Akhtar Badshah is an expert on social impact, philanthropy, CSR and international development, an author and artist. He is the co-founder of Purpose Mindset, founder and Chief Catalyst of Catalytic Innovators Group, a consulting practice focused on accelerating social impact through catalytic innovation. He is a Distinguished Practitioner at the University of Washington, School of Business (Bothell Campus) and Evans School of Public Policy and Governance. He also is a faculty lead at START Center at the Department of Public Health and has served on the Global Washington board since 2008.

– – –

Sometimes, it begins with the vision of one person who sees possibility where others see fragmentation. 

I met Bill Clapp in the early 2000s when we launched the Digital Partners Foundation. He invited me to the early gatherings of Global Partnerships—an effort he helped shape, inspired in part by Muhammad Yunus and the growing momentum around microfinance in Central America.  

Even then, Bill was deeply committed to international development and to the idea that each of us has a role to play in helping people lift themselves out of poverty. He was not only a business leader, but a civic leader—someone who saw responsibility and opportunity as inseparable.  

He also understood something important about Seattle at that moment in time. With the rise of the Gates Foundation, he anticipated that many individuals from Microsoft and beyond would be inspired to contribute—either by launching their own initiatives or supporting organizations already advancing development work around the world.  

When I later joined Microsoft to lead its philanthropy efforts, Bill and I often spoke about how Seattle was emerging as a global hub for international development. Institutions such as PATH, World Vision, World Concern, the University of Washington, and the Gates Foundation had created a powerful ecosystem. Out of those conversations—with leaders across philanthropy, academia, and civic life, including Bill Gates Sr.—Global Washington was born.  

Global Washington had a simple but powerful charter: to bring together the international development community across Washington State. It created a network that connected organizations large and small—foundations, nonprofits, companies, and academic institutions—to convene, collaborate, share ideas, and advocate. It became a place where global voices could meet, where visitors from around the world could engage with a local community, and where those seeking to get involved could find a starting point.  

For 16 years, first under Bill’s leadership and then through the continued stewardship of committed leaders, Global Washington provided a space where people could show up—where the flame of internationalism was kept alive. Through its work, it elevated innovative ideas, amplified smaller organizations, and strengthened the collective voice of a community committed to global development.  

Now, that chapter is coming to a close. The world around us has changed rapidly—especially in how we convene, connect, and collaborate. New platforms and global networks now offer expanded ways to engage. During the COVID-19 pandemic, Global Washington embraced this shift, opening its convenings to participants from around the world. And yet, even as those possibilities expanded, the ground beneath the organization shifted. The gutting of U.S. foreign assistance in 2025 hit GlobalWA’s members hard and ultimately made continued operations impossible.  

I am proud that the Board chose to wind down thoughtfully and responsibly, ensuring that its work would not end, but rather seed new ideas and inspire the next generation of leaders—the next “Bills”—to carry this vision forward.  

Not long ago, we saw images of Earth transmitted from Artemis missions—our small, shared planet suspended in space, without visible boundaries or divisions. It was a powerful reminder that we are all in this together.  

Global Washington as an organization may come to an end, but its spirit—of unity, shared humanity, and collective responsibility—will endure. And somewhere, the next visionary will step forward to make the case for international development once again.  

Some ideas outlive institutions. 

The work of building a more just, interconnected world goes on—and the next generation of leaders will carry it forward. 

Thank you for being part of this journey.  

The post How one city became a global force for good  appeared first on Global Washington.

I’m writing to share some difficult news about GlobalWA’s future. After careful consideration, the GlobalWA Board has decided to close the organization. Over the next five months, we will thoughtfully wind down our work with operations concluding on June 30, 2026. We know this news may be painful, surprising, or unsettling, and we are deeply aware of what GlobalWA has meant to so many of you. 

This decision was made with deep sadness and only after a thorough analysis of the sector landscape, funding environment, and our operating model. While saying goodbye is difficult, we believe the most responsible path forward is to close now, when we can still honor our commitments, serve our community, and preserve our legacy.   

Why Now  

The global development sector is experiencing profound and lasting disruption. Significant cuts to USAID funding, alongside broader shifts in other philanthropic priorities, have reverberated across our entire ecosystem. These changes have constrained organizations’ ability to sustain their own operations, let alone meaningfully invest in networks and capacity building. These long-term challenges facing our sector, and especially support and membership organizations like ours, have made it increasingly difficult to imagine a sustainable path forward.  

We explored multiple scenarios and potential partnerships and ultimately concluded that a planned closure best aligns with our values and serves the community we have built over the last 16 years. While we remain open to opportunities for elements of GlobalWA’s brand, programs and network to continue in new forms, we are moving forward with a clear-eyed understanding of our limited resources and the reality that a more supportive funding environment may not emerge for some time.  

Our Commitment to You  

Between now and June 30, we will continue to operate with full transparency and purpose. All programming and membership benefits will continue, and we will honor our commitments to provide events, resources, and opportunities to learn, connect, and mobilize.  

Throughout this transition, we will share regular updates about timelines, decisions, and ways for you to stay informed and connected. We are also planning a member celebration event in early June to honor the contributions, achievements, and spirit of this community. Details will be shared soon, and we hope you will join us in marking this milestone together. If you have questions about programming, ideas for potential connections to continue programs, or feedback you’d like to share during this transition, please reach out to us at info@globalwa.org. More information, including an FAQ, is available on our website at globalwa.org/globalwa-closure.  

The work that GlobalWA has championed—fostering connection, strengthening capacity and driving collective action—remains critical to our sector. By closing intentionally, we aim to preserve the knowledge, relationships and resources that will allow this work to continue in new forms.  

On behalf of the GlobalWA team and Board, I want to thank each of you for your partnership, leadership and dedication over the years. We are incredibly proud of what we’ve built together, and your support, ideas, and collaboration have shaped this community in countless ways. While this chapter is ending, I am confident that the impact of our collective efforts will continue to be felt for years to come.   

With deep gratitude and resolve, 

Elizabeth Stokely
Executive Director, GlobalWA

The post An Important Update about GlobalWA’s Future appeared first on Global Washington.

Artificial intelligence has been an emerging subject in nonprofit circles for several years, often sitting at the periphery of conversations – either viewed with skepticism or treated as something that belonged primarily to corporate or academic domains. At this year’s Global Washington Annual Conference in Seattle, that perception appeared to shift. The tone of the discussion was notably different: nonprofit leaders were not debating whether AI mattered, but rather seeking clarity on how to integrate it responsibly, meaningfully, and in ways that enhance service delivery for communities.

This evolving mindset framed one of the conference’s first dedicated AI workshops, featuring Michael Tjalve, PhD, Board Chair of Spreeha Foundation, as a panelist alongside development leaders Paul Essene of Opportunity International and Cameron Birge of Microsoft. The session centered on practical considerations for mission-driven organizations exploring AI, balancing its potential to strengthen nonprofit work with a clear-eyed discussion of limitations, risks, and organizational readiness.

Michael Tjalve with co-panelists Paul Essene and Cameron Birge at the Conference

Spreeha’s Perspective: Application Over Abstraction

Spreeha Foundation’s contribution to the conversation was rooted in operational experience rather than theory. As an organization operating a tech-enabled urgent care network in Bangladesh, Spreeha has been testing how digital tools and carefully designed AI-assisted systems can support frontline healthcare delivery. Current efforts focus on strengthening triage decision-making, providing structured decision-support guidance for health workers, improving diagnostic and referral pathways, and designing follow-up systems for patients managing chronic conditions.

