2018/07/26: almost 4.5 million people die each year from health problems caused by inhaling indoor smoke generated by burning solid fuel. Worldwide, 38 percent of the population – 2.7 billion people – cook with wood collected unsustainably from forest and farm landscapes.
In sub-Saharan Africa, the backbreaking process of gathering firewood by hand – often by women and girls – and carrying it home provides the main source of fuel for cooking and heating.
Although liquid fuels, solar energy and hydropower could offer possible alternatives, high costs, infrastructure shortcomings and local habits make sustainable use of wood fuel, including firewood and charcoal, a more viable option in the region.
As a result, researchers at the World Agroforestry Centre (ICRAF) and the Wangari Maathai Institute (WMI) in Nairobi, Royal Institute of Technology, Lund University, Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences, International Institute for Tropical Agriculture, Center for International Forestry Research are trying to find healthier, more efficient energy conversion technologies that emit less pollution and simultaneously produce biochar (biomass charcoal) for soil amendment to improve plant growth and health.
Not only is it strenuous work to gather wood, it detracts women from other pursuits such as agriculture or operating small businesses to generate income,” said Njenga. “Women spend about one working day per week in collecting firewood from forests. This implies that women are essentially living on a 20 percent pay cut as their productive days in a week are normally five as they spend Saturdays attending to domestic chores.”
2018/09/10: The lack of diversity in Wikipedia biographies of notable individuals extends to women in STEM. Ongoing lack of representation in the largest, most frequently accessed body of knowledge in the world contributes to the silencing of our voices.
“According to Wikipedia, being a notable person is less about to life expectancy, somewhat more about education and economic status, and even more about positions of power.” - Klein and Konieczny, 2018
To help change cultural perceptions of who can contribute to STEM and to inspire the next generation of young scientists and engineers, it is essential that open access platforms, especially Wikipedia, offer a realistic perspective on the diversity of people already working to tackle big global challenges and historical contributions by underrepresented groups. Let’s speed up the process… sixteen more years to achieve gender parity on notable biographies is too long!
What can women and allies in STEM do to accelerate the improvement of Wikipedia as an inclusive, fact-based resource for the global community?
2018/03/08: In northern Nigeria, thanks to the ingenuity, dedication, and hard work of a local entrepreneur, Habiba Ali, a new solar energy initiative is not only providing her community with a sustainable and affordable source of energy, but is also empowering other women through access to income-generation activates.
There is huge energy poverty in our country and over 89 per cent of this poverty lies in rural areas. There is a need to bring innovation in renewable energy and sustainability to bridge the poverty gap. I believe innovation is only as good as the impact that it makes.
This sentiment echoes IRENA’s research, which shows that off-grid renewables offer a cost-effective, environmentally sustainable way to accelerate the pace of electrification. Expanding the range of appliances powered by off-grid renewables can also encourage income generating activities in rural areas.
Through Sosai, Habiba also created Women of the North for Excellence (the MASI), an initiative where women can become entrepreneurs through leadership in commission-based projects.
One project involves renting out solar dryers for drying peppers and other crops, thereby increasing their shelf life. Nigeria accounts for about 50 per cent of Africa’s pepper production and in rural northern Nigeria as much as 40 per cent of a family’s income can come from harvesting peppers.
Women play a major role in agriculture, and the introduction of solar powered technology will go a long way to improving their economic and social status.
2018/09/13: The new Higher School Certificate (HSC) physics syllabus for NSW will contain no mention of the contributions of female physicists to the field. Not teaching students about their contributions to the field denies young women role models, and denies all students important knowledge about physics.
An education system which simultaneously claims to praise women in STEM, yet erases them from a physics syllabus cannot be seen as thorough. This needs to be fixed before long lasting damage is done to Australia’s next generation of scientists.
Kate J. Sim examines how the prevailing cultural notion of sexual assault survivors as liars, and the widely held belief of technological objectivity, converge to instruct the design of anti-rape technologies. Design processes reveal how the developers intended these devices to be used, by targeting ideal users, and prompting users to collect certain kinds of information.
By Flavia Fascendini Publisher: APCNews 09 January 2017
Do sexual images of women impact how men perceive women?
Two former Microsoft employees found their phones didn't do what they wanted, so they set out to make one that did.
Playboy's decision to drop nude women from its pages represents just how mainstream hard-core pornography has become.
There was once a time when women and men shared an equal interest in the programming world.
How the "sharing economy" allows Millennials to cope with downward mobility, and also makes them poorer.
Seven "well prepared" women attempted to be ordained Catholic priests in Morristown, New Jersey, on Saturday, April 24. I say "attempted" because women cannot be ordained Catholic priests. It is a theological impossibility. They are not priests. I just read the report of the event on the blog of "Rev. Dr. Judy Lee,
Non-profit Youth For Technology wants to encourage girls in Africa to get into science and engineering through 3D printing. The group is currently running a flexible funding campaign on Indiegogo and will use the money to help cover the costs of of buying equipment for schools. The program, called
The terrible injustice of Jerrie Cobb, who deserved to be the first female astronaut, yet never made it to space at all. There are some stories that have truly captured the collective imagination of
Ms. Popova was a member of a renowned unit of deadly female Soviet pilots called the "Night Witches" by German invaders because of the sound their plywood planes made.
Narendra Modi's BJP has won a massive election victory in India - the first time any party has secured an outright majority since the Congress Party won in 1984 after the assassination of Indira Gandhi
Grace on the Margins: If the church allows married men into the priesthood, they will be a certain kind of man, opposed to full equality for women.
A total of 147 women came to Virginia between 1620 and 1622. By 1624, fewer than 18 %, 230 of the 1,240 Europeans were adult women (Brown 1996, page 82). 1691 still found a 3 to 2 ratio, and the gap between the numbers of men and women didn't close until the early 18th century.