10 Midweek PM Reads [feedly]

 
 

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10 Midweek PM Reads

My afternoon train reading:

• Ray Dalio Patched Bridgewater's All Weather's Rate Risk as U.S. Bonds Fell (Bloomberg)
• Ben Graham Did Not Give Up on Value Investing in Theory (Aleph Blog)
• Euro-Zone Debt Gains Appeal (WSJ) but see Buyers Tackle a Fear of Debt (WSJ) WELL, WHICH IS IT?
• Three Lessons from the Twitter Hedge Fund Ponzi (The Reformed Broker)
• RIAs vs. wirehouses: Who will gather more share? (Investment News)
• Is Delaware a Tax Haven? (Priceonomics)
• On The Future of iOS and Android (Steve Cheney) see also The difference between iOS and Android developers and why it's not just a numbers game (iMore)
• How do prescription drugs get such crazy names? (The Week)
• Unfair Share: How Oil and Gas Drillers Avoid Paying Royalties (ProPublica)
• Tokyo, as you've never seen it: the second largest photo ever taken – interactive (theguardian) and see Tokyo Tower Gigapixel Panorama (360GigaPixels)

What are you reading ?

 

10-yr Treasury Yield

Source: Chart of the Day

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Met vriendelijke groet,

Best regards,

Henk J.Th. Van Stokkom

Four Giving Trends Among Wealthy Donors

http://www.ssireview.org/blog/entry/four_giving_trends_among_wealthy_donors

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DoenDenkers ®

Henk J.Th. van Stokkom

Contact details > http://henk.vanstokkom.tel

Interview with Jim Rogers

http://www.ritholtz.com/blog/2013/07/interview-with-jim-rogers/

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Met vriendelijke groet,

DoenDenkers ®

Henk J.Th. van Stokkom

Contact details > http://henk.vanstokkom.tel

Building Ethiopian Startups at IceAddis

http://timbuktuchronicles.blogspot.com/2013/07/building-ethiopian-startups-at-iceaddis.html

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Met vriendelijke groet,

DoenDenkers ®

Henk J.Th. van Stokkom

Contact details > http://henk.vanstokkom.tel

Byron Wien’s 20 Rules of Investing & Life

http://www.ritholtz.com/blog/2013/07/byron-wiens-20-rules-of-investing-life/

Getting Clear About Overhead, Part 2: Questionable Fundraising Costs

http://www.effectivephilanthropy.org/blog/2013/06/getting-clear-about-overhead-part-2-questionable-fundraising-costs/

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Met vriendelijke groet,

DoenDenkers ®

Henk J.Th. van Stokkom

Contact details > http://henk.vanstokkom.tel

End poverty by giving the poor cash?

End poverty by giving the poor cash?

Chris Blattman

If you've been following my recent posts and papers on giving cash to the poor, three things that may interest you:

First, we've put out a 3-page policy note with the World Bank on one Uganda cash transfer program. Here is an IPA policy note on a second study, of cash transfers to poor women in Uganda.

Second, today the New York Times Economix blog posted excerpts of an interview with me about both experiments on giving cash to the poor.

Last, in a strange coincidence of timing, yesterday the FAI blog posted excepts of a similar interview from last year.

The post End poverty by giving the poor cash? appeared first on Chris Blattman.

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Putting the 'fun' back into fundraising

Putting the 'fun' back into fundraising

Global development news, comment and analysis | guardian.co.uk

Chugging – street fundraising – turns members of the public into prey, releasing adrenalin that triggers fight or flight instincts. It'll take a little more imagination to create behaviour change

It's a beautiful day and as I walk down a busy street, I'm feeling good. I'm in control. But then I get the feeling that I'm being watched, that I've been caught in a predator's gaze. Looking around, I see her – a chugger. I begin to weigh up my options (walk faster; pretend to be on the phone; find another way across) when the worst thing possible happens. We make eye contact. Now confrontation is inevitable, as are the lies I must invariably tell to get out of this situation:

"Sorry, do you have two minutes?"

"No", I answer.

Her senses are sharp and she can tell I am uncertain, so presses on: "Have you heard of Unicef?," she asks.

"Yes".

She flips open her folder and an African child's eyes stare up at me: "Have you considered supporting us?"

"Ehh, yes, I'm a member," I say without thinking.

"We don't have members," she shoots back.

Defeated, I mutter: "Ahh. Ok ... I gave some money once …"

I'm sinking now, my internal peace eroding as I begin to feel morally inferior. The chugger represents the good in the world, and has a UN logo to prove it. I represent the moral decline of my society. We have become such selfish bastards that we don't even want to stop and listen, let alone care about anyone else's troubles.

City dwellers across the global north can identify with that experience. Our days are littered with these interactions in which we have just three options: the first, say you support other NGOs and feel bad it's a weak lie. Second, show interest in the subject matter but not in giving funds, and hope the chugger loses interest. Or third, surrender your bank details. You'll feel good about none of the above because you've simply done what was expected of you. However you slice it, you lose.

So what can we learn from this? For me chugging – or street fundraising – represents three things that are wrong with much of development communications. 1. It presents a negative and pessimistic world view, and mostly uses negative and stereotypical imagery. 2. It triggers action out of guilt, and does not motivate or educate. 3. It lacks creativity.

Indeed, a lot of development communications is about pursuing target audiences with negative pictures, and with messages that tell people what to do or think. An exaggerated version of many fundraising messages says: "The world is falling apart, you should care, we (with the help of some celebrities) are on the case, but we need your money."

Of course fundraising is necessary, but there is a flipside to this type of messaging: the repeated negative portrayal of communities does not make us care more, but less. It makes us feel bad and we stick our heads in the sand. The reason? Being confronted by a chugger releases adrenaline, and adrenaline is not what you want to stimulate if you want to motivate people to give, think or change behaviour.

What is needed instead is the release of endorphins. When we laugh and when our curiosity is sparked, endorphins makes us relax, and help lower our personal defences. Humour and creative curiosity also invites people to think for themselves. I don't like it when people tell me what to think, so why should I ask others to?

Last year my organisation, SAIH, made a music video 'Africa for Norway', a spoof that questioned development messaging. The success of that video helped me realise that although an issue is really important, it doesn't have to be wrapped up in a serious way to make its point. Breaking free from conventional communication techniques isn't always easy but the benefits can be great.

Development communicators can learn a thing or two from the fun theory, an initiative started by Volkswagen and based on the idea that making something fun is the easiest way to change people's behaviour for the better. For example, instead of saying: "Work out more," a 'piano staircase' was installed at a metro station in Sweden. Doing so increased the use of the stairs by 66% .

There is reason to be optimistic that NGOs are starting to get and use this approach. In Spain a concept called 'Bet for food', developed to support the growing use of food banks in Catalonia, capitalised on the competitive passion of football fans and led to 210,000 kilos of food collected in just one month.

US NGO, Mama Hope, has also developed 'Stop the Pity' campaign, a fundraising strategy based on dignity and fun. They have had massive outreach while turning negative stereotypes of Africans on their head. New and different approaches create curiosity, which is important in order to entice people to learn more about the issues.

And the 'fun theory' concept can be extending from fundraising to campaigning. It's a simple logic: if we're smart, there will be no need to hunt people down in the streets. They will come to us.

Sindre Edland-Gryt is communication advisor at, Norwegian Students' and Academics' International Assistance Fund (SAIH). He tweets as @sindreolav

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The Best and Worst Way to Pick a Charity

The Best and Worst Way to Pick a Charity

Ken's Commentary

Experts have noted that a one dimensional focus on nonprofit finances, if not supplemented by other information, can lead a donor/social investor to make the wrong decision as to which nonprofit they support. Except in extreme cases, we think that is correct. In addition, experts have noted that an overemphasis on overhead is misleading. We agree and always have. We further believe that the most critical dimension in evaluating a nonprofit has to do with achieving meaningful results. It is in that spirit that we jointly signed on to today's press release about overhead, with the BBB Wise Giving Alliance and Guidestar. On the other hand, we do not agree with those that say there is no place for overhead in evaluating charities.

