Country Investigator- Rwanda

In 1959, three years before independence from Belgium, the majority ethnic group, the Hutus, overthrew the ruling Tutsi king. Over the next several years, thousands of Tutsis were killed, and some 150,000 driven into exile in neighboring countries. The children of these exiles later formed a rebel group, the Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF), and began a civil war in 1990. The war, along with several political and economic upheavals, exacerbated ethnic tensions, culminating in April 1994 in a state-orchestrated genocide, in which Rwandans killed up to a million of their fellow citizens, including approximately three-quarters of the Tutsi population. The genocide ended later that year when the predominantly Tutsi RPF, operating out of Uganda and northern Rwanda, defeated the national army and Hutu militias, and established an RPF-led government of national unit.

Rwanda is a small country located in central Africa and is approximately the size of Maryland. It has a temperate climate with grassy rolling hills. Rwanda has the occasional drought and suffers from deforestation and the over use of soil from over farming. About half of Rwandans are Catholic while the others are spread among other denominations. There are just over 11,000,000 people in Rwanda with the average age being 18 and the average lifespan being 54 years old. Rwanda has a president and governmental system based on that of Belgium. It is a poor country with about 90% of the population being farmers and thus has to receive substantial financil aid money.

Chris

Millennium Challenge Effort

This is a three year Millennium Challenge Cooperation that supports the Rwandan government's efforts to strengthen the civic participation, promote civil liberties and rights and to improve the judicial system. This program will provide training, tech support and grants jto the local and national civil society organizations and it expands citizen engagement by supporting independent community radio stations. Also, this program reinforces Rwanda's efforts to improve the capacity of the judiciary and helps enact legislative reforms that will strengthen civil liberties, human rights and civic participation. This program will boost training and tech assistance to journalists and the Rwandan National Police in an effort to further transparency and professionalism.

Through the Millennium Challenge Corporation, the U.S. Government is helping developing countries address natural resource and environmental challenges.

MCC’s work is creating hope and opportunity for millions of people around the globe, particularly in Africa.

“We will spare no effort to free our fellow men, women and children from the abject and dehumanizing conditions of extreme poverty…We resolve therefore to create an environment – at the national and global levels alike – which is conducive to development and to the elimination of poverty.”
-Millennium Declaration, September 25, 2000

Kashf Foundation began with many firsts: it was the first specialized Microfinance institution in Pakistan, it was the first Microfinance institution targeting only women from low income communities and it was also the first Microfinance institution to charge a sustainable price for its services. Since its inception, Kashf Foundation has continued to trail-blaze – in 1999 it introduced the first pro-women consumption loan in the sector, in 2001 it was the first Microfinance institution to offer micro-insurance services by collaborating with one of Pakistan’s oldest insurance companies, in 2003 it was the first Microfinance institution to become financially sustainable, in 2004 it was the first Microfinance institution to obtain an investable credit rating and in 2007 it has been able to close over $36 million in commercial deals with key local and international banks.

Kashf's mission is to alleviate poverty by providing quality and cost effective microfinance services to low income households, especially women, in order to enhance their economic role and decision-making capacity.

“We empower poor women and their families to become economically self reliant by providing financial services in a sustainable manner. We promote economic self-actualisation by providing the poor with continuous economic opportunities so they can realise their potential and overcome barriers of poverty. At Kashf we believe access to financial services is the basic right of each and every individual.”

Kashf places the client at the center of all financial services that it offers and designs products and services in the light of the client's demands. We believe clients from low-income communities require innovative financial solutions to meet the many contingencies and crises they face as a result of vulnerable cashflows. With a constantly growing outreach of clients and a diverse product range, Kashf adheres to delighting its clients with client focused products that grow with their evolving needs.

Future goals are to:

• Improve access and scale of microfinance services by demonstrating that women in Pakistan are credible and are active economic agents by reaching out to 750,000 female clients by 2010
• Continue to innovate by creating client-driven products and services for low income households, including home improvement loans and a health insurance product
• Strengthen customer care processes by empowering field staff to listen to client feedback on a continuous basis
• Sustain Kashf’s financially viable business model of providing financial services to the poor and mainstream it with other financial institutions to ensure scalability

Summary

Chapter 11 and 12
Ericka
These two chapters were filled with women who had the chance to improve their family lives and they did. Faith in themselves and faith from others drove these women to better themselves and also gave them the opportunity to educate themselves and their families. As Moa said, “women hold up half the sky.” In these chapters, they not only held up the sky but soared.

