Media in Nairobi is segmented when it comes to news and information; different media target different audience groups in the society through their preferred channels in search of news and information.     In Kibera, the biggest slum area in Nairobi and in whole East Africa, the urban slum community radio station Pamoja FM only works for the citizens living within Kibera. We aimed to find out how the youth in Kibera perceive the efficacy of the radio station as a viable source of news and information. We wanted to establish how important this radio station is to them as a tool of empowerment and knowledge to the youth.   Through semi-structured interviews with the youth in Kibera we carried out a qualitative research study during ten weeks, from October until December in 2011. We walked the field in Kibera to gather as much data as possible, and our findings were very interesting.   Key theories used in this study included the participatory communication model, the media dependency model and the uses and gratifications model.   The findings indicated that Pamoja FM has a great influence in the community as it is considered the most important source for news and information for the youth in this slum, and provides a platform that meets their needs as active participating audiences to the content supplied by the radio station. The radio is accredited to have changed the citizens´ way of thinking about tribalism since the post-election violence in 2007; the young women have assertively declared their space by playing a more proactive role in the community and audiences are empowered with home-grown problem solving skills that have bettered their lives and in pursuit for peace.

Millions and millions of people in urban slums around the world are waiting for an opportunity to build an effective business in generating good source of income. They also wish to have an opportunity to change their lives and to be able to work, to buy food, to send their children to school, and to stop being sick. A group of people, that eventually became good friends, in National Chengchi University while studying in the International Masters in Business Administration and the Executive Masters in Business Administration respectively, have decided to embark in an adventure that aim to impact in a positive way the lives of millions of slum dwellers worldwide through a social enterprise. They established a project called VERMIPOWER which intent to provide a source of income for slum dwellers as well as to enhance the living conditions global slum areas. Social enterprises are a profit generated business that looks for social, cultural, economic, and environmental outcomes. These enterprises are financially self-sufficient. The social enterprise that VERMIPOWER aspires to be, plan to have positive impacts on many factors within urban slums; from directly impacting people’s lives to helping the environment by utilizing elements from within the urban slums. The company is built on the idea that the urban slums have items that can be used for a resource recovery process. Red worms will be needed as well as food waste. Red worms are a perfect fertilizer producer when eating food waste in a process known as vermicomposting. Interesting enough, red worms, while producing vermicompost, reproduce at an accelerated rate providing two interesting sources of income for slum dwellers, both red worms and vermicompost. Vermicompost can be used in farms, gardens and red worms can be sold in bait shops, zoos, etc. As the saying goes, one man’s trash is another man’s treasure, the company will turn trash into treasure, literally. And with the help of third party corporations it will be possible as well to fulfill the ultimate goal, which is creating a source of income for millions of slum dwellers across the world.

<p>Urbanisation processes in developing countries are resulting in a rapidly increasing proportion of habitants living in urban slum areas. In the international development debate the lack of tenure security for slum dwellers in developing countries is considered to be an essentially important problem. Within the framework of the UN Millennium Development Programme the necessity of efforts towards increased tenure security for marginalised urban residents was agreed upon. Sub-Saharan Africa is the region where the overall progress towards improved living conditions for slum area residents is showing the least positive results. This paper investigates the occurrence of activities in the region which show an ambition of improving tenure security for people living in urban slum areas. It does so by examining cases submitted from African countries to the UN-HABITAT database of best international practices in the improvement of living conditions.</p>

Urbanisation processes in developing countries are resulting in a rapidly increasing proportion of habitants living in urban slum areas. In the international development debate the lack of tenure security for slum dwellers in developing countries is considered to be an essentially important problem. Within the framework of the UN Millennium Development Programme the necessity of efforts towards increased tenure security for marginalised urban residents was agreed upon. Sub-Saharan Africa is the region where the overall progress towards improved living conditions for slum area residents is showing the least positive results. This paper investigates the occurrence of activities in the region which show an ambition of improving tenure security for people living in urban slum areas. It does so by examining cases submitted from African countries to the UN-HABITAT database of best international practices in the improvement of living conditions.

Understanding local perceptions of disease causation could help public health officials improve strategies to prevent bloody diarrhoea. A cross-sectional survey was conducted in Dhaka, Bangladesh to elicit community beliefs about the causes of and prevention strategies for bloody diarrhoea. Between March and June 2003, we interviewed 541 randomly selected respondents. Overall, 507 (93%) respondents perceived that a vaccine could prevent bloody diarrhoea. If a vaccine provided lifetime protection, 445 (83%) respondents stated that they would opt to get the vaccine and would pay a median of $0·05 (range U.S.$0·01-0·15) for it, equivalent to <1% of their median weekly income. There was almost universal perception that an effective vaccine to prevent bloody diarrhoea was highly beneficial and acceptable. While respondents valued a vaccine for prevention of bloody diarrhoea, they were only willing to pay minimally for it. Therefore, achieving a high rate of Shigella vaccine coverage may require subsidy of vaccine purchase.