Audrey and Ella accpeting the cash prize at the 2009 Tech Awards from category sponsor, Judy Swanson.

In November 2009, we received a $50k cash prize at the Tech Awards for the Fair Wage Guide project. The winners were announced before an audience of 1500 people at a black-tie gala at the San Jose Convention Center. When our category sponsor, Judy Swanson, announced that we were the winner of the cash prize, it felt as if the world literally paused for half a second. I could feel my emotions getting the best of me, and as we approached the stage, I literally had to wipe the tears from my eyes and take a few deep breaths. We were given 60 seconds to make an acceptance speech, and I pray we remembered to thank everyone who has helped us over the past four years. There have been many organizations and people who have supported our work, and we cannot thank you enough for everything you have done for us! We share this prize with you!

In addition, an amazing filmmaker, Sandy Smolan, was hired to make 90 second videos of all the laureates’ projects. You can check out our video and our fellow equality laureates’ videos here.

As a 2009 Laureate for the Fair Wage Guide Project, we are in the running to win a $50,000 cash prize. Prize laureates will be announced at a gala on November 19 at the convention center in San Jose. In addition, Al Gore will be at the event accepting the 2009 Global Humanitarian Award. We are psyched to be recognized for our work!

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By Jon Axtell

How do we create effective social enterprises that reach to the core constituencies that need them most? Working with supply chains and logistics for 2 years, one thinks about how you can improve processes to be both more efficient but more importantly, more effective. This was at the forefront of my mind when I first attended SOCAP08 and it’s for this reason that I enjoyed speaking with Ella Silverman of World Of Good Development Organizationabout SOCAP09 this week. She focused primarily on effectively representing informal workers who are often overlooked by investors and supply chain managers. On an even bigger scale, she stressed the importance of building new corporate structures that grease and ease the capital and process flows of a social enterprise like World of Good Development Organization.

World of Good Development Organization has partnered with over 700 businesses and NGOs to increase wages for low-income homeworkers, especially women in 61 developing world countries leading to increased earnings for more than 25,000 workers by, on average, 20 percent.

Former TransFair fair trade chocolate program manager, Ella Silverman eventually joined the partnership with eBay to launch WorldofGood.com = “to create market opportunities for people and planet positive products.” She is now Executive Director of World of Good Development Organization (501c3), the sister non-profit of World of Good, Inc. Together these organizations form a hybrid enterprise that allows each entity to act in its own interests, while mutually supporting one another at key junctures to reinforce the overarching goal of large-scale poverty alleviation. Ella Silverman had a lot to say about the way in which World of Good Development Organization fits into the Social Capital spectrum and why she is anticipating her time at SOCAP09.

Q: Where do you see World of Good Development Agency fitting into the Social Capital MarketLandscape?

Ella Silverman: When we talk about Social Investments we need to talk about suppliers. Many organizations have standards for formal workers, but many do not represent informal workers. Informal workers play a major role in supply chains and we need to look closely at how our investments influence these individuals workers. Informal workers may be clothing makers, handicraft workers, or help to create other consumer goods. At World of Good Development Organization we seek to be a voice for the informal worker and seek to create real metrics that support these workers. We looked at Fair Trade standards for the non-commodities sector and created our own metrics for evaluation. We look at wages, the time it takes workers to create a good, their inputs, and help the investor measure the informal-workers working standards.

Q: What made you want to come to SOCAP09?

The thing I saw as different about SOCAP09 was that it wasn’t about baby-steps forward towards change, it was about a real push forward. The people and organizations involved in the movement are innovators and have the ability to influence the direction of the future. The way I view SOCAP09 is that it is a movement coupled with an industry.

Q: What questions do you hope to see raised at SOCAP09?

The painfully obvious question that I think we all have is, how will the recession influence the future? Launching into next year, what impact does the recession have on the way we do things?

