In this interview with Voice of America (VOA), FHI 360’s Phil Psilos, Asia-Pacific Technical Director for Economic Development and Innovation, talks about The Atlas of Innovation for Economic Stability. The document is a global research and crowdsourcing report published by FHI 360 with support from The Rockefeller Foundation. Psilos highlights a few innovations from the report that are helping economies in Africa become more inclusive, such as loans for small farmers and access to emergency services.
The Atlas of Innovation for Economic Stability, a global research and crowdsourcing report published by FHI 360 with support from The Rockefeller Foundation, features innovations from around the world that help people face economic uncertainty. This article highlights several of the 63 examples of economic stability innovations with an emphasis on helping vulnerable people. Patrick Fine, FHI 360 Chief Executive Officer, says, “If we are to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals, we will need new approaches, new types of partnerships and a new mindset that encourages new actors to come to the table.”
FHI 360 developed a Planning for Monitoring and Evaluation course in collaboration with Philanthropy University. The university developed a new online education platform to provide content on capacity building and a community for users to engage with each other. Barney Singer, Director of Leadership and Organizational Capacity Building Programs, discusses the next phase of capacity development and how the platform “combines the kinds of resources we’ve been using with an approach that will engage learners in an interactive way.”
At a meeting in Uyo, Nigeria, results were released of the first Akwa Ibom AIDS indicator survey, a collaboration between FHI 360’s Strengthening Integrated Delivery of HIV/AIDS Services (SIDHAS) project and the Akwa Ibom state government. Robert Chiegil, Nigeria Country Director for FHI 360, stated during the meeting that FHI 360 enjoyed the support and collaboration of the government and people of the state and that the organization was excited to be part of this very important survey. The results of the survey will help guide the state’s HIV/AIDS response.
Louise Dardis, North Dakota Program Manager for FHI 360’s Succeed 2020, says the statewide program is intended to be “a successful transition from school to college and careers for all North Dakota students. FHI 360 provides technical support to Succeed 2020, which is funded by the Hess Corporation.
Among several new options for male contraceptives mentioned in this article is Gendarussa, a product that prevents sperm from fertilizing an egg. FHI 360 developed protocols for the next phase of clinical trial for this product. Paul Feldblum, FHI 360 Senior Epidemiologist, says Gendarussa received clearance from the Indonesian equivalent of the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to proceed with Phase 2 trials.
FHI 360 and National Capital District (NCD) Health Services in Papua New Guinea are training health workers and monitoring and evaluation officers in data collection and reporting. This work will build the capacity of health facilities to use HIV data for quality improvement and introduce new monitoring tools to capture data on key populations receiving HIV services.
The Alive & Thrive project, FHI 360’s global initiative that is improving breastfeeding and complementary feeding practices, received additional funding from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. Part of these funds will allow Alive & Thrive to increase its maternal, infant and young child nutrition programs in Bangladesh. Karin Lapping, Alive & Thrive Global Project Director, stated, “This investment will generate a wealth of knowledge and tools that can be adapted in settings around the world to improve nutrition practices at scale.”
FHI 360, the National Department of Health in Papua New Guinea and the U.S. Agency for International Development are hosting trainings that introduce doctors to bedaquiline, the first new drug for tuberculosis in more than 45 years. Daniel Tesfaye, FHI 360 Country Director, says, “It’s important to ensure that people who have multidrug-resistant tuberculosis get the best treatment,” and adds, “FHI 360 is working to register adverse events in the global system so that Papua New Guinea can become a full member of the World Health Organization’s Uppsala Monitoring Centre.”
A spelling competition in the children’s mother language of Dagbani, designed by FHI 360’s USAID Ghana Partnership for Education: Learning and the Young Educators Foundation, bolstered the country’s literacy improvement plans. The Learning activity has developed a systematic, phonics-based reading program for primary grade P1 to expand and sustain reading performance for primary school students nationwide.
To see if using open data in developing economies could find solutions to complex and persistent problems worldwide, FHI 360, the GovLab at New York University, the U.S. Agency for International Development and the World Wide Web Foundation posted the report Open Data in Developing Economies: Toward Building an Evidence Base on What Works and How. The article lists six takeaways for open data projects and global development.
FHI 360's Advance program and the Council of Community Colleges of Jamaica are working together to improve curriculum design and pedagogy, professional development opportunities for faculty and staff, and enhanced labor market bridging services to help students find gainful employment after graduating. The program targets agribusiness, the creative industries and tourism.
FHI 360 and other humanitarian organizations are addressing the complex famine crises in Nigeria, Somalia, South Sudan and Yemen. FHI 360’s Food and Nutrition Technical Assistance Project (FANTA) conducts research and provides technical assistance to combat global hunger.
The first intrauterine device (IUD) was discussed in a medical journal in 1909. David Hubacher, FHI 360 Senior Epidemiologist, says that the concept of the earliest IUDs was to put foreign objects in the uterus to cause an inflammatory response, making the environment difficult for sperm. With the safety and efficacy advances of modern IUDs, the United States has had a five-fold increase in IUD use since the 1970s.
Ted FitzGerald, Director of Global Research Services at FHI 360, talks about the logistic and economic benefits of commuting three days a week by bus. More than half of FHI 360’s employees in North Carolina either work at home or bike or ride the bus to work at least once a week. FHI 360 is one of the nation’s 231 Best Workplaces for Commuters.
FHI 360 and Qualcomm Wireless Reach team up with Tata Consultancy Services on the Wireless Solutions for Fisheries in Senegal (WISE) project, using a solution that combines wireless connectivity and GPS with specialized mobile and server applications through a smartphone. Berhane Gebru, Director of Programs for TechLab at FHI 360 discusses the unique approach of the project that addresses entrepreneurship and livelihoods, gender, health education and technology.
Patrick Fine, FHI 360 CEO, and Wayne Holden, RTI International President and CEO, co-authored this op-ed that discusses the proposed federal budget cuts for 2017. The op-ed reviews the impact of the proposed cuts on North Carolina jobs and international development aid, which is less than one percent of federal spending and a component of national security.
The intrauterine device (IUD) has a mixed history in the United States and around the world. One in ten American women use one of the five available types of T-shaped IUDs. David Hubacher, FHI 360 Senior Epidemiologist, discusses how other types and shapes of safe and effective IUDs have been on the market in Europe and how manufacturers and the U.S. Food and Drug Administration should expand IUD access in the United States.
FHI 360, the U.S. Agency for International Development and Phandeeyar, an innovation lab in Yangon, hosted the Innovation Marketplace in March. A civic tech competition, the Innovation Marketplace facilitated opportunities to collaborate between civil society organizations and technology companies.
To gather more data to build HIV/AIDS strategies, FHI 360’s Strengthening Integrated Delivery of HIV/AIDS Services (SIDHAS) project will begin the first statewide survey in Akwa Ibom in Nigeria. Robert Chiegil, FHI 360 Nigeria Country Director, says that the “findings from this survey will help the government and its stakeholders to plan how best to address and find solutions to the problem of HIV and AIDS in communities, LGAs [local government areas] and in the state generally.”