Contents:

1. Mighty Abayomi’s Struggle in Africa 2. Sports People that Care Project Gaining Momentum in Ghana 3. oneVillage Foundation and Ford Program agree to Establish Program to Promote Collaboration 4. Commonwealth of Learning (COL) Kenya 5. OVF AIDS 2004 Conference Sign-up in Progress 6. Open Source Conference Meeting in Namibia 7. OVF Represented at the World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS) in Geneva 8. Silicon Valley World Summit on Information Society 9. The Definition of Profit and the Value of Knowledge Transfer between Cultures 10. Meeting between Green Century Institute and OVF about Collaboration 11. oneVillage Foundation (OVF) Founding Member Attends Women's Conference in San Francisco 12. OneVillage Empowerment Program for Sustainability 13. Permaculture in a Box

 

Welcome to the introductory edition of the oneVillage Review. If you would like to get updates of what we are doing, just send an email to [email protected] and write subscribe in the subject line. We see this newsletter as a way to weave together our networks so that we can better use technology to unlock human potential.

Sincerely,

Jeff Buderer

OneVillage Foundation

Stories of Hope

Mighty Abayomi’s Struggle in Africa
Abayomi Rotimi Mighty, a Nigerian youth activist/speaker and advocate who worked with President Obasanjo in the UNDCP World AIDS Campaign 2001 to promote awareness about the growing problems associated with AIDS in Africa. His story is “one you must not miss” says Joy Tang founder of oneVillage Foundation. His work with AIDS education for the young adults not only has a track record, but the heart in which he has sought to raise awareness inspires us towards the realization of the greater potential that resides within all of us. Recently he has been struggling to get the resources he needs to do his work and this drives home the importance of raising funds for OVF so that we can help Africans like Mighty to fully realize their potential as social change agents. There are people like Mighty who need similar support all over Africa. Help us to help them.
Read more about Mighty's Story...

OVF Africa Updates

Sports People that Care Project Gaining Momentum in Ghana
Kafui Prebbie is working with major partners in Ghana launching the "oneVillage Foundation Sports People That Care" HIV/Aids Fund. OVF Ghana will raise money from ticket sales generated at a special upcoming football game in Kumasi Stadium in Ghana. The monies raised will support orphans - by providing clothes, health and educational needs, food, etc., and drugs for the HIV infected. A documentary of the project will be produced highlighting the event as well as stressing the need for strong role models in the fight against AIDS.

oneVillage Foundation and Ford Program agree to Establish Program to Promote Collaboration
The OneVillage Foundation and the John C Ford Program (Ford Program) have agreed to collaborate to establish the OVF Kenya branch of the International Global Education Tele-Community Initiative (GEI Project). OVF Youth will join the Young Scientists and Engineers Tele-Academy, which includes computer skills online research skills water purification and business training two afternoons a week two hours per afternoon. The GEI component of the OVF International Education Hub will interface ICT Literacy prevention of communicable diseases and other training programs to synergize efforts and increase the benefits to youths and adults in underserved communities. The OVF International Education HUB and the GEI Project will additionally collaborate to implement policy developed by the African Youth Initiative and other organizations as oneVillage Foundation deems appropriate. The Ford Program’s Board of Directors was recently expanded to include Kennedy Edwine Onyango and Joy Tang of the oneVillage Foundation.

Commonwealth of Learning (COL) Kenya
One of challenges of building a bottom up economy is developing an effective process of networking and weaving all the diverse groups into a cohesive and unified whole. A consortium of groups aligned with the Kenya AIDS Intervention Prevention Project Group (KAIPPG) recently submitted a grant proposal for 20,000 Canadian dollars to the Commonwealth of Learning (COL) for seed monies to create GRASSUP (NOW). Janet Friedman of KAIPPG has helped to not only ensure that OVF’s role in COL Kenya became a reality, but also facilitate the process of cobbling together all these groups to form Grassroots Underpinnings: Poverty, Nutrition, ODL/ICTs and Women, GRASSUP (NOW). COL is a Canadian organization that focuses on developing effective programs augments with ICT to address the needs of underserved communities. Kennedy Edwine Onyango, Director of Community Initiatives and Social Support Center Organization (CISSO) and Kenyan country director of the oneVillage Foundation, submitted a draft of the grant proposal to the network, which then formed the basis for the submission to COL. Krishna Alluri of COL, has also played an important role in helping to guide and navigate this collaborative process of developing a grant proposal suitable to COL. Other Partners in this consortium include, James Onyango, Director of KAIPPG, Francis Anyona of the Ikonzo Musanda Self-Help Group, Kiragu Maina Coordinator of the Interactive Learning Network Ltd (SchoolConnect) and Mark Roest of the OneVillage Foundation.

