Noteworthy

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Idea Lab Noteworthy

Manuscripts and Archives Division, The New York Public Library

This recently digitized image from the NYPL archives depicts the front façade of the New York Public Library in a photo taken on December 26, 1907.

New York Public Library Boosts Public Domain with Release of 187k+ Historical Images

by Naomi Stewart The New York Public Library is an internationally renowned institution serving the equal exchange of human knowledge. The fourth largest public library in the world, with 53 million holdings, it serves over 18 million

people annually. However, the landscape of knowledge exchange has rapidly shifted from print to digital since the internet started becoming widespread, and many visitors now flock to library websites instead to access their compendiums of information.

As of January 5, 2016, the New York Public Library took their duty of service to the public one step further and released over 187,000 digitized out-of-copyright items into the public

domain. No permissions are required to re-use the materials, and there are no restrictions on their use for any member of the public.

While access to other items in their digital archive has administration fees and more complex processes for accessibility, the newly released materials are free and accessed through a visual browsing tool. This tool is, in and of itself, a powerful aspect of the release— patrons can browse through the images by genre, century, collection, or even

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Idea Lab Noteworthy color. The visualized display is a beautiful rendition that allows online users to get a quick overview of hundreds of thumbnails at once—instantly granting access to a diverse array of incredible rare and historical images.

From detailed pages of 11th century books showing the ascension of Muhammed to heaven with a host of angels, to images of the interior of Masonic Lodges in Philadelphia in the 19th century, this newly released collection is a veritable treasure trove of interest. The New York Public Library has once again shown their interest in continuing the exchange of knowledge for the betterment of humanity, allowing anyone across the world to instantly access and use hundreds of thousands of incredible snapshots of human history with just an internet connection.

The New York Public Library’s newly released digitized images are available at: www.nypl.org/research/ collections/digital-collections/publicdomain.

Is Ginger the Main Ingredient for Easing Poverty in Rural Uganda?

by Colleen Maney Rural communities in Eastern Uganda have long grappled with extreme poverty. Recognizing the potential of common livelihoods built around small agriculture, a local farmer named Anthony Kalulu saw an opportunity for a grassroots social enterprise to benefit entire communities.

Demand for ginger in Uganda is high, and lack of local supplies has fueled imports from neighboring countries.

Recognizing this gap in the supply chain, Kalulu created the Uganda Community Farm, or UCF.

Uganda Community Farm

Local ginger farmers pose at the entrance to the UCF training and demonstration center in Kumuli.

The UCF trains rural smallholder farmers in the production of organic ginger, and then pools their cumulative ginger produce into a cooperative.

While the average smallholder farmer operates only two to three acres of land, their combined community harvest attracts larger buyers, including wholesale grocers and bottling companies, such as Coca Cola. Pooling their crop yields together in this way has provided unprecedented access for the rural farmers to high-value markets.

Two UCF training and demonstration centers are already operating in Kumuli and Buyende, providing skills and knowledge needed for rural households to begin producing their own organic ginger crops. The recent construction of a large storehouse at the Kumuli demonstration center has created a central marketing location.

Outside of the training centers, the UCF is harnessing local knowledge and community networks to educate

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new ginger farmers. In each village, six model farmers are selected to provide peer-to-peer mentoring to new farmers. Sharing their technical knowledge and skills, the mentors will monitor cultivation and organize harvests and collection, as well as coordinate additional outreach activities.

In addition to offering training and market access, the UCF has also devised a microloan program to allow the poorest farmers the means of establishing small ginger farms.

Instead of cash, however, each farmer receives 20 kilograms of ginger rhizomes to get them started. After the harvest, the farmers repay this loan in kind, by offering the same amount of ginger rhizomes to the next household in need. This self-scaling approach aims to maximize access to the UCF community, thus increasing both yields and returns for all involved.

With this approach, it is projected that the UCF will expand by 150

Idea Lab Noteworthy percent each year, with no additional external funding. What’s more, the UCF expects to be fully self-sustaining within two years, based on profits made from the ginger being grown at the two demonstration centers.

At the moment, the UCF is still raising funds to provide 552 pilot smallholder farmers with the startup ‘capital’ of ginger rhizomes. Their initial outlook projects that within only the first year of operation, the income of each farmer will increase to USD$2,600, or $7 per day. In a country where the average income per household was a mere USD$704 in 2013, this would be a staggering increase in economic welfare in these communities.