Another topic that is on my mind, and on the mind of many others is how we will resolve the issues of social enterprise formation. World of Good has been a flagship for hybrid models and has worked hard to search for sustainable methods for dealing with the current legal situation for social enterprises. I’m very interested in hearing about new developments in corporate structuring because we all know this has to change. “

So why am I going to SOCAP09? I’m going so that I can be a part of the movement Ella Silverman spoke of.  The Social Capital Markets movement finds its effectiveness and efficiency in the fact that it is not just a fad, but a real industry that is developing rapidly.Join Ella Silverman, Martin Fisher of Kickstart, Scott Leonard of Indigenous Designs, and Wes Selke of Good Capital as they lead a panel titled “Supply Chains: How Do You Make Sure the Value Goes all the Way Down?” on day 2 of SOCAP09.

In this economy, companies are reigning in their spending on CSR. Money that is devoted to CSR is focused on ways to cut costs by investing in environmental projects that improve building performance etc. I think it is great that brands are looking at their environmental impact, but I don’t think it should be at the detriment of worker’s rights.

While I do think there is heightened awareness around wage issues for workers, I don’t’ think it is on the top of any agendas. This doesn’t have to be the case. I think that if brands really weigh the benefits of paying people fairly with improved efficiency and worker performance, they will see that they might actually be able to equate profits with social responsibility.

Last year, we received seed funding to start a living wage project, in an effort to standardize the calculation of living wages. We are in the process of raising more funds for this project and hope to have something launched by Q1 of 2010.

As you read stories of workers who could go from poverty to a basic standard of living by earning just one extra dollar a day, it is hard to ignore the living wage issue, even in this economy. The article is a great read and really puts things into perspective.

In a survey, home-based garment workers in Lucknow reported that whereas earlier they would get Rs 10 for a dress, now it is reduced to Rs 8. And for a good zardozi sari, they would get Rs 4,000 to Rs 5,000 for a month’s work, but now they could get only Rs 1,500 – the equivalent of approximately $1 (US) a day.

Check out the full story for additional details about how the economic recession is affecting informal workers, most of whom are women, in India.

Both bead producers were extremely interested with my project’s findings. In fact, one called it “magic” to be able to know this much about his business. I think I talked at length in my last entry about how helpful the analysis will be if implemented properly so I won’t spend too much more time on that. However, I wanted to mention how much more important and realistic this all feels now that the bead producers will be using this information when negotiating with buyers.

The project is no longer some theoretical experiment. It has the potential to significantly improve these businesses and ensure that they are around for the long term, which bodes extremely well for their employees who depend on the businesses for their livelihoods.

Their biggest surprise to the costing/pricing analysis was the number of products that were being sold for negative profits. As I mentioned last week, this is a common reaction for artisans that lack a good understanding of overhead costs and how these costs relate to prices.
Most think their businesses are humming along just fine because they don’t factor in the resources that are being spent to cover their overhead. Once this becomes part of the equation, however, it is quite clear that prices are set too low.

But the million dollar question then becomes can the market absorb these higher prices? Because if it can’t, the obstacles confronting these producers become much larger. Reducing costs, and in particular overhead costs, is not an easy task and generally requires sacrificing aspects of the business that make the products attractive in the first place. For example, a business built on producing quality products finds it quite difficult to use lower quality materials. In other cases, reducing overhead costs is near impossible. Such is the case for firewood in the production of glass beads. As the cost of firewood rises with higher rates of deforestation, what is the bead maker to do for an input this irreplaceable?

Luckily, both producers think that there is room in the export market to increase prices. Even though both followed this answer up with stories of buyers driving down prices in order to cut their own costs, they started to see the practical use of having the costing analysis in regard to negotiating better prices with buyers. See, even though it may seem like most buyers from developed countries engage in predatory pricing strategies to take advantage of uninformed artisans, what’s closer to the truth is that buyers generally are just as clueless about artisan costs as the artisans themselves and therefore offer prices that result in negative profits for the artisans.
However, now that these two producers have a thorough understanding of their costs, they can use the negotiation process to educate buyers, which hopefully will result in higher prices. The issue of increasing prices starts to become a problem once we consider the local market for recycled glass beads. With most producers in the market operating at significant losses already, there is no room for a single producer or two to increase prices because it would result in a migration of consumers towards the lower price producers. However, again, the opportunity exists for my two bead makers (who happen to be the largest in Ghana) to educate other local producers about the importance of incorporating their overhead costs into their pricing so that their businesses can be sustainable over the long term. Both producers had countless stories of smaller local bead makers succumbing to market pressures and lowering their prices, only to find themselves in debt and out of work several months later.
These examples demonstrate a tremendous need for business education within the Ghanaian bead-making industry. The craft has the potential to be a significant source of income and empowerment for many local producers, but currently is not being exploited to its fullest extent due to poor pricing strategies. Basically, as businesses, these operations are not sustainable and therefore are not serving as a vehicle for poverty reduction. As a result, the hope is that effective knowledge transfer will occur between the larger and smaller producers, which would benefit the entire industry and increase its chances for future success.