Saima Muhammad

She was desperate to find ways to support her family. She had to have her daughter stay with an aunt because she couldn’t feed her. She grabbed up the chance to get a microfinance loan of $65; Saima bought cloth and beads to make beautiful embroidery to sell at the market place. The business boomed; she hired employees and her husband didn’t say much now or beat her. She was now a respected member of the community and supports her family.
Microfinances are given mostly to women because they are the ones who suffer the most poverty and danger. Women are the ones who die in droughts and famines. Older women are consider witches and killed during famines because the villages would have to feed them. The women’s mortality rate goes down when women are making money and contributing to the household. They receive more respect from the husband and his family—she is less likely to be beaten on a regular basis.

If women control the money—more is spent on children’s health and nutrition instead of instant gratification things the men spend the money on (booze, prostitutes, candy ,sugary drinks and lavish feasts). Only 2% of the household income is spent on education, even though it would eventually get the family out of poverty. 20% of the household income is spent on the expendables. The solution is simple—reallocate spending. The money needs to be put into the hands of women.

Another solution is put women in power. It may take time to get used to it but it will eventually be the norm. Rwanda had 75% women after the genocide of 800,000 people and women control over 1/3 of parliament and so does Costa Rica and Mozambique. Once women had the right to vote in the United States the mortality rate of children 1-4 plummeted 72% from 1900 to 1930. Go women power!!

Goretti

She never left the house because you needed the husband’s permission, which he never gave. She snuck out and became a CARE member in her village. Women empowered to make a difference in village and give a hand up to her fellow women. Loans, family planning, STD and AIDs are testing, running out a 2nd wife potential, education, maternal education and general empowerment to make a difference in their world.
It isn’t all one hundred percent fixed and many things can go wrong but atleast women are helping women. It is a beautiful thing.

summary chapter 9 and 10

In Pakistan, there was a woman from a Christian minority who wanted to pick her own husband. This was a breach of family honor and her brother’s fought with each other trying to decide whether they should kill her or sell her to a brothel. The woman escaped while the brothers were arguing.

In Riyadh, Nick learned that there are female judges in courts, but woman testifying would always lose to a man, even if that man is uneducated. For a woman to travel abroad, she has to get permission from her husband. The Vice President is a woman and even she needs permission to travel. Also, 65% of Iranian university students are females because they score higher on entrance exams than men do.

A woman named Sakena Yacoobi runs an aid organization called the Afghan Institute of learning. She went to college is Stockton, California at the University of the Pacific although she was accepted by Kubal University; she could not attend because of the violence at that time. Sekena opened girl’s schools in Peshwar and had 1500 students by the second year. When the Taliban fell, she moved her operation back to Kabul and provides education for 350,000 women and children in Afghanistan.

A 13 year-old girl named Dai Maju from China who lived in a small village was forced to drop out of school when she reached the 6^th grade. An American read the story written about this girl and her family and after some confusion, the Morgan Guaranty Trust Company donated $10,000 to build a new school and to pay the tuitions. Dai became an accountant and was able to support her family. There were many other girls who benefited from that same donation from the same village that Dai was from.

Angeline Mugwendere was a poor farm girl from Zimbabwe who had nothing. When she took the 6^th grade nationwide graduation exam, she scored on of the highest marks in the country. Ann Cotton started the Campaign for Female Education, or “Camfed”. One of the first girls Ann supported was Angeline. Camfed was expanded to Zambia, Tanzania, and Ghana. It helps over 400,000 children attend school every year.

Adam

Organization Investigator

Some organizations and people are:

CARE- which built and operated schools including for girls in troubled areas.

BRAC- which was a Bangladeshi run project in Afghan provinces, this succeeded because the villagers would protect the employees of the project. It was important to get support form the local mullahs and negotiate what subject girls would study and use Pakistani text books rather than Afghan government texts.

UNFPA- supports the work of the UN population fund

Sakena said "If people are educated then women will not be abused or tortured"

Levy- helped to organize and pay for poor families to keep their children in schools

WFP and UNICEF- the WFP is the world food program and they distributed food to rural schools where the children would get a free meal during the day.
George McGovern also helped with this.

If it ain't broke, don't fix it.