OVF AIDS 2004 Conference Sign-up in Progress
Joy Tang Executive Director of the OVF recently completed a proposal for Olaposi Abiola and Kennedy Edwine Onyango to go the AIDS 2004 Conference in Bangkok, Thailand in July. We have submitted the following for presentation: collaboration on sustainable development, case study on the GRASSUP (NOW) project which will be presented by Olaposi Abiola and Kennedy Edwine Onyango), a skill workshop on human capacity building (as referred in this email) and a scholarship application. We will coordinate with the youth organization AMEN from Nigeria (led by Abayomi Rotimi Mighty) to prepare for the Skill workshop.

Open Source Conference Meeting in Namibia
Olaposi Abiola of Ile-Ife, Nigeria is seeking a grant to go to the Open Source Conference in Namibia towards:
1. Network collaboration and development—we have a strategy for cultivating ICT field agents.
2. Building social enterprises—we are mapping resource readiness to create coalition of operators/joint ventures on computing recycling business to create jobs and markets for open source related ventures.
3. Developing a recycling program that takes advantage of open source software’s superior performance capabilities as compared to windows enables the use of older and slower computers. Open source operating systems like Linux operate sufficiently with less computing capacity. This means there is added value in exporting computers to Africa that are not suitable for American/Western markets. Teachers without Borders (an affiliated organization), has a one-year exemption of all taxes relating to computers and computer related devices. One potential social enterprise opportunity involves the import of obsolete computers from Silicon Valley corporations into Africa for use in ICT learning and enterprise centers.

Olaposi will work with fellow attendees identifying social enterprise needs for collaborative development in relation to the above-mention goals. The core of our plan is to bring connectivity to remote regions while providing a full suite of open source software and training to augment sustainable economic development in these regions.

Collaboration and Alliance Building

OVF Represented at the World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS) in Geneva
The WSIS Conference was an attempt to organize the necessary networks to promote and organization effective policies, strategies and technologies towards a global information and communications system that more effectively addresses the needs of the world’s people. Kennedy Edwine Onyango, OVF Kenya country director did a presentation on ICT's Impact's on Rural Economic Development and Integration. He won the Category Award in: Rural Development and was also published in a GKP Stakeholders Newsletter. His project was mong 23 taken worldwide by the GKP for further work. OVF associate Joerg Geier who is also involved with the Young Think Tank of the Club of Rome, did a presentation about Knowledge Transfer between Cultures drawing upon the experience of distinguished people such as Nigerian scholar Dr. Akinsola Akiwowo. Joerg’s presentation explored the divides in the world (Why are there divides? How have they come about and what are the downsides of technology and future scenarios. Kennedy also delivered a module about his work in his home village Mbita, Kenya and his work through EDTEC and oneVillage Foundation’s ICT-based eCo-Vilage program.
More on the WSIS...

Silicon Valley World Summit on Information Society
The oneVillage Foundation USA team attended the Silicon Valley World Summit on Information Society in January. Seminar participants discussed how Silicon Valley can contribute to the WSIS conference in 2005. Barbara Harley of the International Business Incubator coordinated the event. WSIS Reports were provided by Dr. Nancy Hafkin, Knowledge Working and Akhtar Badshah, of Digital Partners and a Q & A by Linda Alepin, of The Center for New Futures. As well as some comments on possible actions in relation to how Silicon Valley can contribute from Anil Srivastava of AcrossWorld communication. The meeting conlcude with a few words of wisdom from Doug Engelbart of Bootstrap Alliance, who is well-known for his work in inventing the mouse. Akhtar, says the WSIS conference was a great opportunity to bring grassroots people together with international and national leaders. However it also highlighted some of the real challenges of developing global consensus in relation to issues in relation to transparency and openness. Badshah says conservatives sought to undermine the overall agenda of the conference in relation to open communication and gender empowerment. Hafkin and Badshah both agreed that the energy and innovation displayed at ICT4D platform was amazing and inspiring. The meeting reflected a desire on the part of participants to develop a network within Silicon Valley to promote ICT projects in underserved communities.
More on WSIS Silicon Valley

