2013 Annual Letter from Bill Gates

In previous annual letters, Gates focused on the power of innovation to reduce hunger, poverty, and disease. But any innovation -- whether it's a new vaccine or an improved seed -- can't have an impact unless it reaches the people who will benefit from it. That's why in this year's letter, Gates discusses how innovations in measurement are critical to finding new, effective ways to deliver these tools and services to the clinics, family farms, and classrooms that need them.The Foundation is supporting these efforts, but more needs to be done. Given how tight budgets are around the world, governments are rightfully demanding effectiveness in the programs they pay for. To address these demands, we need better measurement tools to determine which approaches work and which do not. In this letter, Gates highlights strong examples from the past year of how measurement is making a difference. In Colorado, Melinda and Bill learned how a school district is pioneering a new system to measure and promote teacher effectiveness. In Ethiopia, Gates witnessed how a poor country, pursuing goals set by the United Nations, delivered better health services to its people. In Nigeria, the digital revolution has allowed the foundation to improve the use of measurement in the campaign to eradicate polio. Thanks to cell phones, satellites, and cheap sensors, data can be gathered and organized with increasing speed and accuracy

Innovation With Impact: Financing 21st Century Development

Leadership from the G20 is critically important right now. The global economic situation is as fragile as it has been at any time in the past 50 years. As leaders of the G20, you face a difficult challenge: How do you resolve the immediate crisis while continuing to make smart investments in long-term growth and improved living conditions?During my lifetime, innovations in business, science, and technology have energized the global market economy in unprecedented ways. The world economy is 500 percent bigger than in 1960. Whole groups of countries that had been at the margins have become key drivers of growth. Their success is widely viewed as a miracle.This progress has benefited everyone, not just the richest. You can see progress in the rising Gross Domestic Product (GDP) of many countries around the world. You can also see it in falling poverty rates and other quality-of-life indicators captured in the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), established by world leaders in 2000 and agreed to by all G20 nations

DESAIN RUANG MUSIK CERDAS UNTUK FASILITAS PENDIDIKAN MUSIK INKLUSIF DISABILITAS NETRA

Anak dengan disabilitas netra mengalami keterbatasan indera penglihatannya tetapi sebaliknya memiliki kelebihan pada aspek lainnya di antaranya ialah kemampuan bermusik. Kemampuan music terbangun karena karena kuatnya daya ingat, intuisi, dan kepekaannya. Berbagai artis seperti Stevie Wonder, Ray Charles, Andrea Bocelli, dan Yoo Ye Eun merupakan pemusik yang terkenal dengan disabilitas netra. Sebuah ruangan music yang dirancang konsep desain inklusi akan memiliki dampak yang luar biasa bagi pengembangan kemampuan musik para disabilitas netra. Ruangan musik berbentuk persegi dengan tatanan tempat duduk berbentuk setengah lingkaran telah didesain untuk membantu para anak – anak dengan disabilitas netra dan anak – anak umum lainnya. Ruangan ini didesain secara inklusif dengan mengambil kurikulum dari Yamaha Music School dan Yayasan Pendidikan Anak-Anak Buta (YPAB). Teknologi juga ditambahkan pada desain ruang musik yang inklusif dengan penerapan Wiimote dan laptop di tengah ruangan untuk mendukung latihan anak-anak.Sementara itu warna interior juga didesain dengan warna dasar merah karena warna tersebut paling cepat ditangkap mata dan dikenali oleh anak-anak. Selain itu warna merah mampu memberikan energi, membangkitkan selera, kegairahan, emosi, semangat yang membara. Desain ruang ini juga didesain dengan prinsip kesetaraan dengan tidak ada perbedaan elevasi pada ruangan dan lebar koridor yang cukup lebar. Selain itu juga disediakan signage dengan huruf braile dan huruf biasa, hand rail dan guiding path sederhana dan intuitif untuk membantuk orientasi anak. Desain ruangan ini juga menggunakan material gypsum dan accourette board, material lantai yang tidak licin seperti kayu dan karpet yang mengurangi gangguan akustik dan meningkatkan keamanan

Empty rituals? A qualitative study of users’ experience of monitoring & evaluation systems in HIV interventions in western India

