April 8, 2009 | Read Time: 1 minute
If you could start a new charity program, what would it be?
For Alanna Shaikh, an expert in global health who blogs at Blood and Milk, such a dream effort would focus exclusively on solving the easiest problems around the world, the “low-hanging fruit in relief and development.”
“There are a million little ideas we all run into, that don’t fit with any expressed donor priorities, but would so obviously make a useful difference in the world,” she writes. “LHF [Low Hanging Fruit] would work on those. We’d document everything to pieces, so it would also serve as research on what works.”
The project’s focus on simple solutions would probably make it an easier sell to donors, she writes. “A Hippo roller or better irrigation is an easy sell, and easy to illustrate in photographs.”
“I’m not arguing that these kinds of quick fixes are the answer to the world’s problems; far from it,” she says. “International development needs long-term approaches to major structural problems. But sometimes a Band-Aid helps heal your wound faster, and it’s frustrating to see someone hurting when a five-cent piece of glass and gauze could make a difference.”
Among the specific ideas she proposes: enclosing drainage ditches to prevent evaporation and seepage; distributing PlayPumps and Hippo rollers that transport water easily; and teaching parents how to make oral rehydration salts at home.
She says that any large international group could establish a “low-hanging fruit” fund to advance such ideas.
What do you think of her proposal?