Reflecting this approach, Michael Tjalve, PhD, Board Chair of Spreeha Foundation, emphasized the importance of staying grounded in real-world needs:

“We’re combining many years of healthcare expertise and deep community trust with a clear-eyed view of where AI can provide the most value for the communities we serve.”

For many attendees, this framing offered reassurance that innovation does not need to be speculative or detached from context. Instead, meaningful use of AI can emerge from local realities, embedded clinical and operational capacity, and a willingness to learn gradually while remaining attentive to risk.

From Theory to Practice: Making AI Understandable

A core strength of the workshop was its ability to move AI from abstraction into operational reality. Michael and his fellow panelists drew on concrete examples from their respective fields to show how AI can support development work when embedded within real organizational contexts.

Reflecting on the discussion, Michael noted:

“My fellow panelists and I shared a range of real-world examples that helped demystify how AI can be leveraged for impact across the sector.”

For participants, this approach helped situate AI within existing workflows rather than framing it as an external disruption. The implication was significant: when practitioners see AI functioning within real service environments—particularly in resource-constrained systems—the conversation shifts away from uncertainty and toward careful, informed experimentation.

A Mindset Shift Among Nonprofits

Michael also noted a shift that reflects growing maturity in the sector:

“More nonprofits are moving beyond the initial, well-placed concerns around AI and are starting to find contextually optimized value from its capabilities.”

This observation suggests that nonprofits are no longer approaching AI solely as a risk or a novelty. Instead, they are beginning to treat it as a tool that can be deliberately shaped to strengthen outcomes—while remaining attentive to limitations and risk. Workshop discussions indicated that this transition is being driven by exposure to practical examples, peer learning, and a growing recognition that AI adoption does not need to be overwhelming. It can begin with targeted, context-specific applications embedded within existing systems.

AI as Enabler Rather Than an End Goal

A recurring theme in Michael’s reflections was that technology must ultimately support people and the real conditions in which they work.

He emphasized:

“Connecting the dots between true local needs and what the technology can do is where I find the most engaging discussions. That’s when AI shifts from being a technology to becoming a catalyst for meaningful change.”

This perspective aligns closely with Spreeha’s philosophy, which prioritizes human capability, clinical quality, and system strengthening over technological ambition. In contexts like Bangladesh—where access gaps, workforce shortages, and fragmented information systems remain persistent barriers—AI holds value not as an add-on, but as a practical mechanism to extend reach, support frontline decision-making, and improve continuity of care.

What Grounded AI Adoption Looks Like in Practice

While Michael’s reflections helped frame how nonprofit leaders are thinking about AI at a sector level, they also raised a more practical question: what does responsible adoption look like inside real organizations, operating under financial, staffing, and system constraints? For Spreeha, this question moved from theory to practice through the lens of implementation – an area closely observed by Smriti Shrestha, Director of Development & Partnerships, who attended Global Washington 2025 as a conference delegate.

From a practitioner’s perspective, conversations at the conference often returned to a shared set of questions: What is the largest impact AI can realistically deliver? And how can organizations integrate it without losing the human element that sits at the core of nonprofit work? The emerging answer was not scale or speed, but incremental adoption—introducing AI in ways that align with organizational capacity and real operational needs.

A key distinction that surfaced repeatedly was between small language models (SLMs) and large language models (LLMs). SLMs are already proving useful for focused, lower-risk tasks such as grant drafting, donor communications, and summarizing reports—areas where benefits are immediate and manageable. LLMs, by contrast, are being approached more selectively, reserved for more complex needs such as multilingual content creation, advanced data analysis, or predictive insights. This sequencing allows organizations to test, learn, and adapt without overwhelming teams or budgets.

AI’s role in nonprofit work appeared less speculative and more tangible. Teams shared how AI is supporting proposal development, tailoring language for specific donors, and translating and localizing content to improve accessibility. Others described its use in data analysis for impact measurement and program planning, particularly where analytical capacity is limited.

Several practitioners also emphasized how reducing administrative burden through automation can free up staff time for deeper community engagement. In these cases, the value of AI lay not in technological sophistication, but in its ability to fit within existing workflows and respond to real constraints.

Implications for the Development Sector

Taken together, these practitioner reflections point to a broader pattern in how AI is entering the development sector. Progress is unlikely to come from dramatic technological shifts. Instead, it is being shaped through incremental, grounded experimentation, led by organizations closest to communities and most attuned to local constraints.

For Spreeha, these discussions reinforced the value of approaching AI through lived operational experience. Delivering urgent care in low-resource settings has required navigating fragmented systems, workforce constraints, and trust-dependent service delivery—conditions that closely mirror the realities many nonprofits face. This context shapes how Spreeha approaches AI not as a finished solution, but as an iterative process that demands ongoing testing, community engagement, ethical reflection, and evidence generation over time.

For funders and partners, this underscores the importance of supporting organizational capacity, learning, and governance—not just tools or platforms. For nonprofits, it highlights the value of integrating AI into existing systems in ways that strengthen, rather than disrupt, mission delivery.

About Michael Tjalve, PhD

Michael Tjalve, PhD, is the Board Chair for Spreeha Foundation, bringing more than two decades of global experience in AI research, product development, and nonprofit innovation. A former Chief AI Architect at Microsoft Philanthropies, he has helped humanitarian organizations and nonprofits leverage AI to amplify their impact. In 2024, he founded Humanitarian AI Advisory, supporting social impact institutions in harnessing AI responsibly.

Michael is also an Assistant Professor at the University of Washington, where he teaches AI for humanitarian action and ethical innovation. He currently serves as AI Advisor to the United Nations (OCHA) and co-leads the SAFE AI initiative, promoting responsible AI in humanitarian settings. He is also Co-founder of RootsAI Foundation, which empowers Indigenous and underrepresented youth to preserve their heritage and shape AI in equitable and culturally grounded ways.

About Smriti Shrestha

Smriti Shrestha is the Director of Development and Partnerships at Spreeha Foundation. She is a results-oriented professional with 10+ years of experience in program and project management, fundraising, and partnership development for global non-profits. Her work focuses on translating organizational strategy into fundable, scalable partnerships grounded in community realities.

The post How Nonprofits Are Reimagining AI — Reflections from the 2025 Global Washington Annual Conference appeared first on Global Washington.

This year’s conference felt especially urgent. At a moment when many across the sector are searching for a path forward after a challenging year, the value of gathering in person was palpable. GlobalWA Executive Director Elizabeth Stokely opened the day with a story about her 3-year-old son going to “work” with her, play doctor’s kit in hand. This child’s innate desire to help others was a perfect representation of the longing we all feel to make the world a better place, even as we carry collective grief. While there was no single “aha” moment, the conference made clear that this was the right place to start.

Throughout the day, attendees engaged in raw, personal, and forward-looking conversations—from an AI workshop and policy roundtable to a career development session—that strengthened a sense of community across the sector. While many challenges remain unresolved, one message rang clear: leaning into community is how we resist setbacks and move forward together.

