tropical agro-food chains and to support the welfare and sustainability of smallholder farmers. Different methods and approaches are used to assess the effectiveness and impact of these certification schemes at farm-household, village, cooperative, and regional level. We provide an overview of the results from robust impact studies on coffee, tea, banana, cocoa, and cotton certification programmes. Overall outcomes show rather modest net revenue effects for farmers, small direct income effect for wage workers, and contested sustainability effects. Most impact studies focus on primary sourcing, but devote less attention to changes in trust and governance throughout the value chain. Moreover, implications for gender issues and supply chain trust are not always fully addressed. In order to better understand these somewhat disappointing effects, we discuss different fallacies and drawbacks that affect impact studies concerning commodity certification programmes. Main attention is given to perverse incentives for intensification and specialization that arise from certification. Moreover, spillovers to other (non-certified) farmers and spatial externalities at landscape level may reduce net effects. Important secondary effects related to behavioural change (risk, trust) and local innovation dynamics are usually overlooked. Current practices in value chain development programmes should focus increasingly on dynamic effects of upgrading and improved market integration. New interactive impact assessment approaches (gaming, multi-agency simulation) that address integrated value chain relationships offer promising perspectives for real-time and systematic analysis of alternatives for smallholder value chain inclusion beyond certification. -
(Book) Lime Production
There is a long history of production and use of lime in Sri Lanka. Its main use has been as a cementing agent and as a decorative whitewash in the building industry.
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(Book) How to Set up and Manage a Resource Centre
This document focuses on resource centres for health workers. Information is especially important for training health workers helping them to understand the context of their work, follow new approaches, undertake new responsibilities, improve their practice and remind them of basic concepts.
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(Book) Wind Energy in Bangladesh
Renewable energy practices in Bangladesh.
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(Book) Making Climate Change Mitigation More Meaningful
The global energy system is the single largest contributor to climate change, and reducing energy consumption and greenhouse gas emissions from energy is of paramount global importance to avoid catastrophic climate change. But increasing access to modern energy services for the 1.2 billion people wh...
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(Book) Manufacturing the Donkey Cart and Ambulance
This manual aims to give useful information to local fabricators and organizations that support them to help them make donkey carts and a donkey cart ambulance.
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(Book) Solar Photovoltaic Water Pumping
The advantages and disadvantages of solar water pumping are outlined in this document.
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(Book) The Brick Mould
Drawing of a brick mould.
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(Book) What is animal welfare?
Animal welfare refers to the physical and emotional state that is impacted by the environment in which the animal lives and works, human attitudes and practices, and resources available to it. Welfare is an everchanging state in which all of these factors can and will cause welfare to fluctuate betw...
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(Book) Kupanda Uyoga Kwenye Ndoo
Juliet Millican, Emily Antoniadi, Peruth Mutesi, Luke Manders
A short guide to how to grow edible mushrooms in reusable containers using upcycled plastic containers to produce highly nutritious food in small spaces. Re-Alliance is a coalition of field practitioners, policymakers, educators, community leaders and humanitarian and development workers, sharing s...
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(Book) Poor People's Energy Outlook 2018
Energy access for all has been enshrined in the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development (SDG7) and the Paris Agreement on climate change and there is now widespread acceptance of the great wellbeing and development benefits energy access unlocks. Nevertheless, a lack of understanding about the best...
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(Book) The Sri Lankan Pumpkin Tank
A small scale roof water harvesting tank promoted in Sri Lanka by the World Bank.
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(Book) Food Regimes and Agrarian Questions
Food Regimes and Agrarian Questions extends the original conception of the food regime, formulated by Harriet Friedmann and Philip McMichael, detailing new dimensions of the succession of imperial, intensive and corporate food regimes. Developing the methodological contributions of food regime analy...
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(Journal Article) Strengthening behaviour change communication in western Nepal: how can we do better?
01.10.2015
The Government of Nepal aims to achieve full water and sanitation coverage by 2017. The bilateral Rural Water Supply and Sanitation Project in Western Nepal (RWSSP-WN) works with local governments in 14 districts, aiming to declare them open defecation free. This behaviour change communications evaluation explored how to improve RWSSP-WN’s present practices to reach the diverse target population in the Terai districts, where more than 1 million people still defecate in the open. The study reviewed RWSSP-WN’s present behaviour change triggering tools and related communications strategies. Our findings suggest that availability of subsidies seems to change how people think about sanitation and tends to eliminate willingness to pay for a latrine. We recommended strong advocacy for a no-subsidy policy, and more attention paid to alternative financing options with targeted support to the poorest of the poor. The present behaviour change triggering tools do work as intended, but there is a need to develop pre-triggering and post-triggering strategies to increase the overall impact. The pre-triggering strategy would ensure that potential barriers to change are identified and addressed before the actual triggering event, and that the key stakeholders are prepared for the actual triggering event. The post-triggering strategy is needed to continue motivating households to change via messages that tap into the drivers of change, addressing also the barriers which may keep each household from changing behaviour. This paper provides a number of recommendations applicable for those working with local governments and communities to increase the scope and scale of behaviour change triggering. -
(Book) Panorama energético de los pobres 2016
¿Qué necesidades energéticas señalan los pobres de los países en desarrollo como las más acuciantes? ¿Iluminación eléctrica? ¿Cocinas no contaminantes y modernas? ¿Energía para los centros de salud? Aprovechando la información obtenida en las exhaustivas consultas realizadas a las comunidades que vi...
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(Book) Operation and Maintenance of Water and Sanitation Infrastructure
The training module developed for sanitation and hygiene education
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(Book) Panorama energético de los pobres 2018
El acceso a la energía para todos se ha consagrado en la Agenda 2030 para el Desarrollo Sostenible (ODS 7) y el Acuerdo de París relativo al cambio climático, y, hoy en día, se acepta de forma generalizada que aporta bienestar y grandes beneficios para el desarrollo. No obstante, sigue sin comprende...
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(Book) Voices of Activists and Academics
Vicky Johnson, Tessa Lewin, Andrew West
Over the past three decades, research and intervention processes have been left wanting by the lack of the substantive inclusion of children and young people, as well as the challenge of adultism − the ongoing and systematic disregard of many children and youth in decision-making. This book is in...
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(Journal Article) Educating sanitation professionals: moving from STEM to specialist training in higher education in Malawi
01.09.2022
Achieving the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) requires effective changes in multiple sectors including education, economics, and health. Malawi faces challenges in attaining the SDGs in general, and specifically in the sanitation sector. This paper aims to describe the existing landscape within public universities in Malawi to build a framework for training a cadre of locally trained experts. This is achieved by reviewing science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) degree programmes and assessing the extent of inclusion of sanitation education. The historical compartmentalization of academic programmes has resulted in few programmes to build on. Deliberate investment is needed to build from the current STEM higher education landscape to an effective framework for training sanitation experts, especially female experts. For low-income countries such as Malawi, a cadre of ~17,600 locally trained sanitation experts may be needed, for which the current higher education landscape is not sufficient. Using the Centre of Excellence in Water and Sanitation at Mzuzu University in Malawi as a case study, this paper provides a model of sanitation education in low-income countries that: 1) provides an effective complementary contribution to delivering sanitation education; 2) links to overall SDGs, national policy, university goals, and localized needs; and 3) engages students, faculty, and communities in local research. -
(Book) Rethink, Retool, Reboot
Technology underpins human development. We need it to provide the very basics of a minimum standard of life – food, water, shelter, health and education. But a significant proportion of the world’s population do not have these basics today. And whilst a fifth of the world’s population lacks access t...