News
Using Big Data to Ensure Water Security
April 5, 2019
Since the 1990s, the innovation known as “big data” has been rapidly reshaping society. Broadly speaking, it refers to the use of computers to collect large amounts of information, analyze patterns and trends, and apply those lessons to improve performance. Its effects can be felt in the changing ways we shop, watch television and listen […]
Feeding a Thirsty World
March 26, 2019
“It goes without saying that there’s no food without water,” said Winrock President and CEO Rodney Ferguson opening the Wilson Center event “Feeding a Thirsty World: Harnessing the Connections Between Food and Water Security” in Washington, D.C., on March 25. “Seventy percent of global water use goes to agriculture. … Water insecurity affects food security […]
Measuring Bugs and Avoiding Crocs
March 21, 2019
Everything about the man in green fatigues suggests he’s alert. His posture (erect), his lips (slightly parted), his forefinger (poised over the trigger of an AK-47 assault rifle). The man, a Serengeti National Park ranger, watches closely under the hot Tanzanian sun as ecologist Frank Masese sloshes around in brown river water with a net. […]
SWP Boosts Stalled Effort to Protect Mara Waterways
March 18, 2019
In 2013, the Kenyan government’s Water Resources Authority met with farmers, pastoralists and other people who use water along the Talek and Nyangores rivers, important tributaries to the Mara River Basin. A crucial source of water to both Kenya and Tanzania, the Mara River faces accelerating pressure from population growth, increased farming, soil degradation and […]
Arkansas Innovation Council Takes Flight at Inaugural Summit
March 14, 2019
On February 19, Arkansas Governor Asa Hutchinson and Winrock’s Innovate Arkansas took an important step to expand Arkansas’ knowledge-based economy with the launch of the Arkansas Innovation Council. This new initiative will tap into the combined insights and innovation of the state’s established industry leaders and its burgeoning startup community. Comprised of key leaders from […]
Reading, Writing — and Empowering
March 8, 2019
The women of Chimbalu, Chioza, Malawi, live and work side-by-side. A year and a half ago, they also began learning side-by-side. Since August 2017, they have attended literacy classes introduced by the Achieving Reduction of Child Labor in Support of Education (ARISE) program. Through the classes (which encourage a team spirit along with the literacy […]
Generation Hope’s Nanette Medved-Po speaks at Winrock
March 1, 2019
Philanthropist Nanette Medved-Po spoke at Winrock International’s Washington, D.C. office about Generation Hope, the social enterprise she founded that uses the proceeds from bottled water sales to build classrooms in the Philippines. A former actress and model, Medved-Po told Winrock CEO Rodney Ferguson that she came up with the idea for Generation Hope after serving […]
Arkansas Woman Jumpstarts Her Business With Help of AWBC
February 26, 2019
When a large chicken processing plant in El Dorado, Arkansas, closed in 2008, roughly 1,500 employees and 160 contract growers found themselves out of work. Amid the bleak economic downturn, however, LaQuita Rainey saw an opportunity. Rainey had spent 28 years in the nursing field and operated her own business, Elder House Adult Daycare, which […]
Tuning in to Rural Communities with Radio in Zambia
February 12, 2019
Shortly after midnight on August 1, 1981, MTV broadcast its first music video, the Buggles’ “Video Killed the Radio Star.” The choice of the song was a statement of purpose – television is ascendant, radio’s old news – in the same way the internet and social media later brashly elbowed their way into public consciousness. […]
From Myanmar to Music City
February 12, 2019
It’s wintertime in Nashville, and coffee roasters at some of the top specialty coffee shops in the U.S. are reacting to their first experience with a newcomer to the international market: beans from the Shan State of Myanmar. “It blew my mind because it’s really complex,” said Will Shurtz, roaster and green coffee buyer at […]