Do you want to use multimedia, online or offline tools to advance your cause creatively and effectively? Would you like to reach the broadest possible audience? Do you want to create and distribute audio programmes, comic books, posters and newsletters? What about setting up a website or a blog to champion your issue? Message-in-a-Box can be used as a resource for any citizen-based journalism work. Combining tools and the tactics to use them is a great way to put technology in context. Tools are only effective if they are matched with effective planning and good strategies and when they are matched with skills and resources. Message-in-a-Box delivers information on doing all this.
Useful Resources
Message-in-a-Box: Media toolkit for non-governmental organisations
Tactical Technology Collective: 2009
Quick ‘n Easy Guide to Online Advocacy
Tactical Technology Collective: 2009
This guide presents advocates with a collection of popular online services that can be used for advocacy quickly with little to no technical support. There are services for publishing photographs and video, for setting up a campaign blog or for using mobiles to communicate in a group. An amazing amount of functionality and tools are available simply by connecting to the internet and opening up a web browser. You don't need to have a lot of technical expertise to try some of these. You also don't need much money, as these services are offered at low or no cost. They require a broadband connection and are not recommended for dial-up connections. Advocates can easily and quickly connect, gather information and distribute powerful messages by utilising these services, while the majority of technology is out of sight. This guide presents use of these services from a Northern perspective, though it has tried to present alternative services popular in different regions and languages.
Using maps for advocacy: A manual
Tactical Technology Collective: 2009
This booklet is an effective guide to using maps in advocacy. The mapping process for advocacy is explained vividly through case studies, descriptions of procedures and methods, a review of data sources and a glossary of mapping terminology. Scattered through the booklet are links to websites that afford a glance at a few prolific mapping efforts. Hosting a map on your website can now become a reality as the guide takes you through the specifics of the process. Examples of valuable data sources, like youtube, facebook, flickr and socialight, have been cited, along with a brief outline of their mapping features. The fold-out offers an illustrative sketch of the inside story, while the fold-in explains a swift and easy method to create a map. The purpose of the booklet is to enable advocacy groups explore the potential of maps to effectively send out their message.
EG4Health Newsletter
EG4Health Newsletter 1, 1 April 2009
The new movement, Economic Governance for Health (EG4Health) promises to be a useful resource for health activists. Its launch coincided with protests and campaigns across the world and involving hundreds of thousands of people angry at the evidence of global financial mismanagement, corruption and rising economic inequalities. A 'Put People First' march in London, host of the G20 meeting, was supported by over 150 civil society organisations. EG4Health presents a 12-point plan for democratic economic governance, as well as a more detailed policy paper, included in this edition of the EQUINET newsletter.
International Drug Price Indicator Guide, 2008
Management Sciences for Health, 2009
Management Sciences for Health (MSH) has published the International Drug Price Indicator Guide since 1986 and updates it annually. The guide contains a spectrum of prices from pharmaceutical suppliers, international development organisations and government agencies. It aims to make price information more widely available in order to improve procurement of medicines of assured quality for the lowest possible price. Comparative price information is important for getting the best price, and this is an essential reference for anyone involved in the procurement of pharmaceuticals. This 2008 version is their latest update and has just been released.
New website: African Food Security Urban Network (AFSUN)
AFSUN was established in 2008 as a network of African and international universities, non-governmental and community organizations, and municipal governance networks. It aims to improve the knowledge base on urban food security in Africa; to build African human resource capacity and expertise in food security policy and management; to develop and advocate policy options to improve the environment within which households make decisions about food security; and to grow the capacity of community change agents to plan, implement and evaluate food security projects and programmes. AFSUN also recognises the critical importance of the global food system and the links between town and countryside in affecting the food security of urban populations in Africa.
Nutrition, Food Security and HIV: A Compendium of Promising Practices
FANTA: 2009
Increasingly, countries in east, central, and southern Africa are integrating nutrition and food security interventions into HIV services. As the number, variety and reach of these programmes expand, identification and documentation of promising practices become valuable in order to help understand what works, to replicate successful approaches and to incorporate lessons into programmes. The Regional Centre for Quality of Health Care (RCQHC) in Uganda and the FANTA Project organised extensive in-country reviews by local teams of nutrition, food security and HIV programmes in Kenya, Malawi, Tanzania, Uganda and Zambia. Nutrition, Food Security and HIV: A Compendium of Promising Practices compiles, analyses and describes the promising practices identified through the reviews.
Working with young women: Empowerment, rights and health
Ricardo C: Instituto PROMUNDO, 2009
Although there has been a significant amount of work done to promote women’s empowerment, most of it has been geared towards the experiences of adult women. This manual, part of an initiative called Program M, includes a series of group educational activities to promote young women’s awareness about gender inequities, rights and health. It also seeks to develop their skills to feel more capable of acting in empowered ways in different spheres of their lives. All the activities draw on an experiential learning model in which young women are encouraged to question and analyse their own experiences and lives, in order to understand how gender can perpetuate unequal power in relationships, making young women and men vulnerable to sexual and reproductive health problems, including HIV/AIDS.
Directory of Grants and Fellowships in the Global Health Sciences
Fogarty International Center for Advanced Study in Health Sciences
This resource guide contains a comprehensive compilation of international funding opportunities in biomedical and behavioral research, separated by category.
Regional Capacity Building Partners: Short courses for 2009
Regional Capacity Building Partners (RECABIP)
The Regional Capacity Building Partners (RECABIP) is a network of professional organisations and individuals who have combined their skills and experience to explore cost-effective ways of strengthening the response to HIV and AIDS, Climate Change, Governance and Leadership issues, among other development concerns. It does this through tailored capacity building workshops, seminars, symposia, conferences and consultancy services. Their professionals have an average of 15 years experience in designing, implementing, monitoring and evaluating HIV and AIDS, Climate Change, Governance and Leadership programmes. For a programme of short courses offered by the network in 2009, visit their website. You also can register online on their website.