That is why we think that many of Dan Pallotta's arguments are extreme and "dead wrong." I have more detailed explanations of my many disagreements with him here, here, here and here. Specifically on the issue of overhead, show me a nonprofit that uses 70% of its funds for overhead and I predict with a great deal of certainty that it is an organization that is either clueless or focused on lining someone's pockets rather than effectively serving others. People may disagree on what the best metric of overhead should be, but to say overhead is irrelevant is to deny a useful indicator of where many thieves and scoundrels dwell. I have worked in enough nonprofits with unethical leaders to say without question that we need to get serious about their existence as more than a rarity (see the book Silence, by Gary Snyder).  As noted above, this is not meant to imply in any way that overhead is the only metric donors should consider, but rather that it is an important data point.

This is exactly why, for a number of years now, we have been working towards a three dimensional rating system (which we now call CN 3.0). Specifically, we believe the three dimensions that must be considered for a social investor to have the critical information needed to make a wise decision are the charity's: 

1. Financial Health (CN 1.0 launched April 2002) – Is the nonprofit sustainable? Does it have robust financial strength to survive in good times and bad? Is the overhead not at the extreme end of the continuum?
2. Accountability & Transparency (CN 2.0 launched September 2011) – Does the organization have ethical practices, good governance and transparency? Is it accountable to its constituents?
3. Results Reporting (CN 3.0 methodology launched January 2013) – Can the organization supply information about meaningful and lasting change in the communities and lives of the people it serves? Can they show evidence that these changes are as a result of their efforts? Do they have systems and processes in place to effectively manage their performance?

Some question whether people who are "casual" (i.e. not super rich) investors, care about this sort of information. Our answer is proven by data. We had over 6 million visits to our site last year by donors seeking objective data on how they should invest an estimated $10 billion dollars of charitable gifts. That is with our existing, admittedly two dimensional rating system. Can you imagine the impact CN 3.0 will have on giving?

I believe that this is a critical battle for the very soul of the nonprofit sector. We MUST get past the notion that overhead is all that matters, while recognizing that efficiency and financial health is of critical importance in maintaining high performance and the best results for the long term. We MUST get past the notion of doing the "good work" with no accountability and transparency, because we know that charities without strong governance and ethical best practices are far more likely to have leadership problems. Once again, to maintain effective results we have to have these characteristics and policies in place. Finally, we MUST get past the idea that nonprofits are too complex or unique to be measured. I have seen it close up for years and it is not a pretty picture. The nonprofit sector must get its act together and make sure it is really helping provide meaningful and lasting change. It is life or death for many of those we serve whether charities are efficient, accountable, transparent and effective or not.

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Development Impact Bonds – a new business model for development?

Development Impact Bonds – a new business model for development?

Owen abroad

On June 5th we published for consultation a draft of our report on Development Impact Bonds, a new way of bringing together the public and private sector to invest in development.  The New York Times has an excellent explainer about the idea:

You are a health official in Uganda, and you're watching a crisis unfold. Your people have long suffered from epidemics of sleeping sickness, one of Africa's biggest killers. There is no vaccine and the only treatment is protracted and painful. Sleeping sickness, transmitted by the tsetse fly, is carried by cattle and also kills cattle, destroying the livelihoods of families who keep them.

… Governments and international aid donors sometimes like to call the work they do to improve people's lives "investing." Uganda's problem is an example. In a figurative sense, treating those cattle is an investment — a very good one. A small amount of money put in now will bring large rewards later. Of course, it's not literally an investment.

But what if it were?

What if this project were treated like a business startup? You'd get people to put up the money. If the "business" doesn't work, the investors are out of luck. But if it succeeds — if the cattle are treated and sprayed, and the gains are maintained — international donors would repay the investors with interest, using part of the money saved by reducing sleeping sickness. …

It is well worth reading in full.  (Ungated PDF here.)

Development Impact Bonds are adapted from a Social Impact Bond which aims to reduce reoffending in Peterborough Prison. The British government has just released interim results for this pilot. The reconviction of former prisoners in the Peterborough pilot has been reduced by 6% over two years, compared to a national increase in reoffending of 16% over the same period.  

As my colleague Rita Perakis explains here, we don't yet know whether reoffending by former Peterborough prisoners is doing better than a comparable group in the rest of the population (the numbers above are raw totals, not adjusted for differences in the characteristics of the prisoners).  We will know early next year whether the Peterborough group is doing better than a carefully matched sample of the rest of the prison population. But in the meantime, the raw numbers are promising.

If the Peterborough pilot succeeds, it will be because the SIB partnership manages service delivery differently from normal government services.  Rita says:

 it is more flexible, data driven, and responsive; and it brings together services from different providers in the public, private and non-profit sectors to target the needs of individual clients. It is this new business model which seems to be producing better results; the point of the financial innovation is to enable this business model to be put in place, outside the inevitable limitations of government budgeting, contracting and performance management.

This is the key point. DIBS are a new business model, made possible by a new financial model. It is the better business model that appears to bring benefits for citizens and clients of the public services (and taxpayers). The financial innovation is important because it allows this to happen.

The Dutch Government published last week an evaluation of public private partnerships in developing countries which was underwhelmed by the evidence of success. Goals have been badly specified, outcomes and impact are not tracked, and the results are ambiguous.  Crucially, they say:

The rationale for relying on PPPs is mostly based on resource mobilization motives rather than for effectiveness reasons. … most PPPs are motivated for financial reasons in order to mobilize additional resources that enable the execution of large public programs. Few evaluation reports mention overcoming financial market failure and product/market risks as a motive for public engagement.

Our draft proposals on Development Impact Bonds address many of these shortcoming in other public-private partnerships.  The need to define and credibly measure impact is baked in to the entire model.  Furthermore, they are specifically not designed as some sort of financial alchemy or strategy for resource mobilisation. The Working Group proposals are specifically and explicitly about enabling governments, delivery organisations, civil society, firms and investors to work together more efficiently to produce social outcomes.

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Aligning Interests in Impact Investing

Aligning Interests in Impact Investing

SSIR Opinion & Analysis

By Daniel Izzo

The structure of a traditional venture capital fund provides two sources of revenues to fund managers. The first is the management fee, which covers the costs of the team, the investment processes, and the monitoring of portfolio companies. It is calculated as a fraction of the total amount invested in the fund and is paid monthly to the management company. The second form of compensation is the carry cost. Early in the life of the fund, the manager and the investors agree on a minimum expected annual financial return. If the return is exceeded, a portion (usually about 20 percent) of the excess amount is due to fund managers as success fee.

This is a structure that has worked relatively well when the objective of the fund is solely financial return. There is a clear alignment of interests between investors and managers: Both sides want to maximize the financial return on investments. But in the case of impact investing, how do we ensure this alignment when impact metrics are also part of what we are trying to achieve?

Impact investments, of course, are made with the intention of generating positive social and/or environmental impact, beyond financial return. This is the exact motivation that made investors join our fund at Vox Capital; blending these two aspects was traditionally seen as irreconcilable. It became clear to us that a more traditional structure that rewarded our team based only on our financial return would not ensure the best alignment between investors and us (fund managers). For this alignment to happen, we needed to link our long-term incentive to the social impact that our fund's activities are generating.

A good example of this is Saútil, a Vox Capital portfolio company. Saútil was created to make it easier for people with no health insurance (75 percent of Brazilians) to access free services already provided by the public sector. The company geo-localized all the public health services providers in every Brazilian city so that the customer, using her ZIP code, could get information on where she should go and what documentation to carry to access a free medication, exam, or vaccination. To monetize the product, Saútil began selling, on a B2B model, a concierge service for blue-collar employees at large companies, who usually do not have a health plan. The product was so useful that insurance companies wanted to offer this same service to their high-income clients, thus reducing the number of claims and their costs.

