global aid & development

Roya Mahboob knew that she wanted to build a career in technology from the first time she set her eyes on a computer in the only internet cafe in Herat, Afghanistan, when she was 16 years old. In 2010, at the age of 23 she became the first tech chief executive in Afghanistan when she founded Afghan Citadel Software (ACS) with the aim of involving more women in her country's growing technology business.

Foreign aid is a key instrument of international engagement in Japan’s foreign policy toolkit. Although Tokyo is no longer the world’s top aid donor that it once was in the 1990s, it still was the world’s number four aid donor in 2015 with close to a US$10 billion annual budget. It is not just the size of the aid budget that has changed. So has Tokyo’s thinking behind foreign aid.

Swiping right or tapping on a mobile phone are not typical ways of helping poor communities, but a new app launched by a medical charity on Friday aims to use technology to help aid workers map areas at risk of conflict, disasters and disease. Using the latest in mobile gaming technology, MapSwipe lets users map remote, rural regions vulnerable to humanitarian crises.

The Council of Bars and Law Societies of Europe (CCBE) and the Deutscher Anwaltverein (DAV) have launched their joint European Lawyers in Lesvos project, aimed at providing legal assistance to migrants requiring international protection. [...] The purpose of the project is to give migrants and refugees the chance to receive individual legal advice from a lawyer – crucial at a time of great uncertainty amongst the more than 4,000 on the island as to their legal entitlements.

How are the BRICS nations changing the practice and players in international development? 

Britain pledged 100 million pounds ($130 million) on Thursday to help educate girls in the world's poorest countries in a move described by International Development Secretary Justine Greening as a post-Brexit bridge to the world. [...] Greening described the pledge as one of the "best bargains" in development investment the British government could make, saying it would build bridges with "trading partners of the future", particularly in a post-Brexit world.

First Lady Michelle Obama has been meeting with key stakeholders -- accompanied by daughters Sasha and Malia -- to promote her Let Girls Learninitiative and address the institutional and cultural barriers preventing 62 million girls worldwide from receiving an education on an overseas trip including Liberia, Morocco, and next, Spain. The most star-studded event on her trip took place Tuesday, when the Obama girls spoke to a group of local adolescents in a panel discussion featuring Meryl Streep and Frieda Pinto in Morocco. 

The Compassion Experience, coming July 1-6 to Castle Rock Park in the Heights, will provide a glimpse of life through the eyes of an impoverished child. Three 20-minute tours will take visitors through scenarios in Uganda, the Dominican Republic and the Philippines. [...] Compassion International, an international child-advocacy ministry, will bring two semitrailers filled with more than 2,000 square-feet of interactive exhibits, Lacy Maloney said.

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