K. Nicole Kindred – Sustainability Consultant

On Tuesday I had the opportunity to attend World Pulse LIVE at the Paley Center for Media in New York City.

World Pulse is an organization that strives to bring a voice to women around the globe using new technology and media. One example of this was in the My Camera and Me against a Regime video – a video that was uploaded from a mobile phone by a women who was arrested during a Sudanese protest. World Pulse allows for an online area where women can come together to find and share their success stories.

For World Pulse LIVE, Martha Llano from Colombia, Beatrice Achieng from Uganda, and Sarvina Kang from Cambodia were selected to come to the US to discuss how they are using new media and technology to facilitate them as grassroots leaders.

The women told powerful stories of how they found their voices. In Martha’s talk she spoke about the dangers of living in the Columbia cloud forest and how she had learned to overcome the dangers. When people told her she should carry a gun, she refused, saying “I will not take a gun to speak for me, because I have my own voice and words”. She emphasized the importance of thinking globally and acting locally.

Sarvina told her story of being the only literate individual in a family of 35. She was the only girl in her family and her village to go to college and now has her Master’s in NGO leadership. She emphasized the importance of education for women in creating change and preventing social problems like sex trafficking.

Beatrice told her story of growing up in Uganda and her emphasis on HIV prevention and education. She emphasized how if you give hope to one girl, a grassroots leader will emerge. She told the story of how when her last brother died of AIDS, her mother lost all hope because only men can own land in Uganda; however, after she told her story on the World Pulse platform, the World Pulse members emphasized that they were behind her and she stood up to her village for the land and was able to keep it.

When asked what the women thought would be most beneficial to their communities in spreading their voice, all three women emphasized that their was a lack of technology in their communities, and solar panels would be an easy remedy.

World Pulse LIVE is also available launching an online tour for individuals who are not able to attend the event in person.

Presentations from last year’s Annual Corporate Responsibility Reporting & Communications Summit are available on the Ethical Corporations website.

The presentations are from a wide variety of sectors discussing reporting and communicating corporate social responsibility including:

• LEGO’s VP of Sustainability on ‘No one reads our CSR reports, what are we going to do now?’
• Vodafone’s Head of CR on ‘How to strike a useful balance between global strategy and local issues.”
• Presentations from ArcelorMittal and Henkel are also available

Ethical Corporations aim is to encourage debate and discussion on responsible business through publishing, conferences and independent research and advisory work.

In addition to the annual conference, they also host a variety of training workshops and publish a magazine.