Soon enough, it was clear to the management team that it was easier to sell to companies that serve high-income clients, compared to those that employ blue-collar workers. However, the intention of the entrepreneurs and their team (as well as Vox Capital's) while creating the company was to provide access to low-income clients—to reduce the gap on health care and services that we experience in Brazil. After much discussion, we decided to sell to high-income clients to guarantee the short-term financial results for the company, but to focus primarily on sales and product development for the bottom of the Brazilian pyramid—those who do not have access to a quality health plan. But then, how do you guarantee this mission lock on the long term? How do we guarantee that Vox Capital, as a member of the company's board, will always vote to serve the less-favored individuals?

The solution we found was to link part of our carry compensation to social impact metrics. That is, we will receive the full 20 percent success fee only if we deliver both the financial return and the social impact expected by investors. The mechanism works as follows: If the fund delivers beyond its benchmark financial return rate, we have access to the full carry compensation only if we also reach a certain level of impact. If we do not reach the minimum expected social impact level, our team is entitled to only half of the carry. At the same time, if the financial return is below its target, we are not entitled to any success fee, regardless of our social impact results, avoiding another potential conflict of interest: managers earning money, even when investors lose it.

The tool we are currently using for impact measurement is Global Impact Investing Rating System (GIIRS). Today, it is the most accepted and adopted methodology within the impact investing market worldwide. Of course, as with any other tool, it still has its limitations, and there is room for improvement. In this sense, and because it is such an important subject for us, we are also committed to helping improve GIIRS so that it increasingly reflects the full impact of our businesses. In fact, the GIIRS team has been consistently responsive to feedback provided by fund managers and investors as to improve their measurement methodology. As the impact-investing infrastructure continues to develop, we are open to adopting a new methodology if one proves more appropriate in the long run.

In a new and growing market like impact investing, it is important to ensure maximum alignment of interests among all players involved in its development. More traditional tools can and should be used, but small changes and adaptations are critical to guarantee that we are actually measuring what we intend to accomplish. It is essential that the structure described in this article is considered as a possible standard in the market. Only then, will impact investors be sure that they are supporting managers who are seeking the same goals. This is an important step in the maturation of the industry, which aims to transform the world for the better through its investments. To achieve that, I believe it is time to link the compensation of managers to social impact, the same way it is linked to financial return, to guarantee that everyone is truly accountable for delivering all the promises that impact investing is making.

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World’s Shortest Analyst Report

World's Shortest Analyst Report

The Big Picture

 

 

 

Hat tip Mike P

 

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Can a “Like” Save a Life?

Can a "Like" Save a Life?

SSIR Opinion & Analysis

By Julie Dixon

UNICEF Sweden issued a bold call to its social media supporters two months ago: Don't "Like" us; give us your money.

Though it likely caused more uproar among those of us in the "social media for social good" community than among the organization's own supporters, it certainly raised some important questions about the potential trade-off of encouraging online support at the expense of offline support, and of the growing value of influence relative to other contributions and individual can make.

We explored many of these same questions in a study that Georgetown University's Center for Social Impact Communication conducted last summer in partnership with Waggener Edstrom Worldwide. We wanted to gain insights into the "engagement life cycle" (from learning about a cause, to deciding if and how to support it, to perceptions of personal impact) among the highly desirable group of individuals who are both active participants in social media and active supporters of charitable organizations and campaigns. The "Digital Persuasion" survey, fielded among 2,000 American adults, yielded a wealth of nuanced data and further illuminates some important trends.

Here are three takeaways for nonprofits that may be considering the best approach to engaging their supporters online:

People learn about causes from social media—whether they support them online or off. There are distinct categories of supporters that emerged in our research, including people who continue to support causes online only and people who support offline only. However, there was a universal way that these individuals first hear about the causes and charities they support: social media. For both groups, social media trumped all other sources of information—online news sites, friends or family in person or via email, and traditional media.

Like it or not, the Facebook newsfeed has become a vital piece of real estate, and organizations must think about ways to ensure that their information will appear where their supporters are looking. A "Like" does allow an organization to claim a piece of that newsfeed (however fleeting), as do a number of other online actions, including commenting on, sharing, or posting content. Discouraging these types of actions among your current supporters only limits your exposure in the very places where people are most readily exchanging information today; it's akin to asking a reporter not to write about you or letting your website domain expire.

Most people who can take further action will take further action. Campaigns such as UNICEF's paint a bleak picture of online supporters. They are alternately categorized as lazy, bored, or selfish. In reality, a majority of our survey respondents (55 percent) reported that they were inspired to take further actions to support a cause after supporting it through social media. Among the actions they were compelled to take, donating money (68 percent); volunteering (53 percent); and donating clothing, food, or personal items (52 percent) occurred most frequently. Interestingly, for those who did not take further action, it wasn't because (as is often reported in criticism of so-called slacktivists) they felt they had done enough or that "Liking" was a substitute for other kinds of support. It was, quite simply, that they didn't have the money (59 percent) or the time (45 percent) to support the organization in other ways.

When an organization such as UNICEF tells its supporters that it's either money or nothing, it's missing out on valuable opportunities to cultivate a captive audience—those who may not have the funds or time to give now but who would give in the future.

We also were able to pinpoint the types of content that triggered people to make that leap from online support to offline. Respondents reported that stories (56 percent), videos (41 percent), and photos (40 percent) were important in motivating offline action, as well as seeing family and friends in their networks also taking action (39 percent). As organizations continue to think through their content strategies across the various social media platforms, it's important to consider what types of content will compel the actions you want your supporters to take.

It's all about influence. Perhaps the worst misconception about individuals who support causes through social media propagated by these types of campaigns is that they don't understand the difference between a virtual "Like" and a real dollar. Our study shows that they do, in fact, know the difference; they also inherently understand something that many organizations are beginning to acknowledge and embrace: the value of influence.

More than three quarters of our respondents (76 percent) reported a desire to influence others to care about the causes they care about. They deemed it more important than being seen as knowledgeable about charities and causes (55 percent), or being seen as charitable (51 percent). And this desire to influence others extends to the types of actions they are willing to take online in support of causes. More than half of respondents (54 percent) "Liked" a cause on Facebook so that they could influence friends and family to also "Like" the cause. The number one reason that people reported sharing information about causes with their social networks was to influence others to support the causes.

Given what we know about how people are accessing information about causes today and how they make decisions about supporting those causes, organizations should be encouraging this kind of social sharing—not writing it off as secondary to a financial donation. Provide online supporters with the tools and inspiration to share your organization's story, and recognize—rather than reprimand—them for their efforts.

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Schendingen van mensenrechten door landgrab in Ethiopië

Schendingen van mensenrechten door landgrab in Ethiopië

Vice Versa

Ethiopië is een donor darling van het Westen, waaronder Nederland, die bij de top vijf van meest spenderende donoren aan het land behoort. Begin dit jaar bezocht minister Ploumen het land en deze zomer zal de commissie Buitenlandse Handel en Ontwikkelingssamenwerking van de Tweede Kamer haar voorbeeld volgen. Ploumen was erg enthousiast over de mogelijkheden voor handel en investeringen door het Nederlandse bedrijfsleven gecombineerd met hulp aan dit land. Maar niet iedereen profiteert van de handel, betoogt Guus Geurts. Hij ging op onderzoek uit en kwam erachter dat er in veel Ethiopische gebieden sprake blijkt te zijn van schending van mensenrechten als gevolg van grootschalige landbouwinvesteringen.

Ethiopië trekt zowel binnenlandse als buitenlandse investeerders aan. Om export van landbouwproducten mogelijk te maken heeft het land de deuren wagenwijd geopend voor buitenlandse investeerders (via langdurige leasecontracten) in zogenaamd marginaal of ongebruikt land. Daarnaast investeert de Ethiopische overheid zelf in grootschalige suikerrietplantages en suikerfabrieken. Ook zijn binnenlandse investeerders betrokken bij het op lange termijn leasen van grote stukken land. Qua areaal is de verdeling volgens Oakland Institute ongeveer 50% buitenlandse en 50% binnenlandse investeringen. Deze 'handel' biedt echter niet aan iedereen voordelen.

Ontwikkeling of gedwongen verhuizing?

