Newsletter

Welcome to the Global STEM Festival (GSF) 2021 - ‘creating real life solutions for real life problems’!

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that will help you bring your ideas to life by taking you through the design thinking process.

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Parents and guardians, don’t forget to have a look at the handy guide on the resources page to help you support the participants on their STEM journey!

Climate and Energy

Economic Development

Education

Equality

Health

What is Economic Development?

Before we try to understand what economic development is, we must first understand what the economy is.

A simple way to think about the economy is how people spend money and the way people make money.  

For example, we use money to buy gifts for birthdays, food when we get hungry and books and games to help us learn and have fun!

We also sell things when we need more money.  This can mean selling a car or a home. We can also earn money by having a job and carrying out work for someone else.

Economic development occurs when people in a country gain higher incomes through the opportunity for more jobs, education and the freedom to make social and economic choices.

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A key driver of economic development is education and lifelong learning. This is because education lets us learn new skills and new ways to support others, giving us more opportunities for jobs and prosperity.

 "We live in a time of rapid change - change that is often unpredictable and not always positive… the best way to manage change, whether positive or negative, is to prepare for it, and that there is no greater form of preparation for change than investments in education.”

His Highness the Aga Khan, Aiglemont, 2003

“The right to hope is the most powerful human motivation I know.”

His Highness the Aga Khan, Commencement Address at Brown University, Providence, May 26, 1996

So why does it matter?

Education is the foundation of hope for a better life, for yourself, the people you love and your community. It is an important part of growth and progress in society and key to escaping poverty. 

It helps to reduce inequalities and helps us to reach a state of equality no matter our gender, race, religion, culture or ethnicities. 

 Within Islam, education is also viewed as a way to engage with our faith and understand more about our Creator and the world around us. Education has a role to play in creating peaceful societies, stimulating creativity, intellectual curiosity so that we are able to adapt and thrive in a world of change. 

Helping others and improving the world around us are important aspects of our faith. As we think about the difficult times that we currently find ourselves in, are there ways that we can contribute to a good cause, or use our resources to directly help someone else? 

You have the power to help shape and improve the economy, even if this is at the local level! “The ultimate resource in economic development is people. It is people, not capital or raw materials that develop an economy” Peter Drucker 

 So what is our goal?

There are several SDGs that relate to economic growth:

SDG 1: No poverty

SDG 8: Decent work and economic growth

SDG 9: Industry, innovation and infrastructure

SDG 12: Responsible consumption and production

These goals are important as they enable people to have jobs that will lead to financial stability and prosperity as well as having a focus on innovation in a sustainable way

News Updates

Muhammad Yunus to receive Olympic Laurel

Muhammad Yunus is set to be awarded the Olympic Laurel at the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games. The Olympic Laurel is a prestigious award that is given to individuals who have made significant achievements in education, culture, development and peace. Muhammad Yunus founded the Grameen Bank in 1983 and won a Nobel Peace Prize for his efforts in 2006.

Low-income groups of people can often struggle to obtain loans as banks are often worried that the individuals will not be able to pay the loan back. As a result, banks do not usually lend money to people who have low incomes. The Grameen Bank aims to change this by giving those on low incomes the opportunity to take out a loan and have access to financial services in order to empower the poor to realize their potential and break out of the cycle of poverty.

They focus on giving out small loans to local people so that they can use this money to better themselves and carry out entrepreneurial activities such as rice-husking, machine repairing, purchase of rickshaws, buying of milk cows, goats, cloth and pottery. Giving out small loans to low-income individuals is known as “microfinancing”.

The Grameen bank is still operating today and as of January 2021, it has 9.38 million members (97 per cent of whom are women), 2,568 branches, and provides services in 81,678 villages.

Another organisation that provides microfinancing services is the Aga Khan Agency for Microfinance. For more information, check out this link

 Spotlight

Frigoken Limited

Subsistence farming is when farmers grow crops and maintain livestock for their use. In other words, they use the crops they harvest to feed their families, and do not sell these crops for any profit. When farmers move beyond subsistence farming to produce extra crops to sell in the local economy, it can lead to small enterprises and economic growth. However, there are often major obstacles to sustaining such growth, including the seasonal nature of agriculture, limited access to loans to purchase farming equipment and limited access to knowledge on appropriate technologies.

To address these issues, Frigoken Limited, a project company of the Aga Khan Fund for Economic Development (AKFED), aims to provide a better future for Kenya’s rural small scale farmers. Frigoken engages directly with small scale farmers to produce various agricultural produce, including green beans.

Frigoken provides farmers with a range of services, including price guarantees; access to customers; provision of highest certified quality inputs; agricultural extension services at no cost to the farmer; as well as many other services.  By processing throughout the year (rather than only when there is seasonal demand), Frigoken provides a steady income to farmers.

Today, Frigoken is the largest exporter of processed green beans from Kenya, supplying niche products to leading European supermarket chains.  The company currently provides direct employment to over 3,000 people, most of whom are women, and supports around 100,000 small scale farmers in rural areas of Kenya.

For more information on AKFED and Frigoken visit this link

Dinner table discussions

These conversation starters will help you explore some of the issues related to economic development with your friends, family and children.  We hope that these will spark some insightful conversations and ideas

Age 5-8:

Resources to Explore:

Economics for kids saving and spending

Exploration Questions:

• Can you think of some ways that you have contributed to the economy? (Think about things you have bought and where/who you have bought them from)
• Can you do some research and name some other AKFED projects around the world?

Age 9-12

Resources to Explore:

What is economic development?

Exploration Questions:

• If you could start your own business what would it be?
• Can you think of any other SDGs that will impact the successful achievement of Goals 8 and 9?

Age 13 -17

Resources to Explore:

Powering Uganda

Exploration Questions:

• Can you think of some of the ways that the COVID-19 pandemic may have affected local economies?
• Why do you think it is important for economic development to be sustainable?