The Definition of Profit and the Value of Knowledge Transfer between Cultures
Jeff Buderer met with Professor Akiwowo and Peter Burgess at a diner while in Manhattan in October of 2003, to gather information for Joerg’s WSIS presentation on Knowledge Transfer between Cultures. Professor Akiwowo started by speaking of his childhood and the impact it had on who he is now. The communities we grow up in impact who we are and how we see the world. Yet there is a tendency to undervalue the intrinsic value of community, because it cannot be easily monetized or commodified. There is a great distance between indigenous cultures and the modern world in terms of how each defines profit. Akiwowo says the Yoruba culture teaches its people that profit is more than financial. For the Yoruba the definition of profit includes five different social criteria of success and well being. It was concluded that knowledge transfers between culture, must involve a mutual respect of each culture’s contributions towards the other. One of the errors of modernization is that there has been an undercurrent of contempt for not just African culture, but indigenous cultures all over the world. Economic programs to promote sustainable development in non-consuming nations should value and validate local culture ensuring that modernization complements and affirms local culture.
More on Akiwowo Meeting...

Meeting between Green Century Institute and OVF about Collaboration
Joy Tang, Mark Roest and Jeff Buderer met with Michael Gosney in San Francisco to discuss a strategy for collaboration between OVF and The Green Century Institute. The Green Century Institute is presently focused on the development of the Green Community Network (GCN), “a web-based resource exchange, publishing and outreach program promoting sustainable development...” The GCN is the foundation for the proposed Califia Ecocity Project, which will showcase and test innovative sustainable development designs and technologies. This converges with one of OVF’s goal to demonstrate the potential of our approach by constructing a US Unity Center Ecovillage. Also discussed was the process of creating a network to facilitate the effective collection, organization, analysis and presentation of knowledge to promote sustainable development as well as expanding opportunities for rapid and sustained economic growth within the OVF network. It was concluded that database development is part of a seamless process of technology and information integration (holistic ICT) and that this will facilitate the development of the skills, knowledge--bases and networks needed to construct sustainable communities and businesses.

oneVillage Foundation (OVF) Founding Member Attends Women's Conference in San Francisco
oneVillage Foundation founder Joy Tang went to the Gather the Woman (GTW) conference a three-day event where women met to talk about voicing their feelings and deeply held convictions in relation to what is going on in the world. Joy is on the marketing and outreach team of Gather The Women. Gather The Women has reached women in more than 40 countries.
More on Gather the Women...

 

Ecology and Sustainability

OneVillage Empowerment Program for Sustainability
The oneVillage Foundation identifies and maximizes the potential of technologies to serve humanity and designs holistic strategies for eco-living starting at the most elemental component of human culture and society the community. Experimental communities called ecovillages have sprung up all over the world testing out the best and most rapid way to grow a sustainable economy from the bottom-up. Disruptive technologies now have the potential to increase the productivity of local economies. These disruptive technologies can be broken down into three main categories:

-Sustainable: solar, wind, Integrated Biomass Systems that recycle waste into valuable resources
-ICT: such as open source computer software and cellular technologies
-Effective and innovative financial strategies to make local economies more productive such as those mapped out in the Solari Action Network.

By threading these approaches and technologies into Unity Center Ecovillage prototypes we can demonstrate the feasibility of this integrated and transitional approach and promote a more environmentally and socially responsible way of living eco-living. These whole systems design models make much better use of resources, while shifting the economy away from the need to rely on people s addictions to sustain an economy that is exploitative to both people and the environment. With the rise of this new design methodology we will consume much less than is now the norm in highly industrialized societies but the quality of our lives will be much richer. The oneVillage Empowerment Program for Sustainability attempts to develop a framework to thread together all the necessary components of an integrated human habitat. Such projects actually executed and successfully completed become inspirational prototypes for the necessary and inevitable shift in the way modern society functions today.

Permaculture in a Box
The industrialization of agriculture sustained an exponentially increasing global population. In the scope of three centuries human numbers have risen from 1 billion to 6 billion. Yet the downside of this system is that it does not account for the long-term ecological impacts that may spill over into surrounding systems adversely affecting their function. Industrialized monocultures are one of the greatest threats to the planet’s ecosystems. Related to this is the fact that we treat the planet’s precious biomass as if it were garbage mixing it with the rest of discarded items and then burying it in dumps. The time has come for the emergence of a new and better system of producing food. The oneVillage Foundation is researching a variety of approaches to sustainable closed loop agriculture and fish farming systems. Our goal is simple develop a system of producing that is highly productive, requires minimal inputs, is suitable to a host of environments and has the capability to convert industrial, agricultural and municipal biowaste into value added products. Several highly productive systems have been developed around the world, enabling communities to choose what will work for their environment and culture. They require minimal inputs and cover a very wide range of environments, and some can convert industrial, agricultural and /or municipal waste into value-added products.
More on Permaculture in a Box systems

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