De investeringen leiden tot vele schendingen van mensenrechten onder de lokale bevolking, in het bijzonder onder inheemse volkeren waaronder de Anuak, de Afar (in de Awash vallei) en volkeren die in de Omo-vallei wonen. Al deze volken leven als als herders en combineren deze levenswijze met kleinschalige landbouw en visserij. Ze worden ook wel (agro)pastoralists genoemd. De Ethiopische overheid voert een actief programma om deze dunbevolkte gebieden tot 'ontwikkeling' te brengen. Men heeft namelijk besloten dat deze volkeren hun 'achterlijke nomadische levensstijl' moeten opgeven en mee moeten in de vaart der volkeren. Zo verklaarde wijlen president Zenawi in 2011 : 'I promise you that, even though this area is known as backward in terms of civilization, it will become an example of rapid development.'

Deze 'ontwikkeling' houdt in dat de Ethiopische overheid met geweld en intimidatie door leger en politie, de lokale bevolking dwingt hun land en hun traditionele nomadische levensonderhoud te verlaten en zich te vestigen in dorpen, ook wel villagization genoemd. Hun vee dienen ze (grotendeels) te verkopen, en men kan als men geluk heeft als arbeider op aan te leggen plantages of in de (suiker)fabrieken aan de slag. Daarbij wordt er voedselhulp en drinkwater geboden, en worden er scholen en gezondheidscentra gebouwd of beloofd. Volgens Human Right Watch gaat het om 1,5 miljoen mensen die geëvacueerd zijn sinds 2010.

Naast het brengen van ontwikkeling is het doel van deze evacuaties vooral om het land vrij te maken voor grootschalige geïrrigeerde landbouw, goudwinning en oliewinning. Op deze manier kunnen exportdollars worden verdiend. Wat betreft landbouw zijn belangrijke exportgewassen suikerriet, palmolie en katoen. Uit een artikel van the Ethiopian Sugar Corporation bleek dat de te produceren suiker niet alleen bestemd is om zelfvoorzienend in suiker te worden, wat men nu nog niet is, maar dat Ethiopië binnen drie jaar bij de top 10-suikerexporteurs wil behoren. Meer dan de helft van de geplande suikerproductie zal dan geëxporteerd worden. De overheid zal hiervoor onder andere gebruik maken van Indiase suikerbedrijven die het in beslag genomen land voor zeer lage bedragen langjarig kunnen leasen. Ze biedt daarbij talloze belastingvoordelen aan de investeerders die het land voor zeer lage lease-bedragen kunnen huren.

Uit een rapport van Oakland Institute blijkt verder dat de Ethiopische overheid wel een erg positief beeld naar de buitenwereld schept. Zo is er geen 'unused' of marginaal land in Ethiopië. Herders grazen periodiek met hun vee op het land om zo overbegrazing te voorkomen en/of men past shifting cultivation toe waarbij sommige stukken land een tijd braak liggen. Ook wordt het land gebruikt voor het verzamelen van brandhout en bouwmateriaal.

Verder is er – in ieder geval in de  Awash- en Omo-gebieden – nauwelijks sprake van vrijwillige medewerking en instemming door de lokale bevolking. Er vindt geen of een zeer gebrekkige consultatie met de bevolking plaats. Dit is in strijd met internationale verdragen. Veel mensen zeggen nog liever te sterven dan te vertrekken. Er zijn vele getuigenissen dat de bevolking door leger en politie met geweld en bedreigingen wordt geïntimideerd, hetgeen bijvoorbeeld blijkt uit het rapport "What Will Happen if Hunger Comes?" Abuses against the Indigenous Peoples of Ethiopia's Lower Omo Valley van Human Rights Watch ) De stamoudsten en leiders worden eruit gepikt, gearresteerd en soms langdurig gevangen gezet. De angst onder de bevolking die zo ontstaat, zorgt ervoor dat ze niet meer durven te protesteren. Ook is er een grote militaire aanwezigheid in het Awash-gebied (Afar) en is het betreffende gebied in de Omo-vallei – met inzet van politie en leger – ontoegankelijk voor buitenlanders. In plaats van toestemming te vragen verschijnen de bulldozers vaak onverwachts om het land bouwrijp te maken. Hierbij worden natuurgebieden, bomen, landbouwgrond (soms met oogstrijpe gewassen) en volle voorraadschuren vernietigd. Vee en bijenkorven werden hierbij gestolen.

Landgrab rond de Awash-river

In december 2012 bezocht ik de Omo vallei en Awash. Daar sprak ik Sabira Hassan en Houmad Hamad Ali, twee vertegenwoordigers van het Afar-volk. Ze vertelden dat het hele gebied dat rond de Awash-rivier ligt is aangewezen om te worden verleased aan buitenlandse investeerders. Rond Aisaita zijn nu al grote suikerrietplantages aangelegd en is er een suikerrietfabriek gebouwd door een Indiase investeerder. Verder wil Ethiopië met geïrrigeerde teelt van katoen een grote exporteur op de wereldmarkt worden. Rond Aisaita is drie miljoen hectare beschikbaar voor investeerders, waarvan één miljoen voor katoenteelt.

Het betekent dat dit nomadenvolk geen toegang meer heeft met hun vee tot de rivier, en dat deze manier van levensonderhoud dus gedoemd is te verdwijnen. Sabira Hassan is bang: 'Eerst zal het vee sterven en daarna de mensen.' Ze spreekt zelfs van een genocide die zich de komende tien jaar zal voltrekken.  Tot 2008 hadden de stamoudsten nog het recht om hun mening te geven over dergelijke projecten en was consultatie verplicht. Maar door een nationale wetswijziging hoeft men de lokale bevolking sindsdien niet meer te raadplegen. Mensen die protesteren worden gearresteerd; er zitten nu minimaal 200 mensen in de gevangenis in verband met deze problematiek, vertelt Hassan. Ook is de militaire aanwezigheid flink opgevoerd mede om de belangrijke weg(enbouw) op de lijn Addis – Djibouti te bewaken. Bij eerdere gevechten tussen militairen en de lokale bevolking zijn 20 tot 30 mensen gedood. De banen in de suikerindustrie worden overigens ingenomen door Indiase werknemers, dus alternatief werk is er voorlopig ook niet. Ook levert de omgang van de Indiërs met de lokale bevolking veel problemen op.

De twee Afar-mensen werken met een Franse ngo samen in een project voor scholen en zonnecellen. Personeel van de Franse ambassade zou in december op bezoek komen om de projecten te bezoeken. Een uitgelezen kans om deze problematiek aan te kaarten, stelde ik voor. Maar nee, dan liep men kans ook het geld voor deze projecten te verliezen. Dus hielden Hassan en Hamid Ali zich tijdens deze gesprekken verre van gevoelige politieke zaken. Daarbij heeft de Franse staat, volgens hen, via Franse bedrijven in de Telecom grote mogelijke commerciële belangen en kansen in Ethiopië. Dus om die niet in gevaar te brengen, ziet men dit soort problematiek, maar even door de vingers. Ook hebben de Franssen hun grootste buitenlandse militaire basis gevestigd is Djibouti, hun voormalige kolonie.

Schendingen van mensenrechten in de Zuidelijke Omo-vallei

De zuidelijke Omo-vallei is een toeristische trekpleister. Het gebied ligt in het uiterste zuidwesten aan de grens met Kenia en Zuid-Soedan. Zowel aan de oost- als westoever van de rivier wonen verschillende inheemse volkeren die sterk aan hun traditionele manier van levensonderhoud en cultuur vasthouden. Dit komt mede omdat het gebied jarenlang zeer slecht bereikbaar was. Maar de afgelopen jaren zijn veel toegangswegen geasfalteerd of verhard. Het nadeel van deze verbeterde wegen is dat ze het gebied niet alleen ontsluiten voor onafhankelijke toeristen, maar ook voor toekomstige grootschalige landbouw, mijnbouw en oliewinning. Het is dus maar de vraag hoe lang deze volkeren hun traditionele levensonderhoud nog kunnen uitoefenen.

