Uncharted Ground With SSIR

Jan 24 2022 8 ep. 38 mins 20

Uncharted Ground With SSIR Podcast artwork

Uncharted Ground tells the stories of nonprofit and social entrepreneurs at the forefront of global development. Host Jonathan Levine takes you on their journeys to solve some of the most daunting social issues on the planet.

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Powering Needs, Empowering Lives

Jan 24 2022 39 mins

Some 800 million people globally – as many as a quarter of them in India – have no access to electricity. Far more suffer routine brownouts and power cuts. The result puts the rural poor, who are most impacted, at a severe disadvantage in every way: Health-care services are crippled, education is compromised, and entire communities are cut off from modern industrial and digital

Healing From Trauma

Nov 18 2021 35 mins

The Northern Triangle countries of Latin America are some of the most violent in the world. El Salvador and Honduras have ranked among the highest murder rates for years. It’s not only the gang violence we hear most about, but also domestic abuse and gender-based violence. And the trauma it leaves behind has a devastating effect on entire communities, from the hospital staff who

From Plow to Prosperity

Oct 11 2021 50 mins

Smallholder farming in Africa is a precarious existence. Low economies of scale, commodity price swings, out-of-date agronomic practices, and the effects of climate change conspire to trap farm families in a never-ending cycle of poverty. At the same time, Africa’s booming youth population is entering a saturated workforce without enough jobs to absorb them. In Nigeria, the conti

A Fair Deal for Coffee Growers

Sep 07 2021 33 mins

For decades, smallholder farmers who produce the world’s supply of quality coffee in developing countries have barely earned enough to stay in business. Many have gone under. Millions of those still producing live in poverty and go hungry. Now climate change is threatening their livelihoods as well. The main problem is a supply chain stuffed with so many middlemen, each taking th

The Business of Water

Aug 02 2021 35 mins

Nothing is more essential to life than clean drinking water. Where it’s in short supply—as in much of Africa and other developing regions—there’s opportunity for promoting good health, improving livelihoods, and making money. Jibu seeks to achieve all three through its franchises that treat, package, and distribute affordable water in the major cities of East Africa. For Ji

A Global Movement for Environmental Justice

Jun 28 2021 38 mins

From coal plants to large-scale agriculture, industrial activities contributing to the environmental crisis tend to concentrate in minority communities with little power, wealth, or legal knowledge to defend themselves. The consequences to health and livelihoods are frequently devastating. To help them protect themselves, the nonprofit Namati trains paralegals to educate and organi

The Healing Force of Family

Jun 01 2021 38 mins

This is the second episode of a two-part series about raising the quality of health care in the developing world. Even before the onslaught of COVID-19, public health services in many developing countries were chronically strained by a combination of burgeoning populations, severe shortages of trained clinicians, and growing burdens of disease. Noora Health harnesses an untapped re

The Videos Saving Lives in the Developing World

Apr 16 2021 31 mins

This is the first episode of a two-part series about raising the quality of health care in the developing world. Deb Van Dyke, a nurse practitioner for Doctors Without Borders, grew increasingly troubled over 15 years by the low quality of care provided by local health workers around Asia and Africa. So she set up Global Health Media, an international video production house, to mak