With nearly 150,000 hectares of vineyards, the small nation of Moldova has one of the largest densities of vineyards in the world. Here, the wine industry is a cultural touchstone with a history stretching back thousands of years. It forms the backbone of the rural economy, providing income for more than 250,000 people and more…
As Category 4 Hurricane Florence barreled toward the Southeast of the United States last week, preliminary damage estimates indicated 758,000 homes across three states could be impacted. Reconstruction costs were estimated at $170.2 billion. Despite the dire forecast and its associated challenges, however, the United States is one of the countries most prepared to respond…
Getting the global economy on track to reap a demographic dividend, create prosperity, protect the planet, and eliminate extreme poverty will be difficult unless governments, international donors, businesses, and practitioners work together to harness the economic aspirations of youth. A recent study by the International Labour Organization shows that 13.6 percent of youth, or more…
This post originally appeared on Agrilinks. A sustained focus on resilience in the past decade has led to broad acceptance of it as a major programmatic priority for programs designed to strengthen the ability of vulnerable households to withstand myriad shocks and stresses. Resilience measurement concepts and methods have improved dramatically together with resilience theory and practice,…
Laura Glaeser currently serves as the chief of party for the Famine Early Warning Systems Network (FEWS NET) team. She is a food security, early warning, and livelihoods analysis expert with nearly 20 years of experience designing, managing, evaluating, and providing technical assistance and decision support for food-security focused programs in Africa, Latin America, and…
This post originally appeared on ICTworks. When working in international markets, there is one golden rule to ensure sustainability: make sure your interventions do not distort markets. In small markets, such as Georgia, a country with less than 4 million people, 50 percent of which are self-employed in the agriculture industry, this is especially important. Laying…
Asdrubal Negrete Lebette is currently the chief of party of the Colombia Rural Finance Initiative, where he works with banks, anchor firms, and producers to design and pilot innovative value chain finance mechanisms to help smallholders, small and medium enterprises to access credit and other financial services. Asdrubal has over 25 years of experience in…
Currently the director of the Colombia Rural Finance Initiative, Heather Joffe Reyes is an international development practitioner with more than 15 years of experience in agricultural value chains, small business development, and rural development. In addition, Heather has worked on contracts and grants management with an emphasis on designing grant programs to avoid market distortions.…
Implemented by Chemonics International, with local subcontractor Junior Achievement Georgia (JAG), the $12,565,635, six-and-a-half year Georgia Primary Education (G-PriEd) Project provided comprehensive assistance to the Georgian primary education system to improve reading and math competencies of Georgian and ethnic minority students in grades 1-6 and to introduce financial literacy through exposure to business skills.
Once broadly defined and loosely measured, the concept of resilience now shapes the development strategies of USAID, DFID, the World Bank, and an increasing number of partner government planning agencies. Resilience thinking provides the basis for a more coherent response to global crises. USAID defines resilience as the ability or capacity to mitigate, adapt to,…
Kirk Ramer has over 25 years of experience managing projects to promote agricultural and small-and medium-sized enterprise development in southeastern Europe, the Caucasus, and Central Asia. He is currently the chief of party of the Agribusiness Development Activity (ADA) in Uzbekistan. Kirk has worked to promote trade and investment and improve business education, microfinance, and…