The potential of the UCF to alleviate poverty offers a promising local solution, with ginger and grassroots action as the main ingredients.

To learn more about the UCF, visit http://www.ugandafarm.org/.

Sahar Speaks Encourages Afghan Women to Tell Their Own Stories

Initiatives like Sahar Speaks, a fellowship program that provides media training to female Afghan journalists, are working to solve this problem. Founded in 2013 by Amie Ferris-Rotman, the name ‘Sahar’ comes from a common name for Afghan women meaning ‘dawn,’ an apt title for an organization providing a new beginning for Afghan women.

“Like all marginalized groups, Afghan women need investment. It’s down to the foreign press. If you don’t stick your neck out and help them, they can’t always help themselves,” says Ferris-Rotman.

A group of ten participants will be selected to receive intensive training in Kabul on how to report on a wide range of women’s issues. Each participant will be paired with a mentor who will connect her to a larger network of female foreign correspondents.

Their work will be published in The Huffington Post, marking the first time female Afghan correspondents are published in a global media outlet.

While working in Kabul as a senior correspondent for Reuter’s, Ferris-Rotman noticed a staggering discrepancy between the small number of female journalists and the amount of foreign news coverage focused on women’s rights. She hopes Sahar Speaks will work to address the systemic failure of the international press to allow Afghan women, not foreigners or Afghan men, to tell their own stories.

“There are stories that only Afghan women can come up with,” says Ferris-Rotman, highlighting the need to incorporate more female voices into the press corps.

Ferris-Rotman says she expects the stories from the first group of fellows to be released in April 2016, and hopes that eventually the project will be entirely run by Afghan women.

She said she has already seen an interest in other communities for similar initiatives, and hopes that together they can bring more female voices to the forefront.

by N’dea Yancey-Bragg

Of the roughly 12,000 journalists working in Afghanistan, only about 2,000 are women, and none of them are employed by a foreign news outlet.

Even after the fall of the Taliban and the withdrawal of US troops from the region, female journalists are still faced with threats to their safety, as well as social backlash.

Cultural limitations on contact between the sexes mean that there are spaces and stories that only female reporters can cover. Given this reality, it is becoming increasingly important to prevent the erasure of Afghan women’s stories due to the lack of female reporters.

Fardin Waezi / UNAMA

Afghanistan marked World Press Freedom Day in May 2015 with speeches and awards to journalists given at a ceremony in Kabul, Afghanistan. www.thesolutionsjournal.org | January-February 2016 | Solutions | 9

Idea Lab Noteworthy

Mike Linksvayer

A residential house fitted with rooftop solar panels in South Berkeley, California.

Project Sunroof Expands Homeowners’ Access to Solar Power

by N’dea Yancey-Bragg Solar energy costs are at a record low in the US and the country’s solar capacity is expected to double over the next two years, according to projections from the Solar Energy Industries Association. Following landmark agreements reached at COP21 in Paris in 2015, US President Barack Obama pledged USD$120 million to boost solar power and other clean energy sources. According to a report by The Solar Foundation, jobs in solar energy have doubled in the last five years, now outnumbering the number of people working in oil and gas.

Given that the solar energy industry is growing so fast and is becoming an

increasingly central component in the United States’ climate change policy, it is surprising that many Americans still feel solar power is out of reach for their personal homes. Misperceptions about the cost, viability, and effectiveness still persist, and many homeowners fail to consider it as a solution for themselves.

Enter Project Sunroof, an initiative begun by Google to help homeowners assess the costs and benefits of installing rooftop solar panels.

The online tool combines Google’s extensive mapping data with information on weather patterns and shadow obstructions to allow customers to determine how much they could save on their energy bill by using solar power. Users enter their address and average monthly electric bill and the program factors in solar lease and loan options as well as federal and state tax credits to generate the estimated cost.

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The program also provides contact information for solar providers in the user’s area to help get them started on the process.

Project Sunroof was introduced in 2015, starting in three test cities: Boston, San Francisco, and Fresno. Now, it is expanding into 20 metropolitan areas spanning California, Connecticut, Massachusetts, New York, New Jersey, Nevada, and Arizona.

The Huffington Post reported that Google has invested more than USD$1 billion in solar energy in recent years, including SolarCity Corp., an organization that finances residential rooftop projects.

With the expansion of Google’s new online service, information on solar energy will be more accessible, and homeowners wishing to make the switch will be better informed and better equipped to do so.