In global health initiatives, particularly in the context of private philanthropy and its ‘business minded’ approach, detailed programme data plays an increasing role in informing assessments, improvements, evaluations, and ultimately continuation or discontinuation of funds for individual programmes. The HIV/AIDS literature predominantly treats monitoring as unproblematic. However, the social science of audit and indicators emphasises the constitutive power of indicators, noting that their effects at a grassroots level are often at odds with the goals specified in policy. This paper investigates users' experiences of Monitoring and Evaluation (M&E) systems in the context of HIV interventions in western India. Six focus groups (totalling 51 participants) were held with employees of 6 different NGOs working for government or philanthropy-funded HIV interventions for sex workers in western India. Ten donor employees were interviewed. Thematic analysis was conducted. NGO employees described a major gap between what they considered their “real work” and the indicators used to monitor it. They could explain the official purposes of M&E systems in terms of programme improvement and financial accountability. More cynically, they valued M&E experience on their CVs and the rhetorical role of data in demonstrating their achievements. They believed that inappropriate and unethical means were being used to meet targets, including incentives and coercion, and criticised indicators for being misleading and inflexible. Donor employees valued the role of M&E in programme improvement, financial accountability, and professionalising NGO-donor relationships. However, they were suspicious that NGOs might be falsifying data, criticised the insensitivity of indicators, and complained that data were under-used. For its users, M& E appears an ‘empty ritual’, enacted because donors require it, but not put to local use. In this context, monitoring is constituted as an instrument of performance management rather than as a means of rational programme improvement

A Systematic Review of Mosquito Coils and Passive Emanators: Defining Recommendations for Spatial Repellency Testing Methodologies.

Mosquito coils, vaporizer mats and emanators confer protection against mosquito bites through the spatial action of emanated vapor or airborne pyrethroid particles. These products dominate the pest control market; therefore, it is vital to characterize mosquito responses elicited by the chemical actives and their potential for disease prevention. The aim of this review was to determine effects of mosquito coils and emanators on mosquito responses that reduce human-vector contact and to propose scientific consensus on terminologies and methodologies used for evaluation of product formats that could contain spatial chemical actives, including indoor residual spraying (IRS), long lasting insecticide treated nets (LLINs) and insecticide treated materials (ITMs). PubMed, (National Centre for Biotechnology Information (NCBI), U.S. National Library of Medicine, NIH), MEDLINE, LILAC, Cochrane library, IBECS and Armed Forces Pest Management Board Literature Retrieval System search engines were used to identify studies of pyrethroid based coils and emanators with key-words "Mosquito coils" "Mosquito emanators" and "Spatial repellents". It was concluded that there is need to improve statistical reporting of studies, and reach consensus in the methodologies and terminologies used through standardized testing guidelines. Despite differing evaluation methodologies, data showed that coils and emanators induce mortality, deterrence, repellency as well as reduce the ability of mosquitoes to feed on humans. Available data on efficacy outdoors, dose-response relationships and effective distance of coils and emanators is inadequate for developing a target product profile (TPP), which will be required for such chemicals before optimized implementation can occur for maximum benefits in disease control

Towards malaria elimination - a new thematic series

The launch of a new thematic series of Malaria Journal -- "Towards malaria elimination" -- creates the forum that allows carrying scientific evidence on how to achieve malaria elimination in specific endemic settings and conditions into the circles of scientists, public health specialists, national and global programme managers, funders and decision makers

Payment instruments, finance and development

This paper studies the effects of a payment technology innovation (mobile money) on entrepreneurship and economic development in a quantitative dynamic general equilibrium model. In the model mobile money dominates fiat money as a medium of exchange, since it avoids the risk of theft, but comes with electronic transaction costs. We show that entrepreneurs with higher productivity and access to trade credit are more likely to adopt mobile money as a payment instrument vis-a-vis suppliers. Calibrating the stationary equilibrium of the model to match firm-level data from Kenya, we show significant quantitative implications of mobile money for entrepreneurial growth and macroeconomic development

Publisher Correction:Voices of biotech leaders (Nature Biotechnology, (2021), 39, 6, (654-660), 10.1038/s41587-021-00941-4)

In the version of this article initially published, an author name was given as Abasi Ene Abong. The correct name is Abasi Ene-Obong. Also, the affiliation for Sebastian Giwa was given as Elevian, Pagliuca Harvard Life Lab, Allston, MA, USA. The correct affiliations are Biostasis Research Institute, Berkeley, CA, USA; Sylvatica Biotech, North Charleston, SC, USA; and Humanity Bio, Kensington, CA, USA. An affiliation for Jeantine Lunshof was given as Department of Genetics, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA. The correct affiliation is Wyss Institute for Biological Engineering, Harvard University, Boston, MA, USA. The errors have been corrected in the PDF and HTML versions of the article

Voices of biotech leaders

Nature Biotechnology asks a selection of leaders from across biotech to look at the future of the sector and make some predictions for the coming years