Let’s Elevate the World Together

Stokely highlighted Washington State’s unique position to respond to global challenges, shaped by its strong ecosystem of philanthropy, technology, universities, research, and global connectivity. She shared how GlobalWA’s new strategy—focused on convening community, strengthening capacity, and mobilizing collective action—has helped the organization adapt during a time of uncertainty.

Keynote speaker Naria Santa Lucia, General Manager at Microsoft Elevate, echoed this sentiment by emphasizing the immense talent and innovation rooted in Washington State. Calling on large institutions to support collective mobilization, she reminded attendees that while change is inevitable, we do not have to navigate it alone.

Several sessions reinforced this theme, including conversations on subnational diplomacy and the power of storytelling to rebuild support for global development. Ports, state agencies, local government, community groups, and individuals all have roles engaging globally even as national policy retreats. Across discussions, one conclusion emerged clearly: elevating global impact must happen together—though the question of “how?” remains.

Washington State’s Global Moment: Rethinking Collaboration

The opening panel set a bold tone for the day, bringing together leaders from academia, philanthropy, global health, and the private sector. The conversation challenged the sector to examine how we work, who we center, what genuine collaboration truly requires, and how we hold ourselves accountable.

Heidi van Rooyen, Chair of the University of Washington Department of Global Health, posed a central question: “What does it mean to genuinely collaborate?” She called for letting go of entrenched power dynamics and moving beyond “do-gooder” models that continue to shape Global North–South partnerships. Her remarks resonated throughout the room and framed many conversations that followed.

Later sessions responded directly to this challenge. Speed networking created purposeful space for connection, while the participant-driven Insights to Action session questioned U.S.-centric assumptions and emphasized local leadership, mutual benefit, and shared accountability over transactional engagement. Questions around funding loomed as the community advanced ideas for true collaboration.

Confronting the Funding Gap

Funding surfaced repeatedly as one of the sector’s most pressing challenges. Philanthropy Northwest CEO Jill Nishi shared how her organization challenged funding cuts by filing suit and fighting to restore wrongfully terminated funds. She reminded attendees that compliance is not the only option, even when resistance is difficult.

Kammerle Schneider, Chief of Global Health Programs at PATH, expanded on this, noting that the traditional aid system’s reliance on federal funding left it vulnerable. She pointed toward more resilient approaches: centering communities, engaging the private sector, and navigating the dual opportunities and risks presented by emerging technologies and AI.

Breakout sessions explored shifts toward locally led systems, cost-effective funding models, and partnerships that equip local governments and organizations to receive and manage funding directly. While significant uncertainty remains, one point was clear: collaboration and adaptation remain essential to the sector’s future.

Mobilizing Beyond the Conference

By the end of the day, attendees felt both exhausted and inspired. In a final collaborative exercise, participants reflected on where solutions emerged and how the GlobalWA community could sustain momentum beyond the conference. Conversations with near-strangers quickly felt like exchanges with trusted colleagues—a testament to a community united by shared purpose and a desire to rebuild the sector together.

Facilitators emphasized the importance of sustaining these connections and introduced a simple framework for continued engagement: the “me” (individual reflection), the “we” (collective connection), and the “bigger we” (commitment to the common good). Attendees were asked to commit to one tangible action they would take to drive meaningful change, and many signed the collective commitment banner.

Looking Ahead

Moderator and GlobalWA Board Member Akhtar Badshah closed the day with three guiding reflections:

1. It is time for us to be unreasonable.
2. Don’t set your own table—go to the one already set in our community.
3. Say yes. It often leads to good trouble.

At GlobalWA, our conference is only the beginning. Through events and convenings throughout the year, we continue to build a connected global development ecosystem in Washington that grows capacity, navigates complexity, and scales impact worldwide. We invite you to stay engaged—sign up for our mailing list, explore membership, and support us on Giving Tuesday. How will you honor your own commitment to global impact?

Special Thank You

We are deeply grateful to our speakers, volunteers, and sponsors whose time, expertise, and support made this conference possible. We look forward to continuing our collaboration as we mobilize the next chapter of global development.

The post This Is What Mobilizing Looks Like: 2025 Conference Recap appeared first on Global Washington.

We are excited to share Global Washington’s new approach to membership. Based on your feedback, we’ve made improvements to reflect both the evolving needs of our community and our bold new strategy. 

For nearly two decades, GlobalWA has served as the hub for Washington State’s global development community. Together, we’ve built a vibrant ecosystem where nonprofits, philanthropies, businesses, academic institutions, and individuals connect, learn, and amplify their collective impact. As we enter a new phase, we are evolving how we work with you—our members and partners—to ensure our community is more connected, more resilient, and more influential in shaping the future of global development. 

A Streamlined Membership Model

We believe everyone should have access to GlobalWA tools, knowledge, and spaces to help organizations and individuals grow stronger, savvier, and more resilient. That’s why we’re moving away from the tiered “Cascades–Himalayas” membership structure to one aligned with organizational capacity, ensuring that everyone has a seat at the table. We now offer two clear pathways for engagement: 

What Your Membership Supports 

While we may have been conceived as a traditional membership association, our work has long been to support a broader mission-driven community. We’re expanding how we think about funding our mission and impact. As we look ahead, your support will power GlobalWA’s three strategic pillars: 

• Convene: We bring together Washington’s global development ecosystem through curated events, storytelling, and shared platforms for dialogue to facilitate meaningful cross-sector collaboration and partnerships that reflect real community needs. 

• Strengthen: We invest in our members’ growth and sustainability by providing tools, knowledge, and spaces that help individuals and organizations grow capacity, navigate complexity, and scale their impact. 

• Mobilize: We drive sector-wide momentum through research, data-driven advocacy, and strategic communications that amplify our collective voice and promote the economic and strategic value of this ecosystem in Washington state. 

What This Means for You 

• If you are currently a member at the Atlas level ($1,000) or below, your existing benefits will continue under the new GlobalWA Community membership.
  
• If you are currently a member at the Kilimanjaro ($2,000) level or above, you will automatically become a member of the Leadership Circle. You will have the choice to renew at the Leadership Circle level ($2,500 or above) or convert to a Community Member. 
  
• If you are not a member and considering membership, we encourage you to explore which membership option is right for you. If your organization is ready to make a deeper impact, we invite you to join the Leadership Circle.

Why Now?

The global development sector is facing unprecedented challenges. In 2025, USAID programs were cut by 83%. The scale and speed of these cuts created chaos—resulting in disrupted funding streams, severed partnerships abroad, staff reductions, program cancellations, and the difficult task of maintaining global operations while navigating an entirely transformed foreign aid landscape. Without coordinated infrastructure, organizations and individuals experience diminished impact, missed opportunities, and higher burnout. This cross-sector community is a global force for change. GlobalWA’s updated model ensures that together, we can: 

• Build a stronger collective voice for Washington State’s global development sector. 

• Provide the tools and spaces needed to grow capacity and scale impact. 

• Mobilize research, advocacy, and resources to position Washington as a national leader in global development. 

Join Us

Sign up or renew your membership here. To confirm your membership level or explore joining the Leadership Circle, please visit https://globalwa.org/membership/, reply to this email, or reach out to us at info@globalwa.org. 

Thank you for being an essential part of this community. Together, we are building a more connected, resilient, and influential sector—one that can better advance equity, sustainability, and shared prosperity at home and abroad. 