Issue Investigator—Chapter 9—10—Ericka
The issues in these two chapters were—is Islam misogynistic, small things can make a difference in education (deworming, bribery, feeding children) and the debate of education for females but scattered throughout the pages where mistakes made by foreigners. That will be my focus as the issue investigator because it interested me.
FemCare (arm of Proctor and Gamble) decide to help girls stay in school in Africa by handing out sanitary products for menstruation. Well, running water was needed for toilets, which the built. Then there was the taboo about female blood and had to purchase incinerators to dispose of the female products. All of this was fine and dandy but not well thought out. The company spent more money than needed because they didn’t think things out. Money they could have put toward tuition, uniforms and other things.
Andrew Mwenda said “the international cocktail of good intentions.” The people who aid other countries truly have their hearts in the right places but sometimes need to take a back seat, write the check and “carry the luggage” so to speak. A lot of the mistakes are made because customs and cultures aren’t taken into account in what is being done.
Handing out soap to Afghan women is saying a women are promiscuous, not a great thing to be saying about Afghan women. Christians coming in and asking Afghan women to take of their burka, read, work, be strong is quite a lot for people who lived this way all their lives. Some educated Afghan women feel we run around naked; there are more important issues than the way they dress.
Another project gone badly: cassava. Women grew this potato like root in Nigeria—the women sold surplus at markets (a little extra money for the women. The UN project got seeds that grew better and it did. Now, the women can’t harvest the entire product and it has more cyanide than the original type. The ground water is being contaminated—have to take care of it. The need for processing equipment to take care of the more product. Well, now the women are making more money and the men come and take over what the women normally had done all along. Women have no money now. Did this really work?
Maybe we need to stop being so in your face and back up a bit. Hire people who are from the community to make hygiene suggestions to Afghan women—not from people who don’t believe as they do. People in a community need to help the community. I know if someone, from half way across the world and a totally different religion, came to my house and said get an education, clean yourself, be strong and dress differently. I would probably tell them to go pound sand—you are messin’ with my life, culture, beliefs and community. Sometimes things work the way they do for a reason. If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.

country investigator chap 9-10

Yemen

I chose Yemen because according to the World Economic Forum rating of the status of women of 130 countries Yemen was in last place. I wanted to explore what was important to a country that doesn't value women. The following is what I discovered.

Yemen is located in the Middle East in the southwestern and southern end of the Arabian Peninsula. It is one of the "poorest and least developed countries in the Arab World, with a formal 35% employment rate, dwindling natural resources, a young population and increasing population growth." (wikipedia). It is considered a developing country with 45.2% of its population below the poverty line.

It is a country rampant with corruption which inhibits the development of the country. Their constitution defines the republic as an independent and sovereign Arab and Islamic country. Islamic law is the basis of all laws. Article 6 of their constitution states that it confirms its adherence to the UN Charter and International Declaration of Human Rights yet women are still struggling with the "various constraints and secondary status. Yemen's Personal Status Law in particular, which covers matters of marriage, divorce, child custody, and inheritance, gives women fewer rights than men, excludes women from decision making, and deprives them of access to, and control over, resources and assets."

Human rights in Yemen is rather poor. The "security forces" have been responsible for torture, inhumane treatment and even executions without due process.

According to Yemeni law a girl can wed at any age, but it forbids sex with them until they are considered "suitable for sexual intercourse". The onset of puberty, which is the age of 9 by some, was set as a requirement for consummation of marriage. Roughly half of Yemeni girls are married before 18, some as young as 8.

Not only do they limit the rights of women they also limit freedom of press. Yemen ranked 136th of 167 nations in terms of press freedom. The government is in control of all radio and television. They will ban journalists for publishing "incorrect" information.

Yemen is a largely tribal society with virtually all citizens being muslim and belonging to either the Zaydi order of Shi'a Islam (50%) or to the Shafa'i order of Sunni Islam (50%). Zaydi's are generally found in the north and northwestern part of the country, whereas the Shafa'i is in the south and southeastern part of the country.

Some things they do value is music. Some Yemenite Jews have become quite popular pan-Arab. Their cuisine is very distinct from the known Middle Eastern cuisine due to Ottoman Turkish influences. Football is very popular in Yemen. The countries citizens also enjoy and have access to mountain and water sports.

Progress has been and is being made to improve the status of women in Yemen, but as the authors of Half the sky stated laws help make changes but cultures need to change and that will take time.

country investigator

Sorry this is late guys, I had a family emergency and just forgot all about it and didnt realize I didnt post!!

the country is Ethopia:

Ethiopia is a landlocked country located in the Horn of Africa. It is the second-most populous nation in Africa, with over 82 million people, and the tenth-largest by area, with its 1,100,000 km2. The capital is Addis Ababa. Ethiopia is bordered by Eritrea to the north, Sudan and South Sudan to the west, Djibouti and Somalia to the east, and Kenya to the south. It is also the most populous landlocked country in the world. The typical school year runs from September through June. Public education is free from the primary to the college level. Religion is a secure and accepted element of everyday life in Ethiopia; even the language is full of references to God.

Ethiopian New Year's Day, Sept. 11
Victory Day , April 6
Labor Day , May 1
Victory Day , May 28: Celebrated as a victory day for the current government and also marks the Fall of Derg.