Om meer te weten te komen over Ethiopische plannen in dit gebied, sprak ik in Jinka Douglas Burji, een vertegenwoordiger van één van de volkeren. Het gesprek vond uit veiligheidsoverwegingen op mijn hotelkamer plaats. Hij zei dat de overheid in het gehele gebied spionnen had gestationeerd. Dus iedere gids of schoenenpoetser zou een informant kunnen zijn. Ik was verrast dat Douglas zo goed op de hoogte was van de plannen voor het gehele gebied. Op mijn kaart tekende hij het geplande gebied in waar – binnen het Kuraz- suikerproject – plantages zouden worden aangelegd en waar de suikerrietfabrieken waren gepland. Ook gaf hij aan welke inheemse volkeren hierbij hun land kwijt zouden raken de komende vijf jaar. Wat hij aanwees was schokkend: grote delen van de leefgebieden van zes inheemse volkeren zouden worden beplant met suikerriet, ook zouden er zes fabrieken worden aangelegd waarvan er één in aanbouw is bij Hana Mursi, niet ver van het Bodi-dorp dat we bezochten. Om de akkers te bevloeien worden er irrigatiekanalen en dammen in de Omo-rivier – zoals de zeer controversiële Gibe III-dam – aangelegd. Zelfs een deel het Mago National Park en een groot deel van het Omo National Park aan de westzijde van de rivier, zullen volgens plan worden ontgonnen voor deze plantages. Ook buiten de genoemde nationale parken zal er volgens Douglas veel primair natuurgebied worden vernietigd. Een landkaart in een rapport van Human Right Watch bevestigt dit. Daarnaast worden in het Ethiopische zakentijdschrift Addis Fortune de plannen van het Kuraz-sugar project in de Omo-vallei verder uitgelegd vanuit een perspectief van de Ethiopische overheid.

Uit een Italiaanse videofilm in de Italiaanse krant La Stampa, blijkt dat er naast suikerriet- ook palmolieplantages zijn aangelegd, die bestemd zijn voor de export van biobrandstof. Hierbij zijn o.a. het Italiaanse bedrijf OBM en FRI El Ethiopia betrokken.

Volgens Burji en Human Right Watch werden vanaf eind 2012 al een deel van de Bodi-dorpen aan de oostoever ontruimd, daarna zijn vanaf begin dit jaar de Mursi aan de beurt. Later zullen volgens hem aan de oostkant de Daasanach, Kwegu (Muguji) en waarschijnlijk de Karo hun huidige grondgebied (deels) verliezen. Aan de westoever wacht de Suri en Nyangatom hetzelfde lot.  In totaal gaat het om minimaal 90.000 mensen die verplicht hun nomadenbestaan moeten verlaten en in dorpen gaan wonen. Volgens Human Right Watch  zullen in totaal 200.000 inheemse mensen in de Omo-vallei grote nadelen ondervinden van dit project.

Over de zeer gebrekkige of politieke gekleurde milieu – en sociale effectrapportages rond de Gibe-Dam in de Omo-rivier werd ook een kritisch rapport gepubliceerd door Berkeley University en de ARWG. Deze Gibe III-dam en de daarmee samenhangende irrigatieprojecten brengen niet alleen het Omo-gebied en haar bevolking in gevaar, maar ook Lake Turkana in Kenia wordt ernstig bedreigd. Beide gebieden zijn World Heritage Sites. Het Turkana-meer zal als de irrigatieplannen doorgaan te maken krijgen met veel minder instroom van water uit de Omo-rivier. Het peil zou met meer dan 20 meter kunnen zakken en er wordt al gewaarschuwd voor Aralmeer-achtige toestanden. Van dit meer zijn nu 300.000 mensen afhankelijk voor hun bestaan. Het gaar hierbij vooral om inheemse nomadische volkeren als de Turkana, Samburu en Rendille. Ondanks waarschuwingen van o.a. Friends of Lake Turkana heeft dit nog niet tot felle protesten van de Keniaanse overheid bij Ethiopië geleid.

Naast ontruimingen om exportgerichte landbouw mogelijk te maken, worden er ook dorpen ontruimd om goudwinning mogelijk te maken. Suri die (aan de Westoever van de Omo) weigerden echter te vertrekken.  Hierop heeft het Ethiopische leger. Hierbij kwamen in totaal 179 mannen, vrouwen en kinderen om. In februari kreeg ik een bericht van Douglas Burji. Hij vertelde me dat het Ethiopische leger op 4 oktober 2012 de dorpen Cholowamale en Garsana had uitgemoord.  Hij zond me over  -  waarschijnlijk – dezelfde wreedheden al eerder in januari een email, die ik breed verspreide naar de internationale en nationale media. CNN plaatste dit bericht als een niet geverifieerd artikel op haar website. Volgens de website indigenouspeoplesissues.com waren er in mei 2012 57 tot 62 Suri vermoord, omdat zij of andere Suri niet weigerden te vertrekken om aanleg van suikerrietplantages aan te leggen. De berichten zijn echter niet geverifieerd door Westerse journalisten.

Hoe nu verder?

In Nairobi sprak ik in januari NRC- en Radio 1-correspondent Koert Lindijer over genoemde massamoorden. Hij had navraag gedaan bij bevriende correspondenten in Addis Ababa. Zij wisten wel ongeveer van deze problemen, maar niemand had tot nu toe de berichten in het gebied kunnen verifiëren. In overleg met de Afrikaredactie van NRC besloten ook zij nog niet te publiceren. Wel publiceerden organisaties als the Oakland Institute, Survival International en de Friends of Lake Turkana op hun websites over de problemen rond de aanleg van de plantages en de bouw van de Gibe III-dam. Maar dit heeft nog niet tot veel internationale aandacht en druk op Ethiopië geleid.

Een teleurstelling was de reactie van een medewerker van een Belgische ambassade die ik een paar dagen na het interview met Douglas Burji, toevallig tegenkwam in de Omo-vallei. Hij zei dat westerse druk op de Ethiopische overheid waarschijnlijk weinig zou uithalen. In het verleden heeft men tegen kritische westerse donoren gezegd dat men hun geld niet nodig had als men te kritisch werd. Lindijer bevestigt dit en denkt dat deze mensenrechtenschendingen voor de overheid 'minor issues' zijn, op weg om exportdollars binnen te halen.

Desselegn Rahmato van het Forum for Social Studies in Addis Abeba, die een kritische publicatie schreef voor de IS Academy, spreekt ook  over de veel mindere kritische houding van de EU en in het bijzonder Nederland tegenover landgrab. Nederland stond volgens hem lang positief bekend als een land dat opkwam voor mensenrechten, maar daar is de laatste jaren weinig van over. Maar erger is nog dat de huidige weinig kritische hulprelatie de schending van mensenrechten zelfs mede faciliteert. Ethiopië besteedt namelijk een deel van westers ontwikkelingsgeld voor hun sociale programma's, zoals genoemde villagization-programma wat valt onder het Protection of Basic Services programme. Nederland hoort bij de top vijf van donoren aan Ethiopië, dus onze hulp zou indirect mee kunnen werken aan deze gewelddadige ontruimingen.

Ministers Ploumen en Timmermans zeggen echter dat er sinds 2011 geen Nederlands hulpgeld meer naar dit PBS-programma gaat. In hun beantwoording van SP-kamervragen over deze problematiek, verklaren ze verder dat er 'geen overtuigende bewijzen (zijn) dat er systematisch en op grote schaal mensenrechtenschendingen plaatsvinden en de claim van dwang kon niet worden bevestigd'. Wel erkennen zij problemen in de communicatie en de compensatie aan de getroffen volkeren. Impliciet geven ze in deze beantwoording aan dat ze het gedwongen op moeten geven van het nomadenbestaan, niet als probleem zien. Als men maar gecompenseerd wordt. Opvallend is verder dat men 'geen voorstander is van het ongeclausuleerd hanteren van de term landroof. Daarvoor is de problematiek te complex. Specifieke grootschalige investeringen kunnen onder bepaalde voorwaarden en omstandigheden een positief effect hebben op de landbouwproductie en armoedebestrijding.'