I wish I was able to stay in Ghana for another few months or so to be able to see this aspect of the project through to completion. However, I am counting on strong leadership and open-minded participants to improve the current state of the recycled glass bead industry in Ghana.

Next week, I’ll finally get to the fair trade aspect of this project and report on my findings using the Fair Wage Guide with these two producers.

See you then.

Philip Buchanan – Fair Wage Guide Fellow 2008 (Ghana)
www.fairwageguide.org

this is a culture devoted to handicrafts…and ceremonies – there are at least three ceremonies scheduled for the area during my 10-day stay.

The Balinese seem to be great at using natural sources to make their products.  Driving through a small village near Tabanan, I noticed piles and piles of discarded coconut shells.  It looked like junk and anywhere else it might have been just that.  However, my wonderful hosts from Mitra Bali informed me they were used to heat the kiln for the ceramics producer we were visiting.  This was the only “garbage” I saw on the roadside for most of the ride through the village.

The story of the producer is interesting (at least to me).  He used make clay roof tiles, like everyone else in his village, and struggled to support his family.  Working with Mitra Bali, he took a chance on ceramic homewares and decorative items AND on fair trade.  When his business started to grow, he hired workers and experimented with new designs.  After 14 years, he now has 50 employees, over half of which are women.  He pays all his employees salaries, gives them paid sick days and holidays, offers overtime, and gives one-hour lunch breaks so the women can go home and make food for their families.  His workshop is relaxed and at the same time efficient – very Balinese.  Mitra Bali refers to him as a model for all their producers.   Here’s what struck me about this gentleman.  He is a true entrepreneur.  We spent two hours at his shop and in that time he showed us at least five new designs he created, and after a 30 minute brainstorm session with Mitra Bali’s designer Adi, he had a few more already started by the time we left.  I was impressed, but not surprised at his drive.

On my first full day here, I visited a producer who uses recycled materials and leaves from his garden to create photo frames, notebooks and boxes.  His family and a few workers create these beautiful pieces at his home.  But don’t be fooled, this is a real business.  He pays his workers salaries, offers sick days, and even supplies breakfast and lunch.  He worked with Mitra Bali to determine a fair salary for his workers.  When I asked him about costing, he had the numbers for each type of material he used.  When we talked about his wage calculation, he was clear on the steps that lead him to salaries.  It wasn’t completely accurate, but it seemed like a step in the right direction.  By the way, he too had already come up with a few new designs to show us – he definitely has a designer’s heart.

One thing to note – both producers said their workers requested monthly salaries.  This helps them save money more easily, as they are not spending it on a daily basis.

Tomorrow I am off to visit a fair trade village and the most scared temple in Bali.  My hosts insist that I combine work with some fun exploring every day – yesterday, we started our day in the very small village of Tabanan (with no street signs or even addresses) and ended the day on the beach in Kuta, the busiest spot in Bali.

For the rest of my trip, I am staying in Ubud, the cultural center of Bali.  And I am excited to not see a Starbucks for the rest of my stay here!

I left Delhi on Wednesday, amidst the scent of diesel fuel and the metalic hiss of jet engines.  I used the two hour flight to nap away some of my anxiety—what would this new place bring?  Yes, I was ready to leave Delhi, but was I ready to face another new city, alone again?

I awoke above Bhubaneswar.  Delhi’s iron grip on my stomach loosened as I surveyed the toy city through foggy windows—this place was green.  The buildings appeared as small, dusty-colored rectangles, like faded packages of chewing gum arranged on a lawn.