Christian festivals include Maskal, or the Feast of the Finding of the True Cross; Christmas; Timkat or Epiphany; and Good Friday according to the Coptic calendar. Christmas in Ethiopia is primarily a religious observance.

Muslim festivals include the ninth month of the Muslim calendar devoted to Ramadan, which is marked by fasting. The greatest Muslim feast of the year is 'Id Al Fatr, which celebrates the end of Ramadan. The 'Id al Adha is the feast marking Abraham's sacrifice

Ethiopia's staple food is injera, a spongy bread made of a unique crop only grown in Ethiopia called "teff." Injera is baked in a clay pan and eaten with sauce made of either meat, ground grains, beans or vegetables.

Usually age 15 and over can read and write.

Summery Chapter 6-8

These chapters had some very horrific stories about women who were sold into slavery and about how others who were pregnant did not get the care that they needed. In chapter 6 a girl by the name of Mahabouba was sold as a "maid" to a man and she was supposed to work hard jobs with long hours for little or no pay. She was also expected to sleep with this man, even though he had a wife. The wife also beat Mahabouba because she was jealous that her husband was more interested in Mahaboua than her. She tried to escape but was caught and beaten close to death. Mahaboua eventually got pregnant by the man and while she was pregnant was able to escape. Unfortunately she was unable to get the medical care she needed and during birth the baby got caught up in her pelvic region and could not be delivered. Mahabouba crawled her way to a hospital where she was finally able to have the [dead] child removed, but the damage done was severe and now has to wear a colostomy bag. In chapter 7 a girl named Prudence went into full labor, but was clearly having difficulty delivering the baby. Instead of giving medical care, the medical assistant started jumping up and down on Prudence's stomach, which eventually led to her death. Chapter 8 discussed how there are various programs that are out there to help women who are in need of medical aid, but can not afford it. Unfortunately, the funding for a lot of these clinics are being cut for political reasons. Due to clinics in China allowing women to have abortions, the Bush administration cut all funding to clinics around the world thus making it even harder for underprivileged women to get the medical care they need.

Issue investigator chap 6-8 Maternal Mortality

There are many definitions to what is or what constitutes maternal mortality but I will use the WHO definition in my entry.

Maternal mortality is the death of a woman during or shortly after a pregnancy. Most of these deaths are medically preventable as the treatments to avoid these deaths are known and available since the 1950's. "maternal mortality is a sentinel event used to assess the quality of a health care system." (wikipedia)

A 2010 research by, U. of Washington and U of Queensland Brisbane Austraila, estimated global MM in 2008 at 342,900 (down from 526,300 in 1980). It also determined that 99% occurred in the developing world where 85% of the population lives. Reducing the MM rate by 3/4's is part of the Millennium Development Goals for the UN.

According to WHO the causes are:
*25% Severe bleeding/hemorrage
*13% Infection
*13% Unsafe abortions
*12% Eclampsia
*8% Obstructed labour
*8% Other direct causes
*20% Indirect causes
"indirect causes such as malaria, anaemia, HIV/AIDS, and cardiovascular disease complicate pregnancy or are aggrevated by it."


Maternal Mortality Ratio(MMR) is the ratio of the number of maternal deaths per 100,000 live births. If we look at the MMR we can measure the quality health care of a particular country.

According to Central Asia Health Review:
MMR Country
2,000 Sierra Leone
1,900 Afghanistan
0 Ireland
4 Austria
13.3 U.S

According to WHO in 2003 the world average was 400 per 100,000, for developed countries 20, for developing countries 440. The numbers of MM are decreasing. The reason for the decline is mostly due to improved asepsis(freedom from disease-causing contaminants or, preventing contact with microorganisms), fluid management and blood transfusion, and better prenatal care.

How we can continue to decrease maternal deaths is for women to have access. Access to health care, family planning services, emergency obstetrics care, intrapartum care and funding.

Why don't women get the care they need? There are many reasons why women don't get the care they need before, during, and after childbirth. Some reasons include: services aren't available, they can't afford them or reaching them are to costly, and some don't like the quality of care offered. Cultural beliefs or the low status of women can also be a barrier.

Kristof and WuDunn have been very consistent in stating that we need to change reality rather than changing laws. What I really liked was how women in sub-Saharan Africa have been taught medical procedures in order to help save the lives of women.

There are ways to eradicate MM and each and every step taken to do so helps to alleviate the unnecessary suffering that occuring every minute of every day.