With gratitude, 

Elizabeth Stokely 
Executive Director 

The post A New Way to Connect, Learn, and Lead with GlobalWA appeared first on Global Washington.

For the past two years, our team has been listening, testing, and iterating toward a simple idea with a profound impact: a vibrant, powerful, engaged community is the foundation for survivors’ healing journeys. As CTO of Our Wave, I’ve had the privilege of working alongside survivors, clinicians, designers, engineers, and advocates to shape that vision into reality. Today, I’m proud to share that Our Wave Community 2.0 is live at community.ourwave.org.

Why this release, and why now? Because building safe digital spaces for survivors of sexual harm, domestic violence, and child abuse requires more than a content library or a forum. It asks for a place where education, personalized resources, and human connection come together—securely, respectfully, and at each survivor’s pace. Our Wave 2.0 is a significant step toward that all‑encompassing experience.

What We’ve Achieved Together

The numbers reflect the momentum of this movement:

• 1,000,000+ views across stories, questions, and community content
• 30,891 resource referrals to trusted services
• 10+ international partnerships to expand survivor‑centered technology and tools

Behind each metric is a person finding language for their experience, a supporter learning how to help, or a clinician connecting someone to care. That impact is our north star.

Stories Remain the Heart

Stories are the foundation of healing. They build understanding, cultivate empathy, and create lasting change across communities and organizations.

In 2.0, story sharing is still core. Survivors can publish narratives or artwork in a secure, moderated space designed to protect privacy and encourage reflection. Whether a story centers on struggle, strength, growth, or hope—all are welcomed, all matter.

Our community’s contributions—1,750+ stories from 71 countries—continue to demonstrate how storytelling nurtures individual recovery and reshapes how communities respond to trauma. With 2.0, we’ve also enhanced moderation tools to support constructive, judgment‑free conversations and to keep safety our top priority for survivors, allies, and supporters.

New Ways to Connect: Comments & Messages of Support 

In Our Wave 2.0, the community can respond more meaningfully:

• For survivors: Thoughtful comments and replies to stories encourage reflection, validation, and deeper connection.
• For allies: Messages of Support now appear alongside survivor‑authored Messages of Hope and Messages of Healing, giving supporters a clear, guided way to show care.

Every interaction is carefully trauma‑informed and moderated, helping ensure that conversations remain empathetic and true to each person’s unique healing path. The result is a space where validation is authentic and wide‑ranging, and where people can engage without sacrificing safety.

Survivor Q&A, Elevated

Our Survivor Q&A has connected community members with trauma‑informed specialists for years. In 2.0, we took that foundation and built upward:

• Upvotes help the most helpful answers rise to the top, so practical insights are easy to find.
• Discussions enable follow‑up questions and peer exchange—all within moderated threads that honor boundaries and lived experience.

Together with our partners, volunteers, and clinicians, this evolving Q&A becomes a collective knowledge base—a living library of wisdom that supports healing at every stage.

A Reimagined Resources Hub—Now in 20 Countries

Access matters as much as advice. Our Resources Hub has been re-designed and expanded to connect survivors with culturally relevant, locally available support across 20+ countries. From crisis lines and counseling to legal rights and housing, our curated listings help people find the right help, in the right place, at the right time.

This global perspective reflects the diversity of our community and our commitment to accessibility. Every survivor deserves support that understands their language, culture, and circumstances.

Built for Safety, Speed, and Belonging

A great experience requires resilient infrastructure. As we rebuilt, we focused on:

• Privacy & Security: We’ve fine‑tuned our product architecture and moderation tooling to uphold the privacy Our Wave is known for. Safety is by design, not by add‑on.
• Performance: Front‑to‑back optimizations improve page speed and reduce friction, especially on slower connections and older devices.
• Accessibility: Improved semantics, keyboard navigation, and screen‑reader support help more people participate fully.
• Internationalization: 2.0 lays the groundwork for multilingual experiences, making our community more welcoming to survivors and allies around the world.

Why These Features? From a CTO’s Lens

Good question. Technology serves people best when it amplifies human connection. Comments, messages of support, and Q&A upvotes are not merely features—they are signals that tell us what information soothes, what words resonate, and where clarity is needed. With those signals, our team can keep improving: elevating content that helps, refining moderation guardrails, and guiding supporters toward helpful, non‑intrusive participation.

Most importantly, these features reduce isolation. They create gentle pathways for engagement—reading a story, leaving a note of support, asking a question, finding a resource—so survivors can calibrate their participation without pressure. In other words, 2.0 is engineered to meet people where they are.

How You Can Participate

• Survivors: Explore stories, add a comment when you’re ready, ask a question, or save resources for later. Your pace is the right pace.
• Allies & Supporters: Share a Message of Support or follow discussions to learn how to show up with care.
• Clinicians & Partners: Collaborate with us on resources, education, and outreach—especially in regions where access is limited. 

Final Thoughts

Our Wave 2.0 is more than a version number. It’s a commitment to community as healing, to privacy that protects dignity, and to an experience that scales care, not just code. We will keep listening, iterating, and building alongside you.

If you or someone you love could benefit from a safer digital space to read, share, learn, and connect, we invite you to join us at community.ourwave.org. Together—with empathy, evidence, and careful design—we can build a world where every survivor is met with understanding, resources, and a community walking the path together.

The post Introducing Our Wave 2.0: Built With—and For—Survivors appeared first on Global Washington.

When the Trump administration issued its January 20 executive order announcing that it was freezing all U.S. foreign development assistance—funding that typically accounts for about a third of Save the Children’s annual global program budget—our senior team was already gathered for a previously planned in-person retreat. Together, we quickly moved through every stage of grief.

First, denial: Was it even possible for a U.S. president to deny funds appropriated by Congress? Second, anger: How could the administration be so cruel as to cut off food, medicine, and education from children in need? Third, bargaining: Could we litigate or negotiate to get some of the money back? Fourth, depression: In the absence of U.S. aid, would we be able to continue our work? Finally, acceptance: We couldn’t avoid or reverse this massive crisis, but we would stay calm, creative, and agile—and eventually navigate our way through it.

The ensuing days were chaotic as we tried to understand what the initial directive and subsequent ones meant for our operations. What started as a 90-day pause on and review of all U.S. aid became, on January 24, a U.S. State Department suspension of all existing programs except for emergency food assistance and military aid to Egypt and Israel. Four days later, the exemptions were extended to “humanitarian programs that provide life-saving medicine, medical services, food, shelter and subsistence assistance.”

We quickly created a global, cross-functional task force to plan for various scenarios. Of the $400 million that Save the Children U.S. had expected to receive from the U.S. government and then distribute to our colleagues and partners who are feeding, vaccinating, and teaching kids around the world, how much would be left? At that time, we thought the best case would be 70%; the worst (and ultimately more accurate) was 20%. We evaluated all our programs against the administration’s criteria for work eligible to continue, and then our financial teams determined how to stretch our cash reserves to sustain as many programs as possible for as long as possible, considering that at that point we hadn’t been paid for work already finished (although we have been since).

In the subsequent months, we have moved on from that immediate “response” phase to one that I refer to as “rebound”: securing new sources of funding to make up for those we lost. I am keen to move Save the Children U.S.—and our entire sector—to a third phase, which I think of as “reform”: streamlining, collaborating on, and experimenting with different types of programs to improve our efficiency and effectiveness. This is the best way to both silence our critics and ensure that we continue to save and enhance children’s lives.