I walked off the plane into a curtain of humidity and fell in love with Bhubaneswar.  Bright palms and scrubby greens smiled across the tarmac in the wet sun.  The stares in the airport were friendly and curious, rather than suspicious or antagonistic, as they had felt in Delhi.  An enthusiastic taxi driver helped me with my bags, and we drove through Bhubaneswar.

The air carries some scent I can’t quite wrap my memory around—like lavender, mint, and moist tree bark.  Gone are the constant gusts of exhaust and claustrophobic concrete of Delhi.  The earth here is red.  Alongside the road, wide, motherly palms stand affably next to elegant eucalyptis trees.  I caught glimpses of Bhubaneswar’s streets:  cows lying placidly in the center of the road amidst honking traffic, chewing their cud introspectively.  People in colorful fabric building structures out of long, straight poles.  Men selling fragrant food out of oversized aluminum cannisters.  Mangoes piled in neat pyramids by the roadside.  My flickering impressions from the drive revealled that poverty exists in rural India as well as urban.  But on a smaller, slower scale, the sense of scarcity doesn’t feel as frantic, nor the struggle as impossible, as it did in Delhi.

I have come to Bhubaneswar, first of all, to work with ORUPA (Orissa Rural and Urban Producer’s Association).  ORUPA is a fair trade umbrella organization that acts as both a capacity-building partner and a marketing agent for 109 member organizations, among them NGOs, handicrafts cooperatives, and independent artisan workshops.  Training them on the Fair Wage Guide would be a new challenge for me:  since ORUPA mostly sells to the domestic Indian market, they’d never heard of World of Good or the FWG before I contacted them—so I would be starting from scratch.
I had another reason to come to Bhubaneswar:  my mother, her parents, and her brother and sister lived here for several years in the mid-1960′s.  My grandfather was invited to come to Bhubaneswar on a USAID contract, acting as an advisor at Orissa University of Agriculture and Technology (OUAT).  So in 1963, my very-Midwestern family packed trunks of clothing, kitchen appliances, and Christmas decorations, and moved to Bhubaneswar, then more of a village than a city.  For five years my grandparents lived here with their children, adapting their lifestyle and habits from Columbia, Missouri to the realities of rural India.  The stories I grew up with paint a picture of a hybrid life, sometimes makeshift in its day-to-day solutions, and often poignant and comical in its surprising cultural mix-ups, like the time when the cook tried to wash the paper plates after a picnic, or the time when the housekeeper was found politely worshiping the cardboard Santa that had been left temporarily sitting inside a mock fireplace.  My grandmother proved to be a creative, adaptable homemaker, and the staff that ran their household proved equally adaptable and patient, learning to prepare strange American foods and procuring imported items like butter from far-away city emporiums.  Since I was a child, I have imagined coming to this place and finding remnants of these stories myself.

The day after my arrival, I visited the house where my family had lived and the campus of OUAT.  I hadn’t expected an emotional experience, but tears welled up as I searched the drab concrete walls of their former house (now a bank) and the breezy, dusty walkways of the university’s open-air campus for something—I don’t know what—a tiny scrap or echo of my grandparents, my mother, her siblings.  Uncertain what I was looking for, I wandered through the market, touching fabric and bell metal bowls and woven mats that did not seem to contain my mother’s stories.  By the afternoon, my malaria pills had spun me into a haze of loneliness and nausea.  Wondering how I could feel both so connected to Bhubaneswar’s past and so remote from its present, I was about to return to my hotel when I remembered the English bookshop.  My mother visited Bhubaneswar ten years ago and met the bookshop’s owner, a kind man who then introduced her to someone who remembered my grandfather.  After some searching I found it: a small square shop, its shelves jammed with dusty titles.  I settled into its narrow aisles, browsing precarious, waist-high stacks of novels, textbooks, and volumes on development and politics and art.