Chapter 6-8 local orgs

Local organization:
AMDD—Averting Maternal Death and Disability
I chose this organization because of Allan Rosenfield. We read about him in chapter 6 and his compassion for women and maternal mortality started AMDD with a grant from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation in 1999. I also peeked at that organization also and it was a toss up between the two.
I am going to share the mission and vision of this organization but first I want to share information about AMDD. As I checked out the web site . . . http://www.amddprogram.org/d/, I was very impressed with the thoroughness of the information, statistics and the ease of going through the web site. The AMDD is trying to make the statistic of 99% of maternal deaths are in developing countries and reduce it by 75% by 2015 (Millennium Goal #5). This organization is trying to have global access to emergency obstetric care. This is their mission and vision. This can explain more about them then I can. It is what they stand for and believe in.
The Mission: Recognizing that maternal health is a basic human right, AMDD works with partners worldwide to stimulate new thinking and generate evidence-based solutions to improve maternal and newborn survival. AMDD supports action and intervention to strengthen overall health systems so that whenever and wherever emergencies happen – from home to hospital – lives will be saved by effective and timely response.
The Vision: We believe in a world that respects and upholds the dignity of all women and their basic human right to survive pregnancy and childbirth. We believe in taking a good, hard look at the overall health systems that are meant to support – but all too often do not support – women and their newborns. But it isn’t enough to simply examine these systems; we work collaboratively and innovatively to transform and strengthen them. Strong health systems are an important solution to broader global issues of poverty and inequity.

The organization also has Needs Assessment for Emergency Obstetric and Newborn Care (EmONC). It is people getting data to back up the need for obstetric care and bring the data to the forefront and essentially proving to the world have grave the situation is. Mothers are dying giving birth and there are so many things that can be done to prevent and/or help with this epidemic. This data collecting is imperative to the success of this organization to get grants and present information to the appropriate people, governments and health organizations to get them on board.
This is the Need Assessment in a nut shell. . .
• Facility-based, cross-sectional studies that are usually national in scope
• Timeline: 8 -18 months
• Scope of data collection: infrastructure, human resources, equipment, drugs and supplies, service statistics, case reviews, and provider interviews relating to EmONC and maternal and reproductive health
• Results used for planning and health systems strengthening at all levels
(the italics was copy and pasted from the website: http://www.amddprogram.org/d/sites/default/files/needs_assessment_factsheet_english_0.pdf
I believe that this organization, which has been in business since 1999, is right on the money. They believe in what they do and they have gone after it. AMDD teams up with other organizations with the same beliefs to fight maternal mortality.
I think is a great cause. Women have been treated as second class citizen
enough; I also believe unborn children should be protected and cherished. It is a shame unborn children and mothers are left to die or fend for themselves. As the book said. . . education is possible the key. It showed that educated people were more likely to have money saved (because of better jobs) to have mothers see a doctor or have enough tucked away for emergencies. Let’s educate people—it couldn’t hurt.
Ericka Turlo
http://www.gatesfoundation.org/Pages/home.aspx
also another great organization-¬helps out globally and in the US

India

India declared its independence from the UK on August 15^th, 1947. It is the 7^th largest country in the world. Similar to the U.S., it is broken up into 28 states and 7 union territories. The country’s motto is “Sataymeva Jayate” which means “Truth Alone Triumphs”. The capital is New Deli. The largest city is Mumbai with a population of 12,478,447 which is 4,303,314 more people than New York City has. The total population of India is 1,189,172,906. The average age is 26.2 years. (The average of male and female age.) India is a federation with a parliamentary system governed under the Constitution of India. Their common law system is based on the English model. There are separate personal law codes that apply to Muslims, Christians, and Hindus. India is turning into an open-market economy but there are some aspects of its past are still intact. The Congress is considered liberal. There is a high risk of infectious disease and is the world’s largest producer of licit opium for the pharmaceutical trade. Some environmental issues include air pollution, water pollution, soil erosion and the massive population is using up the natural resources rather quickly. The available military force is estimated to be at 319,129,420 for men age 16-49 and 296,071,637 for woman of the same age group. India has almost 200,000 refugees from countries such as Tibet/China, Sri Lanka, and Afghanistan. There was a sex trafficking trade exposed in Mumbai where woman were sold and made very little money. In past years, there have been 500,000 female babies have gone missing each year because of illegal sex trafficking selection and abortions. 450 million people in India live below the poverty line, which is 42% of the world’s poor. Half of the world’s IT services are based out of India which makes it a $47 billion industry. India is the second largest importing country of weapons and has spent $50 billion on defense in the last 10 years. India’s Cherrapnuji gets 425 inches of rain every year.

http://www.businessinsider.com/amazing-facts-about-india-2010-12

https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/geos/in.html