A Legacy of Aid

Save the Children was founded in 1919 by Eglantyne Jebb, a British woman spurred to action by newspaper photos of German and Austrian children left to starve behind Allied troops’ World War I blockades. Our U.S. arm was established in 1932 to help struggling families in Appalachia during the Great Depression. Since then, we have expanded to offer programs in 14 U.S. states and raise funds for programs in more than 100 countries, which means we impact the lives of over 100 million children each year.

I joined Save the Children International as deputy CEO in 2012 after a 15-year career in the private sector, working for Kimberly-Clark and Unilever in my home country of the Netherlands as well as in Indonesia, Singapore, and the United Kingdom. I’d long been interested in transitioning to humanitarian work, where my economics and finance training, global business experience, and cross-cultural skills would be of use. (I’m half-Dutch, half-Indonesian, and fluent in four languages.) So, when a headhunter called asking if I would consider a role overseeing the integration of all of Save the Children’s separate country groups and 24,000 staff members into a more cohesive and flexible global entity with consistent messaging, standards, and success metrics (something that I’d just helped execute at Unilever), I jumped at the opportunity.

After seven years leading that transformation at Save the Children International, I moved to Save the Children U.S. to become its president and COO; then in January 2020 I was appointed CEO, with oversight of all our domestic programs as well as U.S. fundraising, including advocating for those critical government contributions. At the time, I was proud of the improvements we’d made to our processes and systems, creating more-flexible funding and knowledge sharing across geographies, more accountability for program results, and a more resilient and sustainable supply chain. But I was also cognizant of the headwinds we faced.

Even then, funding was flatlining, while the number of children in need continued to grow. Last year, the Global Humanitarian Overview estimated that the United States and other countries had committed only about 16% of the more than $48 billion necessary to help people in need around the world. For comparison, in 2014 wealthy nations were meeting 60% to 70% of that need. Governments did increase aid to developing regions in 2020 and 2021 in response to the global pandemic and the start of the war in Ukraine, but it has fallen again in the years since, reflecting a shift from aid to defense spending in Europe and an unfortunate decline in political support, both there and in the U.S., for investing outside one’s own borders to help the less fortunate.

That was our situation in January, when President Trump took office for a second time, and we knew his administration would make further drastic cuts to international aid. We had all read Project 2025, the Republican plan for remaking the federal government. However, we thought—perhaps naively—that the decreases would be gradual. After all, the 2025 U.S. government budget cycle had been approved by Congress and aid funds allocated, so we expected the big financial hit to come in 2026 or later. Clearly, we were wrong.

Shock and Response

Humanitarian workers tend to be good in a crisis: We run to the fire instead of away from it, and it’s in our DNA to stay focused and agile amid chaos. So once our team had taken a few moments to process the news, we moved quickly into crisis management mode. I even pulled out my favorite book on coping with unexpected change—1998’s Who Moved My Cheese?—and shared it with my team. The message was: Our world has been upended. We might not like it, but we must accept it and move forward.

As the leadership team tried to determine which programs might still be eligible for U.S. government funding due to their lifesaving nature, which we could sustain using other money, and which we would need to shutter immediately, our finance group modeled different futures: How much of Save the Children could continue to operate with half or even a fifth of the money we’d expected from our biggest funder?

We couldn’t tell our thousands of colleagues around the world to simply hold tight while we figured it out. In some places they were treating babies so malnourished that, if they had stopped, the children would have died. Our goal was to maintain as many programs as we could, as well as to preserve long-term investments in functions that were now even more critical, such as private fundraising capabilities, data and digital improvements, and enterprise resource planning. That meant learning to manage our cash flow the way a scrappy retail business might.

During this period, I also connected with CEOs of other humanitarian organizations affected by the cuts, and we formed a sort of virtual war room to discuss what we could do together, from media and policymaker outreach to developing a legal strategy. I asked Save the Children’s board of trustees to create a subcommittee to meet with us every Friday to review our plans and cash position and to discuss new ideas and solutions. And our executive team made sure to overcommunicate with our people at headquarters and in the field, explaining exactly what we knew and what we didn’t and acknowledging that program closures and layoffs were likely. We initiated a weekly, all-hands update, and we were as transparent as possible in both delivering news and answering questions.

By early February, we realized we would lose a significant amount of U.S. government funding for a variety of programs, everything from emergency response in Sudan to education for girls in Afghanistan to food distribution in Mozambique. On February 7, we offered most employees the option to take a voluntary buyout, and about 40 did. The following week we moved into furloughing and termination, which was both painful and complicated since it affected more than 3,000 staff in about 50 different labor-law jurisdictions.

Everyone understood why we had to do it, but that didn’t make it any less tragic. All we could do was try to soften the blow by offering career and well-being resources and by assuring both departing and remaining staff that, in making those cuts, we were preserving programs to continue helping children and to maintain the organization’s long-term financial stability. By the beginning of May, we determined that roughly 70% of our U.S. government–funded awards had been terminated.

Planning a Rebound

Through the spring and summer of this year, we’ve been in our rebound phase: looking for new funding streams, continuing to build bipartisan relationships and advocate for policies that support children and families worldwide, activating communities that will support us in those efforts, investing in growth where we can, and keeping our remaining staff energized. For example, when we heard that funding for our U.S. programs—which serve more than 250 rural communities—might also be on the chopping block, we mobilized state governors and allies on Capitol Hill to preempt such cuts. We’ve also secured additional donations to reinstate some suspended or threatened global programs, such as education and protection work in Syrian refugee camps.

We’ve accelerated our outreach to corporations, foundations, major philanthropists, and smaller-scale donors, finding new ways to target those prospects, share our mission, and highlight the positive outcomes generated by our work. Our philanthropic partners stepped up tremendously, donating more than $16 million in undesignated funds through May, a 63% increase from the same period in 2024. Many of these donors—who had for years restricted their support to specific programs—redirected their contributions to our overall mission fund; understanding the gravity and significance of the moment, they trusted Save the Children to direct the money where it was needed most.

Internally, having seen our way through the cash crunch, we are also putting money toward mission-critical, future-focused upgrades to our outreach, content, and evidence-building systems. For example, globally we have committed a substantive investment to further digitize our programming, enhance our data infrastructure and analytics, and automate more systems to increase operational effectiveness despite the reduction in scale of our workforce.

Envisioning Reform

As we move into the end of 2025 and beyond, I’m keenly aware that crisis can often be a catalyst for necessary long-term change. There are many wonderful aspects to being a 106-year-old institution: our track record of positive impact, our collective knowledge, our deep understanding of nonprofit best practices and the regions in which we work. However, an organization of our age and size must also avoid complacency and be willing to adapt to a new normal of volatile or reduced government support.

We’ve already proved that we’re capable of transformation. When I joined from the corporate world a decade ago and first mentioned KPIs, or key performance indicators, it was considered a little countercultural. But now we have them, and they’re reported out every month. Did we keep more children in school? How many did we feed and vaccinate? What health improvements did we see? Are our budgets in line with expectations? Are the quality measures in green, amber, or red? We also measure the cost-effectiveness of our most prevalent interventions more clearly than ever before. And we’ve become smarter about deciding where we can add value with a rubric that helps us to choose whether, when, and how to intervene in a particular region or with a new emergency: What’s the available funding? How big is our footprint there? Which gaps can we best address?