Soon the owner approached me and I introduced myself, explaining about my mother and her visit.  He remembered her clearly and greeted me as an old friend.  With relief, I accepted his offer of a plastic chair and a bottle of mango juice, and we talked for an hour about my grandfather, Bhubaneswar’s development since the mid-60′s, Orissan handicrafts, and fair trade.  He helped me pick out several books on child labor written by Indian scholars and invited me to come to his house for dinner sometime to meet his wife and children.  I headed toward my hotel feeling like I had finally found some part of Bhubaneswar I could grasp.

The following days brought the relief of many more connections.  ORUPA’s staff was welcoming, if slightly bewildered by my visit.  My demonstration of the Fair Wage Guide was met at first with polite nods.  Do you have any questions or any critical feedback?  No, they smiled.  Doubtful, I invited them to try the tool themselves, and then I could see them beginning to grasp the tool’s complexities, as well as its usefulness.  As an organization that has only just begun to penetrate the export market, they are concerned about finding a place for traditional Orissan handicraft products in the trend-driven Western consumer market.  The idea of measuring the time it takes to make a product and calculating a wage accordingly was new to them, but their ideas about transparency in fair trade, the necessity of design modification, and the importance of paying artisans a living wage predisposed them to be receptive to the Fair Wage Guide.  After two days in their office, I have the impression that, although they are too busy to run time samples on most of their products immediately, they have absorbed the training well and will begin to use the tool as they develop new products.

They offered to take me to visit several of their member organizations, so on Friday I drove with their Director of Promotion to visit a training program in a village outside of Bhubaneswar.  The ride to the training workshop was like a high-speed chase scene in an action flick—the driver skidded in and out of traffic at breakneck speed, greedily overtaking every vehicle in our path and several times veering across the median strip into the opposite lane and dodging oncoming traffic.  He toggled the horn with both thumbs in rapid succession as he accelerated around buses and auto-rickshaws and cows lying in the road, reminding me of a child with a video game controller, pressing all the buttons at once.  I calculated the probability that my life would end in this car (fairly high because this guy was completely crazy?  or fairly low because this was clearly the way he always drives, and he, after all, was still alive…)  Feeling my colleague’s glance, I tried for a serene expression as we pulled up to the workshop and I unclenched my white-knuckled hand from the door.

The training workshop is one of many affiliated with ORUPA, revealling that it is as much a capacity-building enterprise as a sales intermediary.  Artisans can enroll in 6-month programs to be trained in skills like wood painting, golden grass weaving, and embroidery.  Today we visited an orphanage that trains its older children in craft techniques so that when they are old enough to leave school, they have the vocational skill to become artisans.  The orphanage’s staff welcomed me warmly, feeding me my umpteenth cup of sweet, creamy tea and showing me the clean, airy rooms where the children sleep and go to school.  They spoke of their work in tones both serious and heartfelt—these are people who have devoted their lives to these abandoned children.  The orphanage itself is lovely—the building is well-cared-for and is surrounded by  stands of palm trees and a lush valley of fields and hills where the children play.   It was a beautiful example of the right way to run a home for abandoned children, and I promised to return in a year or two and stay with them.

In between my visits with ORUPA, I spent the weekend sightseeing and drinking in the beauty of the countryside around Bhubaneswar.  The grimy office of the Orissa Tourism Development Corporation welcomed me Saturday morning with loud electric fans and a ridiculously cheap ticket for two days of touring Bhubaneswar’s temples, the nearby Khandagiri Caves, and Nandankanan Zoo, as well as Pipli (home of the famous Orissan applique embroidery) and the coastal towns of Konark and Puri.  Some striking moments from my two days on the tour bus surface from memory—

I saw a majestic white tiger in the tiny zoo, hemmed in only by a chainlink fence.  Beyond him stretched the tawny tall-grassed expanse where he might have lived before his capture, making it feel merely accidental that he was on the inside of the cage.

An elephant paused lazily in the pathway of the zoo with its keeper and, at my tour guide’s suggestion, I posed for a picture.   As I smiled for the camera, I suddenly felt the thick hairs and leathery skin of the elephant’s trunk wind companionably around my neck.  In the photo my eyes are closed and I am giggling uncontrollably.

