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New video: Jakarta’s Slums – A Surveyor’s Perspective
The ATM team conducted the Jakarta leg of our poverty profile survey back in February, and the results will be out soon. Don’t forget to check back on the blog around the end of April!
In the video below, the students that we worked with share their post-survey reflections on the biggest challenges for Jakarta’s poor that they observed in the field. (A big thank you to all our surveyors for your hard work!) You can watch the video by clicking here or on the image below.
Stories from Jakarta – interview with a warung owner
The Asian Trends Monitoring team went to Jakarta in February 2012 to research the condition of Jakarta’s slums and its inhabitants. Here is a video interview of a “warung” (grocery kiosk) owner in Tanah Tinggi, one of Jakarta’s largest slums.
Despite government policies that caused his roadside stalls to be demolished, our interviewee is still content with his life and his ability to provide for his family. Government clearing of roadside stalls was a common story among interviewees. What alternative solutions could the local government have offered business owners? And what policies could facilitate job creation in rural areas? Share your views in the comments.
Catalyst for Change: Play the Game to End Poverty!
Play the game to catalyze change in the lives of poor or vulnerable people around the world: catalyze4change.org. Institute for the Future is teaming up with the Rockefeller Foundation’s Searchlight Partners and their Community Partners around the world to start a chain reaction of 21st century innovations in social change to transform the landscape of poverty. The Asian Trends Monitoring team will be participating as global game guides.
When: On April 3, 1600 GMT / April 4, 0400 SGT (Singapore Time)
Join the game now at http://game.searchlightcatalysts.org/
You can also follow the game on twitter at @catalyze4change
To read more about how it works and what the game is actually about, read our previous post.
Inside a BRAC school
One of the more striking statistics associated with BRAC is that in Bangladesh alone they run over 24,000 primary schools and over 13,000 pre-primary schools. Five million children have graduated from these schools at a cost of only US$32 per child annually.
One of the main reasons that BRAC has been able to set and run more schools than many countries have, stems from their focus on keeping things simple. Faced with the realization that millions of children across Bangladesh were not receiving any formal education at all, BRAC has worked to provide a basic education to as many as possible.
Inside the classroom. Almost no furniture is used, but everything is clean, orderly, and focused on student learning
BRAC primary schools only run from grades one to five. After graduating from BRAC schools fortunate students are able to shift into government-run schools and continue their education. Those who are not so fortunate have still learned valuable basic skills in reading, writing, and math. In many cases even this education is much more than anyone else in their family has received previously.
The plight of Jakarta’s trash pickers
Here is a video interview with a trash picker in Jakarta, where she shares her views on life and her wishes for her son. It was produced by the World Bank, and is definitely worth a watch.
The team has just returned from a field visit to Jakarta, where we spoke to several people who live in the city’s slums, including some trash pickers. Sadly, the woman in the video is not alone in her plight. Hundreds of thousands of people live in small rental housing without a water connection or proper toilets.
Pile of a trash in a community of trash pickers we visited
Income levels rarely exceed 2 dollars per day per family member, and the people just cannot realistically expect things to get better over time. This World Bank video does a good job at portraying just how bad things can get for some. It is also a good preview to the kind of content we will be sharing here on the blog.
Over the next few weeks, the team will be sharing the findings from our Jakarta trip and writing about the issues that are most important to the poor in Jakarta. Stay tuned!
Catalysts for Change Global Game: April 4-6
A new way to think about the future
Can games change the way we think about the future? Can they catalyze change in the lives of poor and vulnerable people everywhere, building resilience and equity?
On April 4-6, the Asian Trends Monitoring Bulletin is partnering with Institute for the Future and the Rockefeller Foundation to launch the first global foresight game to imagine an innovative 21st Century perspective to achieving social change. We will all win when you share your wisdom and innovativeness to envision the future of poverty and global well-being.
What is a catalyst for change?
Our global community is a complex system, and although creating positive change can be daunting, complex systems have leverage points where a small innovation, a simple insight, or just the right resource can make a big difference. These are catalysts for change.
A catalyst might be new evidence, like real-time detection of an emerging epidemic. Or it might be a new capacity, such as a low-fee ambulance service. It’s no surprise that new rules can also catalyze change–for example, new rules designed for tracking earnings across national borders creates security for a migratory workforce. Of course, new stories are often the most powerful catalysts for change. The stories people tell about the world are lasting legacies that give shape to daily life, and to create positive change in our daily lives, we need new voices telling a multitude of stories to inspire new solutions.
Interview with Prof. Muhammad Yunus: “Now is the time to redesign the system!”
Prof. Yunus visited the LKY School on February 23, 2012
Claire Leow, an editor at The Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy interviewed Professor Muhammad Yunus, winner of the 2006 Nobel Peace Prize. Prof Muhammad Yunus is also a Pioneer of Social Business and Chair of Yunus Centre. Before the interview, Claire agreed to include a number of questions from the Asian Trends Monitoring team.
The interview starts out on impact of the financial crisis on microcredit and the enhanced need to support the poor with financial services. Prof. Yunus says that
“The priority of microcredit should be on supporting the people in poverty, not making money out of them, that represent mission drift for me.”
He hoped that conventional banks would be inspired by the success of microcredit, but so far he is disappointed at the take-up rate by traditional financial institutions. The interview continues to cover the idea of social business, entrepreneurial slum dwellers, societies’ addiction to money making, and how to make the transition from “unbankable” to bankable.
To conclude, I’ll leave you with a longer quote from 16 min 30 sec:
What drives remittance costs? Hope in sight for millions of migrants?
It’s crunch time for the Master of Public Policy Candidates at the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy. Last week they had to present their preliminary findings of their thesis equivalent called the Policy Analysis Exercise (PAE). Second year MPP Student, Jan De Graaf, is working on the fascinating question of “what drives remittance transaction costs?”
Last year alone, more than 350 billion USD were transferred to developing countries in the form of remittances. Big business for banks and money transfer operators such as Western Union who charge significant transaction fees for each transaction. Jan realised that given the high volume of remittances the transaction costs incurred by migrants seem high, and so he set out to identify determinants for these costs in his PAE research.
His research question focuses on “What policies can help reduce the global average remittance transaction costs?”
The main focus of his analysis is on a World Bank dataset with data for 31 major sending countries, 91 receiving countries and thus data for a total of 213 ‘remittance corridors’. He conceptualizes total transaction costs as the sum of the fee paid by the sender and the exchange rate margin set by the provider.