Still, there is always room for improvement. As in any other industry, sector, or organization, there are inefficiencies to root out—and in the nonprofit world they are sometimes harder to see and correct, because we lack market signals. Our consumers are children in such desperate need that they happily accept anything we provide, and until recently our donors were consistently supportive.

Now we have more of an incentive to innovate. Don’t get me wrong: I hate that the United States suddenly ripped away aid that amounts to only 1% of its annual spending and yet saves countless lives and greatly enhances the country’s global and moral standing. But we can use the shock to become more efficient, collaborative, and experimental and to learn to drive the same positive impact with fewer resources.

We’re trying a number of approaches. One is to work more closely with various national, regional, and local governments to discern where international aid is the right intervention versus where officials’ commitments to the right policies and funding for children would be more effective. Another is to pursue more partnerships with fellow nonprofits so that we can each bring our own expertise and experience to a problem while also avoiding overlaps. We are examining when cash assistance would be more helpful than delivering food, medicine, or books, or when locally manufactured goods could be substituted for ones imported from afar. In emergencies, we are also testing fundraising not for the direct work of Save the Children or other Western NGOs but for a pooled fund to be given to and dispersed by local actors, with reporting requirements for accountability. We’ve tried this in South Sudan, giving small amounts of money to 160 domestic organizations, and found that it led to people getting the support they needed faster and at lower cost.

On a macro level, there is absolutely enough money and expertise in this world to make sure that children don’t suffer. Consider one simple intervention for a malnourished child, a six-week course of therapeutic peanut paste: It costs $67, is easy to administer, tastes great, and is an overwhelmingly effective treatment. We simply need to figure out how to most effectively raise money for and then deliver that kind of aid in a changed political landscape.

Lessons Learned

Stepping into the CEO role of Save the Children U.S. five years ago, I did not expect to confront Covid-19, wars in Ukraine and the Middle East, or the wrenching withdrawal of U.S. development assistance. But our organization has weathered many bad storms before, and we’ve always found ways to make good on our mission of ensuring that kids everywhere survive and thrive.

By sharing our experience, we hope to contribute to a collaborative conversation in which leaders learn from one another’s challenges, whether it’s a funding crisis, a new tariff, or the loss of a big client. We have navigated this difficult period by displaying and developing a few key organizational strengths.

First, radical acceptance: Confront your new and brutal reality as soon as possible. Second, flexibility: In any volatile environment, you must keep your knees slightly bent, ready to absorb and adapt to new developments. Third, focus: Ignore the noise around you, home in on what you can control, and commit to working together to fulfill your mission. Fourth, decisiveness: In chaotic and fast-moving situations, you can’t always wait for more information, so understand that close enough is good enough and that, if things change, you can adjust course. Finally, vision: My team’s embrace of the three-phase outlook—starting with crisis response but then looking ahead to rebound and reform—helped us immensely, giving us a positive, proactive mindset and pointing us to the light at the end of the tunnel.

Save the Children U.S. and other organizations funded by USAID, and above all children and vulnerable communities across the world, have suffered a devastating blow. But moving forward I am keeping in mind the great quote from Max Roser, the founder of Our World in Data: “The world is awful. The world is much better. The world can be much better.”

Yes, we have seen gradual rollbacks, and then a dramatic one, in official development aid, and we’ve seen unequal progress in health, nutrition, safety, and education across countries and demographic groups. At the same time, over the past 50 years we’ve seen enormous reductions in the number of children dying, getting sick, going hungry, or being deprived of education each year, while the percentage of people living in extreme poverty has dropped from 42% to below 10%.

We won’t let this crisis stop us from making even more headway on those problems in the decades to come, and we hope that governments, fellow nonprofits, foundations, businesses, and individuals will join us in that fight.

Originally published on Harvard Business Review

The post The CEO of Save the Children U.S. on Navigating a Sudden Funding Crisis appeared first on Global Washington.

Aida, a farmer with myAgro in Senegal, picking up her farming inputs in Keur Samba.

For smallholder farmers in West Africa, the global climate crisis is having an outsized impact.   Rains that they rely on have become more unpredictable and temperatures are rising 1.5 times faster than anywhere else in the world. As the region’s population continues to rise, it is imperative that smallholder farmers, who produce an estimated 30% of the world’s food, are supported to respond to rapidly changing climate conditions.

myAgro is an award-winning organization equipping smallholder farmers in West Africa to move out of poverty. Through its mobile layaway model, myAgro offers integrated packages of improved seeds and fertilisers, seedlings, poultry, and training to smallholder farmers in Mali, Senegal, and Cote d’Ivoire – enabling them to increase their incomes using inputs and practices that support climate resilience, adaptation, and mitigation.

There are multiple terms for agricultural practices that support farmers in our rapidly changing environment – terms like climate-smart agriculture, regenerative agriculture, and agroecology. While all three prioritize sustainability and care for the earth, they each have unique definitions and practices. myAgro’s approach can be described as leveraging climate-smart agriculture.

Defining “Climate Smart”

According to The World Bank, climate-smart agriculture (CSA) addresses the interlinked challenges of food security and accelerating climate change. CSA aims to:

• Increase productivity: Produce more and better food to improve nutrition security and incomes, especially for poor and rural farmers through climate adaptation.
• Enhance resilience: Reduce vulnerability to climate risks like drought, pests, and disease, and build farmer capacity to adapt in the face of longer-term stressors like shortened rainy seasons and erratic weather patterns.
• Reduce emissions: Pursue lower emissions for each calorie or kilo of food produced, avoid deforestation from agriculture, and identify ways to absorb carbon out of the atmosphere.

Climate Smart Agriculture in Action at myAgro

myAgro integrates and innovates climate smart solutions to ensure that farmers and their families can benefit from immediate yield increases in the short term, while cultivating healthier land for future generations. While myAgro integrates climate-smart approaches across many aspects of our programming, here are two highlights that we are most excited about from the past year with our farmers:

1. Scaling Agroforestry in Mali

One of the biggest challenges we are tackling at myAgro is that farmers in Mali and Senegal are dependent on one rainy season per year to do their farming and often have no other source of income, leaving them even more vulnerable to the worst impacts of climate change. One bad season can have long-term, detrimental consequences for the food security and well-being of farmers and their families.

myAgro’s agroforestry program is the first and only community-based agroforestry program in West Africa – helping farmers diversify their food sources and income by providing them with seedlings and training to plant trees amongst their food crops. We’ve established a network of 550 village-based mother units (MUs): nurseries that grow trees from seed and then deliver healthy seedlings to farmers in surrounding villages. As opposed to sourcing seedlings from big-box nurseries, the MU production network improves tree survival rates, lowers package delivery costs, and provides our locally recruited MU managers (most of whom are women) with additional income via sales commissions.

In 2024, we scaled our program to serve 189,000 farmers with packages of baobab and moringa trees, planting a total of nearly 1 million trees – a major investment in the climate resilience of the region. These trees mature to provide farmers and their families with nutrient-dense leaves, seeds, and fruit that can be harvested and sold multiple times per year, helping to improve and stabilize their food security and income. The trees also strengthen farmer climate resilience by improving soil health, reducing erosion, shielding crops from extreme weather, improving biodiversity, and offsetting carbon emissions.