Outside the zoo, I tried not to blush as 40 people stopped their conversations and stared.  A sign read “HONEY PICKLE SQUASH TOMATO SAUCE.”  At a small stand, a butterfly alighted on the top of a 7-Up bottle.  I bought a bottle of water whose seal turned out to be broken, a sure sign that it had been refilled with tap water by its resourceful purveyor.

I climbed to the top of the Khandagiri Caves.  Tinny, sliding music floated up from the town below.  From my rocky perch, I could see far across scattered buildings and lush palm forests to the hazy horizon.  It was green and the air was fresh—here I could really breathe.

Next to a milky, olive-colored river, we passed a deep grassy field of cows, each one with its own companion stork, for some reason.  Tiny villages with thatched-roof huts, half-hidden by palms, flashed past the windows and were gone.  We crossed a bridge over a river where people bathed, their skin glistening wet in the sun.

The only other woman on my tour bus the first day, dressed in a fuschia sari, fell into step with me as we walked along the bank of a river and said shyly, “Nice mendi.”  The golden swirls and dots on my left palm had already faded so much I was surprised she had noticed, but, grateful for her attempt to reach out, I thanked her and we fell into conversation along with her husband.  They and their son were from Bihar.  Eager for a connection, I forged ahead:  I have been working for an NGO and have become interested in the issue of child labor in Bihar.  Blank stares.  I backtrack:  Do you work in business, sir?  Yes, he answers.  What kind of business?  The garment industry.  Ah.  Acha.  Yes.  Excellent.

Bumping down a dusty road in the tour bus, the slate-blue curtains whipping out the open windows, we passed a caravan of carts that looked like silver cribs suspended on bicycle wheels with awnings overhead, carrying huge speakers that were blasting Indian music.  A car followed close behind, covered in flowers.  A wedding procession, I was told.

On the wide, crashing beach in Puri, I paid a few rupees to be conveyed several hundred yards by an ostentatiously-decorated camel being led by its sullen owner.  As I was gallumphed down the beach, to the amusement of several large groups of Indians, I learned that there is no graceful way to ride a camel.

The second day I befriended a Belgian woman who is here working for a local NGO, an Indian man who is in training to be a government bureaucrat, and a retired Indian expat living in Chicago.  We laughed and talked and connected on topics both light and serious—they reminded me how much I have in common with people from other places, and we exchanged cards, promising to be in touch.

Tomorrow I board a plane for Bangalore, and the next day, for Kerala.  In less than two weeks I will be back in the U.S.—I can hardly believe it.   The homesickness of three days ago seems a world away now.  I have begun to love the crowded streets, the crazy driving, the colorful drape of saris, the taste of potatoes and cumin for breakfast, the warm nights, the polite sideways nodding, and the tshing tshing tshing of belled feet walking bare across the stone floor.

In the week that has bridged these two extremes, new meetings and conversations with others concerned about child labor crowded into the cracks of my schedule. A child labor activist. The head of an NGO that provides housing and education for homeless children. A media maven. A public health worker. They have brought more depth and texture into my thinking about the sweatshops I saw last week.

Some of them were surprised to hear my account and see my pictures—and some were not. We all met with Joshi from Tara Projects on Friday to discuss what, if anything, can be done. Each of us shared the impulse to want to do something tangible and immediate to help these particular children, but beyond that consensus, every idea for local, immediate action seems to yield a dead-end…

“Organize a police raid!” They’ve tried that. The police invariably arrive to find the workshops empty—the children (and especially their overseers) melt away into the maze of rooms and alleyways surrounding the workshops. Then the media reports a false alarm, or worse, it drives the operation further underground. And when they do manage to take some of the children out of the sweatshop, what to do with them? The government-run children’s shelters are few and far-between, and those that do exist are apparently in worse condition than some of these workshops.

“Call the media!” Maybe. But would this really make a new story in Delhi? In general, with the exception of Delhi’s wealthy, everyone I have told is not too surprised. And in any case, this story has been covered hundreds of times without solving the problem. How can media coverage help without the resources in place to house and rehabilitate the children?

“Send in child rescuers!” Such a thing exists—there is an NGO here that rescues children from bonded labor. But since these children come to the sweatshops at their parents’ bidding, they generally show up again in another workshop a few months after being “rescued” and brought back to their villages.

