This guide has been produced by the World Health Organization to assist countries with limited resources in their efforts to reduce neonatal mortality and to ensure care for newborn babies with problems due to complications of pregnancy and childbirth, such as asphyxia, sepsis, and low birth weight or preterm birth. The main section of this guide is arranged by clinical signs or findings, which facilitates early identification of illness, and provides up-to-date guidelines for clinical management. Use of these guidelines is essential in promoting and assessing the quality of health services and training providers and supporting quality services through supervision and feedback on performance.
Pertinent questions and sound methodologies are essential for quality research, as are quality partnerships. By what criteria do we select partners and how do we build meaningful partnerships that add value to our research efforts? and that contribute to improving the overall landscape for the development and use of research? We would like to propose several areas of concern for partnership development and management that many of us deal with on a daily basis and that might seem obvious but nonetheless merit repetition as we still do not integrate them fully into our work. Drawing on personal experience in a research network, this essay invites reflections from others in grappling with questions related to the development of quality partnerships for quality research.
We try to present here perspectives of research units, networks and institutions, including university-based ones, particularly in West and Central African contexts.
'Historically and across a diverse range of countries, women from disadvantaged racial and ethnic groups have tended to provide care services to meet the needs of the more powerful social groups, while their own needs for care have been downplayed and neglected. This paper by the United Nations Research Institute for Social Development traces the evolution of ideas in the area of gender and care, and analyses some of the main strands of thinking. The author analyses the contribution of feminist economics to the conceptualisation, as well as the measurement and valuation, of the unpaid economy, including its care components. The author shows how in approaching the issue of care from their distinct disciplinary perspectives in social policy and sociology, gender analyses of welfare regimes have contributed to the theorisation of care in important ways, some of which intersects with the work of feminist economists.'
'As part of its strategy to increase rural incomes, USAID/Kenya has supported two projects to develop tree fruit value chains-the Kenya Business Development Services (KBDS) project implemented by the Emerging Markets Group and the Kenya Horticulture Development Project (KHDP) implemented by Fintrac. This report presents the findings from a study of the impacts of these projects on smallholder farmers who grow avocados and passion fruit in Central and Rift Valley provinces in Kenya. The study included a panel survey of 1,640 farmers including those who have participated in these projects and a comparison group of non-participating farmers. The survey was complemented by qualitative research comprising in-depth interviews and focus group discussions with over 100 individuals involved in the tree fruit value chains: farmers, producer group leaders, input suppliers, extension service providers, brokers, exporters and the KBDS project and KHDP directors and staff.'
Clean water and sanitation are not only about hygiene and disease; they're about dignity, too.… [E]veryone, and that means ALL the people in the world, has the right to a healthy life and a life with dignity. In other words: everyone has the right to sanitation.' Prince Willem Alexander of the Netherlands, Chair of the UN Secretary General Advisory Board on Water and Sanitation.
2.5 billion people lack access to basic sanitation. Tellingly, the Millennium Development Goal sanitation target, to halve by 2015 the proportion of people living without access to sanitation, remains the most off-track of all the MDG targets. The impact of a lack of sanitation on health, education and economic growth is profound. Every day, at least 5,000 children under the age of five die due to diarrhea, a disease directly related to poor sanitation. Lack of adequate sanitation in schools is a critical barrier to school attendance, particularly for girls. The resulting economic cost to individuals and to governments of ill-health and under-education is at least nine times greater than the cost of addressing this problem. Full paper in PDF format (1.53MB); Number of pages:
Many health and development programs use behavior change communication (BCC) to improve people's health and wellbeing, including family planning and reproductive health, maternal and child health, and prevention of infectious diseases. BCC is a process that motivates people to adopt and sustain healthy behaviors and lifestyles. Sustaining healthy behavior usually requires a continuing investment in BCC as part of an overall health program. The tools in this issue of INFO Reports are meant to help with planning and developing a BCC component in family planning programs. Full paper in PDF format (987kb); Number of pages: 8p
Institute of Microfinance in order to facilitate their future and current research initiatives and enable researchers outside the Institute to get a list of readily available literatures on topics related to microfinance, has taken initiatives to start an annotated bibliography series.
InM hopes that the annotated bibliography would serve the purposes of dissemination of information to the professionals, researchers, international agencies and academics as well as helping in our capacity building.
Articles includes on general aspects of microfinance and on issues like microfinance borrowers, poverty, savings mobilization, loan recovery and repayment, employment, women empowerment, microfinance innovations, sustainability, competition etc. It is a unique effort to reach general readers with the theories and practices involved in microfinance of Bangladesh in a simplistic and comprehensive manner. Full paper in PDF format (624kb); Number of pages: 108p; Source: InM.
This resource book on women's health needs and problems in Africa. Designed for use by health workers and others who provide information and counseling to women at the community level. It addresses reproduction and sexuality, pregnancy and childbirth, adolescent health, menopause, gender issues, and social and cultural determinants of women's health.
'The concept of mutual accountability refers to the establishment of working relations based on respect, fulfilling commitments, being transparent about development objectives, and accounting for decisions, actions and results. This paper focusses on how mutual accountability in development aid is understood and how it works in practice in Afghanistan, while also examining the challenges involved in achieving mutual accountability in aid relationships. The paper concludes that mutual accountability can make development aid more effective by, for instance, increasing public support for development policies, increasing a government's legitimacy, increasing donor accountability, and contributing to anticorruption measures. Accountability mechanisms ensure greater transparency and help to control expectations. With these mechanisms there is more clarity on what will be delivered and on what systems are in place for people to access information and enable them to voice complaints or concerns.'
