I’m mobile now – finally bought myself a scooter (see pic), so now every morning rather than negotiating with a taxi driver I just get on my scooter, drive along the corniche and into town. Its only about ten minutes into the office, and so long as the rain holds off (which it has so far), very pleasant, with nice views of the Atlantic ocean off to my right. Just have to be aware of the trafiic around me – apparently my scooter has a special feature which makes me completely invisible to taxi drivers! After work I can drive straight from the office to the club Atlantique for a swim, before going home again along the corniche, with views of the sun setting over the ocean.
In the office I have been working on getting some of the projects moving. The main work this week has been on a Food Voucher programme. This is a relatively new initiative for WFP – rather than distributing food, the idea is to give those in need vouchers which can be exchanged for food at local stores. This can be useful where the problem is high food prices rather than lack of food. One of the advantages of this approach is that it can help stabilize and inject liquidity into the local economy, and can also offer cost savings as there is no need to transport large quantities of food across what are often long distances. A number of pilot programmes have been run and it is expected that this will become an increasingly important way of distributing aid to those in need. I have been looking at how IT can support these programmes, as there are no real solutions available at the moment.
Ramadan starts at the weekend – either on Saturday or Sunday, depending on sightings of the moon. Of course this means that the local Muslims (by far the majority of the population here) will be fasting during the day, so I would imagine the atmosphere will be quite different.
Despite being here in Francophone West Africa where cricket is completely unknown , I’ve been able to follow the Ashes series as well, via TMS on the internet. Apologies to any readers who don't know what cricket is, and also to any Autsralians reading this (Salma?) - but right now listening to a frankly unbelievable comeback by England following the dismal performance in the last test – at this rate they’re actually in danger of winning the series.
In the office I have been working on getting some of the projects moving. The main work this week has been on a Food Voucher programme. This is a relatively new initiative for WFP – rather than distributing food, the idea is to give those in need vouchers which can be exchanged for food at local stores. This can be useful where the problem is high food prices rather than lack of food. One of the advantages of this approach is that it can help stabilize and inject liquidity into the local economy, and can also offer cost savings as there is no need to transport large quantities of food across what are often long distances. A number of pilot programmes have been run and it is expected that this will become an increasingly important way of distributing aid to those in need. I have been looking at how IT can support these programmes, as there are no real solutions available at the moment.
Ramadan starts at the weekend – either on Saturday or Sunday, depending on sightings of the moon. Of course this means that the local Muslims (by far the majority of the population here) will be fasting during the day, so I would imagine the atmosphere will be quite different.
Despite being here in Francophone West Africa where cricket is completely unknown , I’ve been able to follow the Ashes series as well, via TMS on the internet. Apologies to any readers who don't know what cricket is, and also to any Autsralians reading this (Salma?) - but right now listening to a frankly unbelievable comeback by England following the dismal performance in the last test – at this rate they’re actually in danger of winning the series.
Paul - thanks for the Ashes reminder. I prefer not to dwell on the past but instead look to the future. No sour grapes here..
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