The root cause is the brutal reality of extreme poverty in the regions north and east of Delhi. An activist I spoke with ventured that these sweatshops are in good condition compared to some of the villages where the children come from. There simply isn’t enough funding for the government to support struggling families and orphaned children in these regions. In extreme cases (and there are a lot of them in Bihar), a family’s breadwinner is an eleven-year-old. If you take away their work, they and their siblings will starve—simple as that. And so my position begins to shift—from “no child labor ever” to “long-term incremental transition program away from child labor that begins with humane working conditions for all, coupled with serious efforts at economic development and educational opportunity in Bihar.” A shock of pragmatism to my rosy idealist identity.

“Okay, fine, in the immediate term, work with these sweatshop people for the sake of the children—clean up the workshops, install decent lighting and clean water, and get the kids into school for at least a few hours every day.” Great idea, but unfortunately, too blatantly illegal for many NGOs to touch it.

My mind tangled up in this catch 22, and overwhelmed by the prospect of taking any action without longer study, I and the group of NGOs I have met with are looking to Moon and Joshi and their colleagues at Tara Projects for guidance—they have been involved in the fight against child labor for many years. Depressing as the prospect might be, it seems that there is nothing immediate that I or others who are concerned can do for these children without harming their interests in the end. I will be speaking to my colleagues at Tara about it today—stay tuned. One thing is clear: some of the highest-impact work that can be done on this issue is on the consumer and corporate end. If enough consumers care, you can shift the demand away from these products and create incentives for subcontractors to ensure better working conditions and adult labor. Then you begin to create change, one workshop at a time.

These events have been set against a backdrop of heavy, wet heat. The monsoon came last week, suddenly. One minute it was hot and dry, as it had been since my arrival. And then without any warning, in a single moment, the sky opened up and rain hit the earth in one crashing, racing sheet—a downpour, lightning, and humid, humid heat flowing in the windows. I didn’t know how dramatic it would be! It has come and gone all week, tempering the air.

This week I worked with Anita and her colleagues at Conserve India, an innovative fair trade organization that focuses on environmental issues as well as paying fair wages. They have developed a recycling program that allows them to convert thousands of kilos of abandoned plastic bags into a unique recycled fabric and then tailor interesting, functional bags out of the material. I visited the “workshop” where they wash and sort the plastic bags. Conserve has chosen to employ some of the most economically disadvantaged people in Delhi: the “rag-pickers.” These people normally make their living by picking through heaps of trash, looking for odds and ends to sell (generally for cruelly low prices). In Conserve’s case, the people are paid a fair wage to find and sort used plastic bags. They are given gloves to protect their hands while they sort things, they work normal working hours each week, their children are provided with a free school, and they are given job training to improve their skills. The organization is another example of pragmatism in the face of extreme poverty. The work is gruelling, but the way in which it is being done is improving the lives of the workers and making headway on Delhi’s waste management problem to boot.

Aside from child labor, recycled plastic bags, and the simple peace of my guest house, my impressions of the week are dominated by snatches of memory from Delhi’s streets. A Coca-Cola sign. A goat. Endless, exhausting negotiations with auto-rickshaw drivers whose prices mysteriously double when we reach our destination. A thin man with dusty feet napping by the road. Vendors selling fragrant daal on the street. A cow reclined on a pile of trash. Auto-rickshaws squeezing through crevices in the traffic and flirting with median strips. Women wearing brightly colored saris, strolling. People carrying things—all sorts of things—on their heads.

And staring. Lots and lots of staring. I spent yesterday at the Taj Mahal in Agra, where apparently I was an oddity. Fifteen or twenty Indians now own photographs of me posing awkwardly with their children, friends, brothers, and wives. It makes me feel like something between a celebrity and an alien. A strange feeling, indeed.

The Taj itself was, of course, breathtaking. An oasis of cool white marble and neat expanses of green and water, the Taj inspires a serene feeling of being deliciously small. It was a welcome respite from the grit, chaos, and intensity of Delhi. I’m ready for the quieter pace that Bhubaneswar will no doubt bring tomorrow.