This guide is written for MFIs committed to managing and achieving their social mission, and the organisations that support them.
Inside, you will find step-by-step guidance on integrating a social lens into your performance management systems. This practice guide draws upon experience and lessons learnt from over 45 MFIs and support organisations across the industry, detailing:
- Different entry points into SPM
- Case examples from the field
- Key issues at each step of the process
- Practical tips and clear guidance
- Further resources and support
Whatever your starting point, you can use this guide to strengthen the systems you use to deliberately balance your social and financial objectives.
'What are the impacts of of parental death and chronic poverty on children's education and health in Indonesia? This paper estimates the short- and long-term effects of maternal and paternal death on children's school enrolment, educational attainment and health in Indonesia, and compare it with the effect of chronic poverty. The authors also investigate whether there are any gender dimensions of the effects.'
'This paper presents an analysis of Official Development Assistance (ODA) flows to the water and sanitation sector, based on data gathered from the OECD Development Assistance Committee (DAC) and Creditor Reporting Systems (CRS) databases, as well as current knowledge in the sector. As part
of this analysis, ODA flows to the health and education sectors, as well as to broader topics including governance and finance, are also considered. Where possible, policy implications and specific discussion about small towns is provided, however there is a general lack of information about financing flows to small towns, due to the nature of the accounting systems used by donors (and reported to the OECD).'
'This paper highlights the fact that the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) do not directly address the issue of adult basic education and literacy, in spite of these being essential for achieving the Millennium targets. It explores the potential of adult basic education with gender equality to be transformatory for individuals, and for groups working to address key issues, such as gender-based violence, and HIV/AIDS. The role of governments and other key agencies in relation to gender equality and adult basic education is also explored. The paper concludes with a discussion of how to develop longer-term approaches to gender equality, adult basic education, and literacy.'
'The effects of the recent financial crisis are only beginning to be felt in many developing countries, but economic activity is declining rapidly with far reaching impacts. It is estimated that the high food and fuel prices alone have increased the number of extremely poor in the world by at least 100 million. While impacts of the crises affect both urban and rural populations, the urban poor have been hit hardest in this recent food and fuel crisis, and in previous financial crises, given their heavy reliance on the cash economy, no agricultural production to fall back on, and wage reductions and employment losses at urban based industries. This has resulted in social unrest in a number of cities earlier in 2008 all over the developing world.
'The limited availability of freshwater in the Arabian Gulf region has, for decades, presented a significant challenge to the people and the governments of the region. Scarce rainfall, together with a high rate of evaporation and consumption, leads to deficits in the water budgets of the countries of the Arabian Gulf region. This Policy Brief covers various issues related to water, such as current water status in the Arabian Gulf countries, water and agriculture, climate change and water, and water conflicts. Finally, water policy issues in the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) and recent initiatives are discussed.'
The UNU-WIDER project 'Fragility and Development' explored state fragility and its relationship to household vulnerability, noting that there is a lack of research on the economic dimensions of conflict, aid, and development in fragile states. This Research Brief provides a summary of the various contributions made by this project, including case studies on Iraq, Kosovo, Palestine, and Somalia. It also addresses a number of pertinent questions such as; when are states fragile? What are the costs that fragile states impose on their people and the international community? Should the sovereignty of fragile states be reconsidered? and how can aid flows to fragile states be made more effective?
Learning for Change in ADB
The rapidly changing-and, at times, excessively complex-nature of development work demands diverse competences from aid agencies such as the Asian Development Bank. The learning challenges these present require the ability to work more reflectively in a turbulent practice environment.
Learning for Change in ADB broadly defines a learning organization as a collective undertaking, rooted in action, that builds and improves its own practice by consciously and continually devising and developing the means to draw learning from its own (and others') experience. It identifies the 10 challenges that ADB must overcome to develop as a learning organization and specifies practicable next steps to conquer each. It can help deliver the increased development effectiveness that Strategy 2020, ADB's long-term strategic framework for 2008-2020, seeks.
The purpose of this working paper, a think piece on governance in water services, is twofold. First, it aims to provide a basis for discussion and debate as to how the Department for International Development (DFID) should improve its approach to governance in water services.1 Second, it aims to develop a more comprehensive and structured approach to the analysis and the development of governance in water services by applying DFID's current governance thinking at the sector level. The paper therefore draws on internal DFID governance thinking, terminology and approaches and is, in this first version, targeted primarily at a DFID audience interested in governance, basic services and water.
'Diseases that disproportionately affect the developing world cause immense suffering and ill health. Medical innovation has the potential to deliver new medicines, vaccines, and diagnostics to overcome these diseases, yet few treatments have emerged. Current efforts to resolve the crisis are inadequate: financing for research and development (R&D) is insufficient, uncoordinated, and mostly tied to the system of intellectual property rights. Delivering appropriate medicines and vaccines requires reforms to the existing R&D system and a willingness to invest in promising new approaches.'
This book is designed to assist women in caring for their own health, and to help community health workers or others meet women's health needs. It remains highly relevant and includes valuable and vital information that will be useful for those with no formal training in health care skills and for those who do have some training. It provides comprehensive chapters on sexual and reproductive health, nutrition for women, family planning and women with disabilities.
