A Game Aims to Draw Attention to Women’s Issues

Social cause gaming, or the use of games to promote awareness of societal problems, has been growing since pioneer online projects like Food Force, the United Nations World Food Program’s 2005 game about confronting famine, and Darfur Is Dying, MTV’s 2006 offering in which players navigate the terrors of a Sudanese refugee camp.

WFP Launch School Feeding Programe to Boost Enrolment

The program also targets 40,000 girls through the girl’s incentive pilot across 1,250 schools in Eastern Equatoria, Lakes, Jonglei, Warrap, Western Bahr el Ghazal, Northern Barh el Ghazal, Unity and Upper Nile States, Chris Nikoi, WFP Country Director South Sudan said. He said that the feeding program activities are targeted in geographic areas where assessment evidence shows the highest levels of food insecurity in addition to nationally low enrolment, attendance and retention rates especially among girls.

Listen to poor people; don't just hand out the cash

We already know a fair amount about the ways poor people and their communities benefit from cash transfers, but we know far less about what poor people themselves think about these programmes: what they particularly value, what they think could be improved, and how the programmes could work better. In a climate of austerity, with growing concern over aid effectiveness and value for money, donors and governments are increasingly recognising the value of poor communities participating in the monitoring and evaluation of social protection programmes. Who better to ask than those affected by such programmes?

Army boots keep Syrians warm

In Aleppo, Syria's largest city and a once-bustling commercial hub, scenes of people searching through big rubbish bins are now commonplace. They are collecting plastic bags and other flammable material they can use to warm themselves in the chilly Syrian winter. (..) Today, boots originally made for the government soldiers now shelling rebel-held neighbourhoods have become a means to keep families in these areas warm.