Deze weinig kritische insteek is ook te lezen in een artikel in de Volkskrant over het bezoek van Ploumen aan Ethiopië is. Ze benadrukt hierin vooral de zegeningen van handel en investeringen via het bedrijfsleven, en zegt dat ontwikkelingshulp zal verdwijnen. Voor volkeren die buiten de globaliserende economie met hun eigen hulpbronnen op duurzame wijze in hun eigen levensonderhoud willen voorzien en daarbij hun tradities in stand willen houden, lijkt in deze filosofie minder plek.

Om positief te eindigen, komen er nu bijna wekelijks kritische rapporten en berichten naar buiten, die meer internationale druk kunnen faciliteren. Zo haalt mensenrechtenadvocaat en publicist Gordon Bennett snoeihard uit naar de Britse overheid omdat ze – als 2^e donor van het land – weigeren kritiek te uiten op de schending van mensenrechten in de Omo-Vallei.  Positief is ook dat XminY Solidariteitsfonds een projectaanvraag van Douglas Burji positief heeft gehonoreerd. Hij zal de komende maanden in het geheim de misstanden in het gebied gaan vastleggen op film. Ik maak me grote zorgen over zijn veiligheid, maar hopelijk lukt het hem deze film tot een goed einde te brengen. Zijn hoop is dat als deze beelden het Westen bereiken er wel voldoende protest los komt vanuit de internationale gemeenschap om de plannen van de Ethiopische overheid en de buitenlandse investeerders in de Omo-vallei, te stoppen.

Guus Geurts is beleidsgericht milieukundige, publicist en fotograaf, o.a. auteur van het boek 'Wereldvoedsel – pleidooi voor een rechtvaardige en ecologische voedselvoorziening', www.guusgeurts.nl

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Henk J.Th. Van Stokkom

Minister Ploumen moet durven vertrouwen

Minister Ploumen moet durven vertrouwen

Vice Versa

In 2015 komt er een einde aan het subsidiestelsel voor het maatschappelijk middenveld zoals we dat nu kennen. Negen vooraanstaande vrouwen uit de ontwikkelingssector nodigen minister Ploumen uit om te kiezen voor een radicale koerswijziging en een systeem in te richten dat gestoeld is op een onmisbaar basiselement: vertrouwen. 

In 2015 komt er een einde aan veel van de bestaande Nederlandse subsidieregelingen voor ontwikkelingsorganisaties. En dat is goed. Want het huidige subsidiesysteem is eigenlijk een mislukking. Omdat het is gebouwd op gestold wantrouwen en boekhoudersdenken. De papieren werkelijkheid regeert. Dat er ondanks dit subsidiesysteem dag in dag uit ook goede resultaten worden behaald in de strijd tegen armoede is eigenlijk een wonder. Wij, negen betrokken deskundigen uit de ontwikkelingssector dagen minister Ploumen uit om nu te kiezen voor een radicale koerswijziging. Zodat ze haar belofte om méér armoede te bestrijden met minder geld ook werkelijk waar kan maken.

Het is geen gemakkelijke opgave om meisjes naar school te krijgen in Zuid-Sudan. De regering van dit nieuwe land is fragiel, en onrust ligt op de loer. De meeste mensen durven er nog nauwelijks te denken aan het opbouwen van een nieuw leven. Toch zijn er organisaties die zich juist daar willen inzetten voor een groep kinderen waarvan de kans dat zij een goede toekomst tegemoet gaan het kleinst is. Meisjes. Maar wat als al doende blijkt dat niet alleen het gebrek aan leraren het probleem is, maar tegelijkertijd de onveilige route naar school? Mag je je strategie dan aanpassen, zonder dat je een deel van je inkomsten verliest? Dat kan alleen als je die inkomsten op basis van vertrouwen hebt gekregen. Vertrouwen dat een organisatie op basis van jarenlang opgebouwde kennis en ervaring steeds opnieuw de best mogelijke keuzes maakt.

Miljoenen Nederlandse donateurs en vrijwilligers vertrouwen de organisaties die zij steunen. Ook de bijdragen van de Nationale Postcode Loterij aan goede doelen zijn gebaseerd op vertrouwen. Met 5 medewerkers verdelen zij jaarlijks bijna 300 miljoen euro over 89 streng geselecteerde goede doelen. Dat doen ze bewust zonder dwingende formats, strakke subsidiekaders en gedetailleerde monitoringsprotocollen. En biedt daarmee volop de ruimte aan hun gepassioneerde, professionele partners om datgene te doen wat ze het beste kunnen. Dat vertrouwen zou minister Ploumen voor Buitenlandse Handel en Ontwikkelingssamenwerking ook moeten geven aan ontwikkelingsorganisaties.

Karrenvracht papier

In het huidige medefinancieringsstelsel (MFSII), opgesteld onder verantwoordelijkheid van toenmalig minister Koenders, is de regeldruk wanstaltig. Dat begon al bij de aanvraag die in sommige gevallen zo omvangrijk was, dat ze letterlijk als karrenvracht papier het ministerie in werd gereden. Omdat er gedetailleerde resultaten per jaar tot aan 2015 moesten worden vastgelegd. Ook moet daar jaarlijks op worden gerapporteerd. Het Adviescollege Toetsing Administratieve lasten heeft in mei 2011 geprobeerd te berekenen hoeveel de ontwikkelingsorganisaties hebben geïnvesteerd in alleen al het schrijven van hun aanvragen: twaalf miljoen euro. Er is dus twaalf miljoen euro ontwikkelingsgeld niet besteed aan schoon drinkwater, scholing en goede gezondheidszorg.

Toen de subsidieaanvragen in Nederland werden geschreven, zag de politieke en praktische werkelijkheid in Zuid-Sudan er compleet anders uit dan vandaag, én dan in 2015. Maar organisaties die MFSII-subsidie krijgen moeten vasthouden aan de in hun aanvraag gemaakte keuzes. Simpelweg omdat die nu eenmaal zo zijn vastgelegd. Door op zo'n gedetailleerd niveau subsidies toe te kennen, en te monitoren, geeft  Buitenlandse Zaken weinig blijk van vertrouwen in de ontwikkelingsorganisaties.

Er zijn overheidsinstanties die dit beter doen. Al in 2009 presenteerde toenmalig minister Bos van Financiën het Rijksbrede Subsidiekader. Het uitgangspunt hierbij is verantwoord vertrouwen en risicoacceptatie. Dat wil zeggen dat de subsidieontvanger rapporteert op kosten en prestaties, en dat de overheid accepteert dat er fouten gemaakt worden. Mits daarvan wordt geleerd. Bij MFSII werd dit rijksbrede subsidiekader volledig genegeerd.

Verantwoord vertrouwen

De hoogte van het subsidiebedrag dat voor ontwikkelingsorganisaties ná 2015 beschikbaar wordt gesteld, wordt deze dagen in de Tweede Kamer uitgebreid bediscussieerd. Maar hoe, en onder welke voorwaarden, deze subsidies verdeeld zullen gaan worden zal minister Ploumen pas na de zomer duidelijk maken. De minister heeft gekozen om de inhoudelijke lijn van haar voorganger te volgen. Daardoor ontstaat er rust en ruimte om op vorm een radicale andere koers te varen. Er is nog genoeg tijd om een dergelijk nieuwe koers echt goed uit te werken.

Wij roepen minister Ploumen op om de subsidies voortaan te verdelen op basis van vertrouwen. Niet blind, maar verantwoord vertrouwen. Vanzelfsprekend gaat daar een uitgebreide selectieronde aan vooraf. Vertrouwen moet je ook verdienen. Door aannemelijk te maken dat je goede resultaten haalt op de doelen die de minister heeft gesteld. En beschikt over de cruciale succesfactoren: een bewezen strategie, omgevingssensitiviteit en aanpassingsvermogen. We bieden de minister binnenkort graag een uitgewerkt plan aan waar in staat hóe dat dan kan.

