One tenth of the markup on a latte would help a coffee farmer, better than nothing.

Approximately 1/20th of my age pension goes to UNHCR. I don’t think it helps much. Many contributors might think like I do and hope for the best. No warm fuzzies. There is no system possible for quality control in the neediest places.

It would be appropriate, although hard for them to countenance, for all foreign aid institutions in the globe, from the World Bank down to the local church, to publish online an annual audit for general perusal. Then at least we would see where the donations were directed. At present none them knows what the others are doing.

Good on the Office of Development Effectiveness in accounting for Ausaid, an example to the world

Aid needs to help in a structural way, those people (in communities) it aims to assist most.

I praise New Zealand and Australia for example, for opening the dialogue and debate on allowing 'oversea's unskilled' workers into Australia. I see this as highly strategic.

Given I see the Banks already attempting to 'cash in' on the value amount of transactions of monies people in Australia are sending to their families living in under-developed economies overseas, and that this form of money value is even greater than the sum of aid given (in most cases) itself... I sense there is a pathway that could help glue specific needs of others across boarders in ways that we seek - more productively.

I wish I could see the Australian Liberal Party and our public do more to make the proper connections. We need to understand better, the ways we can design new ways to assist others, and to help ourselves, as the problems we face is a global form of inter-dependence... food, fuel, water, jobs... shared technology... sustainability, under climate change ... is what is pushing us all to see we are actually a world of one.

I respect the address made to the 'Forest Disappearing in Papua New Guinea'. Aid is meaningful when it helps to sustain new knowledge awareness in a way that advances citizens in a economy to make the changes it must, to combat industry methods that are locked in by the past.

In this case as with our case be it Timber Forest or Solar Energy investments... it is the ethic’s of business and a mass public who will help make the differences.

This I see is the heart of the climate change debate.

While we continue to under-cut 'fairness', the idea of poverty against fair-trade, as people, citizens, individuals of the whole human race... we will not advance.

Trust and integrity I believe is the thing that is lost under present forms of industry and aid - trade - policy susidies.

http://www.miacat.com/

I find this topic very interesting. A group of friends and I went overseas to Cambodia and discovered that the policies of overseas aid in one particular community were not neccessarily what the local people wanted or directed where it would be most effective. We also discovered that much overseas aid comes with policies that do not neccessarily fit with the local culture. It became such an issue of concern for us, that we started to fund the community ourselves directly, traveling back 6-monthly.

We have now registered as a charity in our own right, with local Khmer people on the board and work together with the community towards education for chiildren, infrastructure, generational transference of culture and family connections. The local Khmer people identified practical skills as an area that they wanted to work on, so this became a focus, to up-skill people for local jobs.

It has not been easy, and has taken a lot of talking and listening and interpreting.

The international aid agencies have now pulled out of the area (which was a shame as together we could have all made a difference). I think some of the warm and fuzzies went out when the local people didn't want to take on some of their suggestions and wanted to do it their own way. It all made me think that people don't want to give without strings attached. They want to have their name placed on a water pump or feel good about themselves rather than do what really matters for local people.

And the reality is that people give more if they feel good (warm and fuzzy), so the ultimate empowerment of local people is always compromised and restricted by what people percieve as good, rather than what is actually needed.

From the article: "The inventions of terminator technology that has decimated local agricultures has been permitted because it fits neatly within a perverse rendering of fairness moderated by market economies and copyright excesses.

Terminator technology is not directly used, but the intentions of its invention - the philosophies of moneymaking from patents and “gene-protection” liabilities are infused within agribusiness."

Is Leanne acknowledging in the second quoted paragraph that "termintor technology" has never been released or even field trialed? If so, how don't these two sentences contradict each other?

How can something "decimate local agricultures" without being used? Just by mere mention of them? That's some strong technology alright.

Sorry, wrong thread. Please ignore/remove my last comment thanks.