2. Improving Productivity at Lower Costs

A second challenge faced by smallholders in West Africa is the high cost of inputs like seeds and fertilizer. Over the past five years, market volatility of fertilizer prices has been a major challenge for farmers, who rely on this input to boost their yields in a region impacted by soil erosion and degradation. Overuse and over-reliance on chemical fertilizer can also reduce soil biodiversity and ultimately reduce natural soil fertility.

Currently, myAgro provides farmers with microdosed quantities of fertilizer, along with training on how to apply a microdose. As opposed to liberally applying large amounts of fertilizer, microdosing involves applying small amounts in targeted locations close to the plant for improved uptake. The practice allows farmers to achieve yields similar to traditional application methods at a lower cost. myAgro has been testing strategies that help farmers reduce their reliance on chemical fertilizer even further, while still achieving high yields. Our goal is to help farmers lower their input costs and rebuild natural soil biodiversity and fertility.

In 2022 and 2023, myAgro began trials for an innovative “half-dose” peanut package, in which only half of the microdose quantity of chemical fertilizer is applied to fields in a targeted manner. Through a series of controlled trials, we concluded that a half-dose package could produce peanut yields comparable to myAgro’s standard microdose – and at a fraction of the cost.

In 2024, myAgro launched a pilot with 27,000 farmers in Mali so that they could try this new practice for themselves. Farmers who purchased a typical myAgro peanut package had the option of adding on a half-dose pilot package, so that they could see the results side-by-side. We recognize that adopting a new practice can feel risky, and requires farmers to trust our recommendation, learn a new method, and apply the method properly to see its full benefit. To support farmers in trying out this new method, we provided:

• Pilot packages that were subsidized (lowering financial risk)
• In-person demos and training on how to apply the half-dose successfully
• Personalized field visits to support farmers during planting and application
• Ongoing mobile support via our Call Center to answer questions

At harvest time, we found that the half-dose continued to perform well in the “real world” when looking at yields in metric tons per hectare: trial participants achieved an impressive 155% increase in yield relative to control farmers, which was comparable to the standard microdose package (see Figure 1). This means that for just half the fertilizer cost, farmers can still achieve the same output – ultimately increasing their net profit per hectare.

This trial has helped to establish a network of farmers that are excited to champion the practice to others, sharing their success stories with other farmers – and helping to increase the adoption of new sustainable farming methods more broadly. Looking ahead, myAgro aims to continue testing and expanding farmer access to this solution in order to hone a product, training, and delivery model that generates maximum impact at scale while maintaining cost efficiency.

Balakissa Kieta, a peanut and okra farmer in Bancoumana, Mali, participated in myAgro’s half-dose trial this year. She shares, “I have my two plots here, one cultivated with half the dose of fertilizer and the other with the regular dose. I am very satisfied with the project because this year I observed a clear improvement in my field. We applied the fertilizer rigorously and followed the training agent’s recommendations by carrying out weeding twice. This special attention has contributed to the health of my plants. On my 1/8 hectare plot on which half dose is applied, I think I can harvest two bags of peanuts, which represents a much higher yield than normal. The half-dose method seems to be paying off, as the peanuts are sturdier and healthier. This experience gives me confidence in the techniques we have learned and shows how good monitoring and management can make a real difference. I can’t wait to see the end result. Improving the health of our soil using lesser fertilizer will benefit my family.”

Continuing Improvements in the Face of Global Warming

As global temperatures continue to rise, the adoption and scaling of climate-smart approaches like agroforestry and reduced fertilizer use is vital to ensuring that farmers and their families can improve their food security in the short term, while fortifying the health of their land for generations to come. myAgro is energized to continue this work in partnership with farmers in Mali, Senegal, and Cote d’Ivoire and to continue learning and improving its practices and offering in the years to come.

The post How Climate Smart Farming Practices are Improving Soil Health, Crop Yields, and Resiliency in West Africa appeared first on Global Washington.

August 9, 2023

By Snow Leopard Trust

20% of snow leopard-friendly beekeeping profits in Kyrgyzstan fund conservation projects

Located in Asia’s high mountains, this Third Pole has the highest concentration of snow and glaciers outside the Arctic and Antarctic regions and is thought to store 7,000 trillion liters of the planet’s fresh water. It plays a major role in sequestering carbon and determines weather patterns across many countries. It is also home to the legendary ghost of the mountains.

The snow leopard, living just above the tree line and below the permanent glaciers, is custom-designed by evolution to survive in this steep terrain with thin air and extreme temperatures. This elusive cat roams 12 Asian countries with no passport or visa required to cross borders. Research confirms it crosses international boundaries regularly as long as they are not fenced, making it the ideal ambassador of the Third Pole, transboundary cooperation and climate impacts.

The Third Pole is home to 14 of the world’s highest peaks and 100,000 sq km of glaciers. This region is projected to be severely affected by climate change and is anticipated to warm at twice the average warming rate of the northern hemisphere. These changes will cause greater stress on human populations, especially the marginalized and vulnerable living in remote mountains dependent on limited resources. Extreme events are increasing in the form of flash floods, droughts and other disasters, which will cause significant losses to lives, livestock and livelihoods. Climate change will likely interact with every other threat snow leopards face, making each of them worse.

Glaciers are melting at an unprecedented rate. The increasing risk of emerging infectious diseases in the Third Pole due to warming and globalization threatens humans and snow leopards alike. New roads and infrastructure development in once inaccessible habitats facilitate the illegal wildlife trade. These threats not only affect snow leopards and other wildlife but also have a cascading impact on us, our well-being and our livelihoods.

Temperatures in snow leopard habitat are extreme, ranging from -40 to +40 degrees Celsius. While they may be able to withstand some level of warming, snow leopards will be affected by how humans respond. The lives of these elusive cats and the indigenous people of High Asia are as intertwined with glaciers and snow as they are with each other. Catastrophic weather events and forced changes in livelihood options could result in more human-wildlife interaction and, thus, lower acceptance of wildlife and negative encounters.

That’s why Snow Leopard Trust initiatives emphasizing climate adaptation programs are so vital. These include helping local and indigenous communities diversify their livelihood options, catalyzing better disease and healthcare management in people, livestock and wildlife, and strengthening peoples’ ability to coexist with snow leopards and other biodiversity.

Our most successful conservation programs are founded upon the PARTNERS Principles for community engagement. From beekeeping to eco-tourism to cheese and sustainable cashmere production, economic development that expands livelihood sources without damaging snow leopard habitat is an increasingly powerful tool for climate adaptation. These programs are designed to foster coexistence with snow leopards. 

To ensure snow leopards roam these peaks for generations to come, we must prepare for a future when the snow melts. Our continuing research to better understand how this mountain-dwelling species will be affected by a warming climate is critical to developing solutions to protect it. 

You can help by raising awareness about the importance of climate action to protect snow leopards and their unique habitat, known as the Third Pole.

Photo credits: Prasenjeet Yadav and our partner, Snow Leopard Foundation-Kyrgyzstan

The post What Will Climate Change Mean for Snow Leopards? appeared first on Global Washington.

With the aid of digital mapping tools, Saadia is restoring rangeland to grow trees that will increase income and provide fodder for livestock in Wayama Japta, Kenya.