Kiezen voor vertrouwen als uitgangspunt voor het subsidiestelsel voor ontwikkelingsorganisaties vergt een radicale koerswijziging. Maar het komt de slagkracht van ontwikkelingsorganisaties zeer ten goede, omdat zij zich kunnen zich gaan richten op hun core-business. En dat zou goed nieuws zijn, voor de meisjes in Zuid-Sudan. En voor al die anderen op al die andere plekken waar de strijd tegen armoede nog niet is gestreden.

Marjolein de Rooij, Evelijne Bruning, Femke Rotteveel, Ingrid Plag, Marieke de Wal, Tabitha Gerrets, Wilma Roozenboom, Anke Tijtsma en Hilke Jansen.  

 

 

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Will the Post-2015 report make a difference? Depends what happens next

Will the Post-2015 report make a difference? Depends what happens next

From Poverty to Power by Duncan Green

An edited version of this piece, written with Stephen Hale, appeared on the Guardian Poverty Matters site on Friday

Reading the report of the High Level Panel induces a sense of giddy optimism. It is a manifesto for a (much) better world, taking the best of the Millennium Development Goals, and adding what we have learned in the intervening years – the importance of social protection, sustainability, ending conflict, tackling the deepest pockets of poverty, even obesity (rapidly rising in many poor countries). It has a big idea (consigning absolute poverty to the history books) and is on occasion brave (in the Sir Humphrey sense) for example in its commitment to women's rights, including ending child marriage and violence against women, and guaranteeing universal sexual and reproductive health rights.

The ambition and optimism is all the more welcome for its contrast with the daily grind of austerity, recession and international paralysis (Syria, Climate Change, the torments of the European Union). In response, the report is clearly designed for a no/low cost environment, downplaying the importance of aid, talking up access to data, and revenue raisers like cracking down on tax evasion.

But then the doubts start to creep in. What's missing is always harder to spot than what is in the text, but three gaps are already clear: The emerging global concern over inequality is relegated to national politics, and otherwise dealt with through the 'data default' of requiring any target to be met amongst the poorest fifth of a population, not just the population as a whole. The concept of poverty is pretty old school – income, health, education, and fails to recognize the considerable progress made in measuring 'well-being' – the level of life satisfaction people feel. Finally there is too little recognition that the earth is a finite ecosystem, and that we need to make a reality of the concept of planetary boundaries if we are to sustain progress in tackling poverty.

But the elephant in the room is not the text, but how this text will or will not connect to the struggles to achieve the many very laudable aims set out in the report.

Five or 10 years down the line, will the High Level Panel report be food for termites, or a watershed in human development? The shelves of international bodies are piled high with forgotten reports by distinguished panels. Do any readers remember the 2012 High-Level Panel on Global Sustainability or the UN High Level Advisory Group on Climate Financing? Thought not.

These reports sank because they failed to connect with more permanent international processes and did not tackle the critical underlying issues of power and politics that determine what good ideas make it into policy, and what are ignored.

thanks guys, now what?

Here the HLP report risks going the same way. It is written in the name of an imaginary 'we' (as in 'it is crucial that we ensure basic safety and justice for all'), ignoring the reality that 'we' may not all want the same thing (which is why we need politics, after all).

The post2015 process could have lasting influence in four main ways: Firstly, making the case for improving the quality or quantity of aid (the major achievement of the MDGs). The HLP report does pretty well on that, as you would expect.

Second, international agreements can be effective in triggering long-term, under-the-radar changes in public norms and values. This is more subtle, but very important – research is piling up to show that international conventions to end discrimination against women, or on the rights of children, have permeated people's heads (and national laws) in many countries, changing in fundamental ways, perceptions of what it is to be a woman or a child. It is very unlikely indeed that this report will have that effect, but it's still possible if there is sufficient pressure.

That brings us to a third pathway to impact: directly exerting traction on national governments. Will the post2015 process persuade national governments to do things differently, for example by creating a 'race to the top' between governments, highlighting the heroes and zeroes (like the World Bank's Doing Business rankings). Promisingly, the report urges regional reports and peer reviews – nothing annoys a leader (or wins press coverage) like being trounced by a neighbour in a league table.

Finally, the post2015 process could create stronger and broader alliances of civil society organizations, trade unions, faith institutions and others who take whatever comes out of the process and use it to put pressure on their governments, as they have done with some of the ILO conventions, or the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

The report now enters the treacherous waters of a 'UN Open Working Group'. With two and a half years before the MDGs deadline, the task of those concerned with development should now be to defend the good stuff in the HLP report from dilution, while focussing far more strongly on how a new set of global goals can lead to lasting change at national level.

The report's publication inevitably triggered an avalanche of opinion pieces. The ones I liked included Charles Kenny, a round up of reactions by Global Dashboard and (of course) Claire Melamed. Any others stand out?

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Henk J.Th. Van Stokkom

Soil atlas of Africa

Soil atlas of Africa

Africa Unchained

From the European Commission:

What is special about soil in Africa?

The first ever SOIL ATLAS OF AFRICA uses striking maps, informative texts and stunning photographs to answer and explain these and other questions. Leading soil scientists from Europe and Africa have collaborated to produce this unique document. Using state-of-the-art computer mapping techniques, the Soil Atlas of Africa shows the changing nature of soil across the continent. It explains the origin and functions of soil, describes the different soil types that can be found in Africa and their relevance to both local and global issues. The atlas also discusses the principal threats to soil and the steps being taken to protect soil resources. The Soil Atlas of Africa is more than just a normal atlas. It presents a new and comprehensive interpretation of an often neglected natural resource. The Soil Atlas of Africa is an essential reference to a non-renewable resource that is fundamental for life on this planet.

More here

via Boing Boing

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Henk J.Th. Van Stokkom

Why all the attention to cash transfers now?

Why all the attention to cash transfers now?

Chris Blattman

That's the question Jennifer Lentfer asked on the Oxfam blog following my post and paper last week on the amazing impacts of cash transfers in Uganda.

Cash transfers are nothing new, though there's a lot of hub-bub about them this week in the popular media. One researcher and blogger publishes a paper and, voilà, the next development trend is born!

She points to a wealth of evidence on conditional cash transfer programs–CCTs in the acronym-laden world of development. These programs give regular payments to poor families (sort of like a welfare check) but only if they send their kid to school, get them vaccinated, and so forth.

She is right, and you should see her post and links if you want more details. There is also a recent book (free to download) from some great World Bank researchers, summarizing all the evidence so far.

I also disagree in two ways, though. Here's what I posted on her blog:

One is that… my sense is that people like Jennifer are the exception and not the rule.

Most of all, governments and NGOs want to give away cash on condition, or with lots of hands-on follow up or accountability, some of which is not very cost effective. We really don't have much evidence at all on unconditional transfers. Here I expect a lot of skepticism from the aid community–well-deserved skepticism, at least until we have more studies.

An aside: we actually do have at least one study on the value added by NGO giving conditions and otherwise holding the poor "accountable" for cash: here is a post on an experiment we recently finished in Uganda, where we randomized this cost-laden accountability and hands-on advice, alongside cash. It helped, but not so much that it passed reasonable cost-benefit tests. NGOs will need to learn to streamine here.

But I digress.

My second counter-argument is this: everything we have on CCTs show they go directly into current spending, precautionary savings, or investments in children. This is terrific, but this doesn't raise the short or medium-run earning potential of households. It doesn't necessarily change the lifetime income stream of the people receiving the transfers (except to the extent their kids earn more 20 years down the road). It doesn't help shift economies from agriculture into cottage industry.

What's striking is that almost none of these CCT studies look to see whether the windfalls were invested in productive enterprise. At root are some of the deepest questions in development: What constrains entrepreneurship? What holds back "occupational choice"–the decision to be self-employed and in what sector? What prompts structural change from agriculture to industry? This is the basic process of development that CCTs haven't illuminated.

This point comes across more clearly in our paper than my blog post. We try to frame what we've learned relative not only to CCT programs but also to studies of asset transfers, training programs, and business grants.

But the basic point–that any paper stands on the shoulders of giants–is still correct, and ours is just one contribution to a literature that tells us the power of cash to transform lives. It ought to make us skeptical of the cost-effectiveness of the alternatives, enough to test which services actually "add value" in the sense that they make at least as large a difference in the lives of the poor as the cash grant alternative. Otherwise we ought to get out of the way.

Comment below or here.

The post Why all the attention to cash transfers now? appeared first on Chris Blattman.

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Met vriendelijke groet,

Best regards,

Henk J.Th. Van Stokkom

Measuring without measuring

Measuring without measuring

Seth's Blog

As an organization grows and industrializes, it's tempting to simplify things for the troops. Find a goal, make it a number and measure it until it gets better. In most organizations, the thing you measure is the thing that will improve.

Colleges decided that the SAT were a useful shortcut, a way to measure future performance in college. And nervous parents and competitive kids everywhere embraced the metric, and stick with it, even after seeing (again and again) that all the SAT measures is how well you do on the SAT. It's easier to focus on one number than it is to focus on a life.

Paypal and Chase and countless other organizations do precisely this: they figure out a metric, decide it's important and then create a department to improve that metric.

Consider the Chase Fraud Prevention department. It costs a credit card company (and especially their merchants) a lot of money when fraudulent charges are made, because they often have to eat the cost. So this department of thousands of people works to make the number of fraudulent charges go down at the same time they keep expenses low. Which sounds great until you realize that the easiest way to do this is to flag false positives, annoy honest customers and provide little or no fallback when a mistake is made.

Simple example: I regularly get an automated phone call from the bank with an urgent warning. But even when I answer the phone, the system doesn't let me ring through to an operator. Instead, I have to write every detail down, then call, wait on hold, prove it's me, type in all the information, and THEN explain to them that in fact, the charge was mine.

And this department has no incentive to fix this interaction, because 'annoying' is not a metric that the bosses have decided to measure. Someone is busy watching one number, but it's the wrong one.

Or consider the similar problem at Paypal. Stories of good (or great) customers being totally shut down, sometimes to the point of bankruptcy, are legion. There may be people at Paypal who care about this, but the security people don't. That's because they're not measuring the right thing.

Measurement is fabulous. Unless you're busy measuring what's easy to measure as opposed to what's important.

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Henk J.Th. Van Stokkom

Gates v. Moyo: Are Aid Critics Getting Trolled?

Gates v. Moyo: Are Aid Critics Getting Trolled?

Open The Echo Chamber

I'm late to this show – I was traveling last week when the whole Gates/Moyo throwdown happened. I was going to let it go, but I have received enough prodding from others to offer my thoughts – probably because I have offered extended critiques of Moyo's Dead Aid (links below), while also noting that Gates' understandings of the problems of aid and development are a bit myopic. So, here we go…

Bill Gates finally voiced what has been implicit in much of his approach to development – he sees aid and development critics as highly problematic people who slow down progress (or whatever Bill thinks passes for progress).  Honestly, this is thoroughly unsurprising to anyone who has paid any attention to what Bill has said all along, or indeed anything the Gates Foundation does.  There just isn't much room for meta-criticism at the foundation or its work – sure, they evaluate their programs, but there isn't much evaluation/consideration of whether or not the guiding principals behind those programs make much sense.  There is an assumption that Gates' goals are somehow self-evident, and therefore critics are just problems to be solved.

Let's just start with this part of what Gates said. To me, his comments represent a profound misunderstanding of the place of aid and development criticism – his comments represent critics as annoyances to be brushed away, implying that criticism is an end unto itself. I do not know a single aid/development critic for whom criticism is the end. Critical thinking, and any resultant criticism, is a means to the end of changing the world. Simply put, without critical thinkers to constantly evaluate, challenge, and push the thinking of those in the world of development policy and implementation, where would we be? Take gender, for example. Today, nobody questions the need to consider the gender of the beneficiary when we think about policies or programs, but in the late 1960s those who first raised this issue were critics, often viewed as "annoyances" who slowed down the process of designing and implementing projects with their silly concerns about the needs of women. Gates does his foundation, and the entire enterprise/discipline of development a disservice in this rather sad misrepresentation of the aid critic.

Had Gates simply said what he did about aid critics in the abstract, I think it would have passed without much comment. But he didn't. Instead, he singled out Dambisa Moyo as an archetype of aid criticism. As a result, he gave a platform to someone who clearly loves the attention. I fear he also somehow made her the archetype for the aid critic, validating a writer whose "critical" arguments are rife with errors and problems (I detailed these in an extended review of her book here, here, here, here, and here). In short, Gates was rather clever here: he picked the contemporary aid critic with the greatest conceptual shortcomings and held her up as the problem, as if the rest of the critical thinkers shared her thinking, shallow arguments, and factual problems. Further, he (apparently rightly, given the reaction of twitter and the blogosphere) seems to have assumed that such critics should and would rally to her support.

Well, not me.

I am without question a critical thinker when it comes to development and aid. I have a hell of a paper trail to prove it. But I do not see myself as a colleague or contemporary of Dambisa Moyo. I'd prefer to be a colleague of Bill Easterly, Arturo Escobar, James Ferguson, James Scott, and Timothy Mitchell (all more senior than me), and I see myself as a colleague of Katharine McKinnon, Kat O'Reilly, Mara Goldman, and Farhana Sultana (all friends or colleagues of my generation).  All of these scholars have conducted extensive scholarly work on the problems of development, and backed up their work with evidence. I don't think any of these scholars is perfect, and some have produced pieces of work that I see as deeply flawed, but all hold their work to a much higher standard than that I saw in Dead Aid.

The fact is that Gates was right: Moyo doesn't know much about aid and what it is doing – Dead Aid made this rather clear (seriously, read my review of the book). On her webpage, she argues that she "dedicated many years to economic study up to the Ph.D. level, to analyze and understand the inherent weaknesses of aid, and why aid policies have consistently failed to deliver on economic growth and poverty alleviation." First, a Ph.D. is no guarantee of knowing anything – and I say that as someone who holds two Ph.D.s! I have seen absolutely no scholarly output from Moyo's Ph.D. work that supports any sense that she developed a rigorous understanding of aid at all. Indeed, her very phrasing – she sought to analyze and understand the inherent weakness of aid – suggests that her work is not analytical, but political. And after two years in D.C., one thing I have learned is that the political has very little to do with facts or evidence. In that regard, I can safely say that Dead Aid is a political book.

Second, being born and raised in a poor country does not mean that one understands the experiences of everyone in that country. Zambia is a culturally, economically, and environmentally diverse country, home to many different experiences.  Just as I cannot make any claim to understand the experiences of all Americans just because I was born here, majored in American Studies, and have lived in five states and a federal colony (D.C.), Moyo's implicit claim that being born in Zambia allows her to speak for all those living in countries that receive aid, let alone all Zambians, is absurd.

Finally, she argues that she has served as a consultant at the World Bank, implicitly suggesting this gives her great purchase on development thought. It does not. As I have argued elsewhere, working as a consultant for a donor is not the same thing as working as an employee of a donor. I too have been a consultant at the World Bank. Technically, I am currently a consultant for USAID. These are very different roles from those I occupied while employed at USAID. Consultants are not privy to the internal conversations and machinations of development donors, and have at best partial understandings of what drives decisions about development policy and implementation.  Moyo has no practical experience at all with the realities of development donors, a fact that comes through in Dead Aid.

So let's divorce the two things that Bill Gates did in his comments. He completely misrepresented aid critics in two ways: first, in failing to recognize the contributions of aid criticism to the improvement of aid and development programs, and second in lumping aid critics into the same basket as Dambisa Moyo.  This lumping is pretty egregious, and the overall characterization represents a significant flaw in Gates' thinking about development that is likely to come back to bite his foundation in the ass in the near future – without criticism of the overall ideas behind the foundation, it's programs will wither and die.  We can separate this first problem from Gates critique of Dambisa Moyo, which aside from characterizing her as doing evil (which is just going too far, really), pretty much got the assessment of her thinking right.

In short, let's push back against Bill's thinking on development criticism, but not valorize Moyo's crap arguments in the process.

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Met vriendelijke groet,

Best regards,

Henk J.Th. Van Stokkom