May 16, 2025

Saadia is the sole provider for her family. She supports them primarily by managing livestock like goats, sheep, and cows in Wayama Japta Village in Wajir County, Kenya.

Managing the herd was never easy and it has become more challenging. Over the last few years, recurring floods and drought have made it harder to feed and water the animals—leading to the death of livestock. Instead of going to school, her 11-year-old son must spend his days taking the animals to graze nearly five kilometers away.

Saadia says. “Some animals die, which creates a food security crisis… and makes it difficult to meet daily needs. It’s very stressful.”

Across the Horn of Africa, many families that farm and raise livestock for a living are struggling to adapt to the increasing frequency and severity of extreme weather patterns. From 2019 to 2022, a devastating drought affected the region and threatened the lives and livelihoods of more than 20 million people. Communities that rely on agriculture struggled to recover and adapt to the natural disasters.

But while farmers and pastoralists can’t change the weather, they can change how they prepare for and respond to it. Especially when they tap into the power of digital tools and collaborate with local governments and committees.

Powering climate adaptation with technology

In Kenya, communities are adapting to the climate-driven challenges affecting people’s lives with digital tools introduced through the ASAL Adapts program.

In 2022, Mercy Corps partnered with Cisco to establish the Adaptation Services for Action and Learning (ASAL Adapts) program. Supported by a grant from Cisco, and refined over time with input and feedback from farmers and pastoralists, ASAL Adapts is helping communities in northern Kenya to improve the way natural resources are managed through digital tools.

With access to technology like real-time weather warnings, geographic information systems (GIS), remote sensing, and satellite imagery, communities are protecting their land, livestock, and way of life. As we mark three years of impact from ASAL Adapts, we are sharing the stories of Saadia, Rakia, Abdi, and Florine—all of whom are building new ways of adapting to the ongoing climate challenges through the power of technology.

Rangeland Management Committees used community resource mapping to determine where and how to rehabilitate land that had been barren. Saadia (in purple) helped by digging soil crescents to retain water in preparation to plant trees.

Identifying and restoring critical resources

Saadia became involved with ASAL Adapts in 2022 as part of the Wayama Japta Village Rangeland Management Committee. In October 2024, she and other community members started rehabilitating a five-acre site that had been barren due to overgrazing and firewood collection. Participants relied on a digital map developed with geographic information systems software and collaboration with the local people to identify resources—creating a community resource map.

The committee has organized plans to rehabilitate the land for grazing. Community groups dig soil crescents to capture and retain water, plant grass seeds, build raised beds, and prepare deep holes for planting acacia and eucalyptus trees. As they mature, these trees and grasses will provide fodder and medicine for livestock, ensuring a more sustainable future for the land and community.

Mercy Corps collaborated with communities to rehabilitate 500 acres of degraded rangelands and develop plans to guide communities on proper land use. Nearly 113,000 people receive increased access to forage on land with improved soil quality. And with usage agreements in place, community members encountered less conflict between groups using the land. Additionally, more than 2,800 people were trained to use digital tools to create maps measuring the effects of floods and droughts—using the data to plan for the future.

For Saadia, the project represents a turning point. “Previously, it was very barren,” she says. “Now that we will have fodder and plants, the entire community will be able to feed their livestock. My hopes are high.”

Real-time weather warnings have helped Rakia, and other pastoralists, avoid floods, find grass to feed their animals, and retrieve water to keep them all alive.

”We were given a month’s notice to prepare for the floods and we did not lose animals,” says Rakia, who has 20 goats. “Because we were able to take precautions.”

Mobile weather alerts help anticipate danger

Rakia and her family are pastoralists who move from place to place to find water and land for their 20 goats and four cows to graze. They sell milk along the way. Rakia has seen the weather change and become less predictable over her lifetime, with erratic rains and sweltering heat. She and her family had no way to plan for the harsh weather until it was too late, most recently resulting in catastrophic floods that killed her livestock and put her family in danger.

“It was very tough,” Rakia says. “We were struggling financially due to loss of income from livestock. And the drought caused water and pasture scarcity, leading to malnutrition and deaths among livestock. It was harder to access clean drinking water.”

But in March 2024, Rakia and the 200 other households in her community started receiving seasonal weather forecasts and real-time weather warnings through ASAL Adapts. Mobile phone alerts promptly message community representatives, who relay urgent weather information through word of mouth and to local language broadcasts on radio stations. This has enabled them to avoid floods, find grass to feed their animals, and get water to keep them all alive.

“This system has been very helpful, especially for those of us who don’t know how to read, because they make the information easy to understand in a clear and simple way,” she says. “A good example is when we received the alert … about the upcoming floods. We migrated from our location to higher ground to avoid the floods. We were given a month’s notice to prepare for the floods and we did not lose animals because we were able to take precautions.”

“This [climate-related advisories] help [the community] avoid danger, ensuring their safety and protecting their property,” said Abdi, who volunteers for the local planning committee.

Building resilience in the face of extreme weather

Abdi was once a pastoralist but he lost all his cattle and goats during the drought in 2019 to 2022. Now, Abdi volunteers his time as a member of the Ward Planning Committee in Bute Village.

“We have lost so much of our history and way of life due to climate change,” he explains. “As someone from this area, I feel it is my responsibility to promote awareness, mobilize the community, and protect resources such as water sources, pastures for grazing, wildlife, and vegetation communities.”

Abdi and his community benefit from climate-related advisories provided by ASAL Adapts in collaboration with the Kenya Red Cross and the local meteorology department. These advisories help communities prepare for environmental hazards, reducing risks to their lives and property. For example, if heavy rains are forecasted, people who are settled in areas prone to flooding will be advised to move to higher ground.

For Abdi, this work represents a critical step for families building resilience in the face of extreme weather events. “This information helps them avoid danger, ensuring their safety and protecting their property,” he says. “By following these advisories, they save themselves from the risks posed by volatile rains. This is a clear benefit and a significant advantage of having access to timely climate information.”

Florine is a Geospatial Advisor for ASAL Adapts. She partners with county governments, training them to use technology to improve use of rangeland by integrating community knowledge with scientific data.

Technology to help manage natural resources

Florine is the Geospatial Advisor for ASAL Adapts. She studied geographic information systems (GIS) at university and is passionate about using the tool to help her fellow Kenyans. GIS is a suite of software tools for mapping, analyzing, and visualizing data related to a specific location. This data can include things like natural resources, demographics, livestock market values, disease clusters, and water availability.

Florine’s main role is to work with county governments, training them to use geospatial technology to improve the use of rangeland by integrating community knowledge with scientific data.

“Climate change was a major driver [in our work] because it’s all about resilience,” she says. “Trying to move away from the approach of responding, but to more of building the institutional capacity to be more resilient… taking up activities to make them less vulnerable over and over across the different seasons.”

Saadia, Rakia, Abdi, and Florine are all part of larger communities learning how to cope and adapt to unpredictable climate disasters. Through ASAL Adapts, and the strong partnerships with local groups and governments, people are adapting to the changing climate on land that they are restoring with their own hands. With access to digital tools and technologies combined with historical knowledge from community members, people are now better equipped to forge a more sustainable future and withstand extreme weather in Kenya.

The post Digital Tools Help Restore Rangelands and Adapt to a Changing Climate appeared first on Global Washington.