Building South West Partnerships for SDG 5 in Exeter
SWIDN were delighted to have the opportunity to attend the inaugural 4M Conference held at the University of Exeter in June, meeting inspirational researchers and practitioners working all over the world to improve menstrual health and management, sexual, reproductive health and rights (SRHR), and improve participation and access for people who menstruate and experience menopause,…
Why our wellbeing is key to shifting power
At SWIDN, we are passionate about wellbeing. Of course we want to live our best lives and achieve the ideal work-life balance, but we also think prioritising wellbeing is a key part of transforming our sector away from colonial ways of working and towards greater equity and solidarity. The campaign to ‘shift the power’ continues…
Career Journeys Blog Series #1 – Lucy James from Child.org
Welcome to the first in this blog series where we learn about the fascinating paths our members have taken to reach the roles they are currently in. In a sector where building a career is notoriously confusing to navigate, with no singular clear route to follow, we wanted to share stories of our members who…
Celebrating Earth Day at SWIDN
This week in celebration of Earth Day, we heard from researchers across the South West whose work contributes towards knowledge and practice to tackle the climate crisis. This session was very kindly chaired by Dr Hannah Peck from SWIDN member Cool Earth, a Cornwall-based organisation working to protect rainforests and address social and climate injustice…
International Women’s Day 2024
We celebrated International Women’s Day this year by hearing from three African women. We invited Dr Stella Nyanzi, Dr Atuki Turner and Godess Bvukutwa to share about their work as grassroots women leaders of civil society organisations and movements working to tackle gendered injustice. The session quickly became about the power of storytelling, the power…
Locally-Led Development: SWIDN’s Plans for 2024
This year, SWIDN will be focusing some of our events and our annual conference on the theme of ‘locally-led develoment’. This is partly a result of the focus on this in last November’s White Paper on International Development from the UK Government, partly from what we’re hearing from the Opposition in relation to their values…
Campaigning in the General Election – What Do SWIDN Members Need to Know?
Many of us have kicked off 2024 with a sense of political anticipation. With politics usually so unpredictable, we do know that there will be a General Election in the next 12 months, with the latest possible date being 25 January 2025. The Political Parties, Elections and Referendums (PPERA) Act 2000 considers the 12 months…
The White Paper on International Development: A Brief Summary for SWIDN Members
Over the summer months, SWIDN asked our members to share their thoughts in response to the FCDO’s invitation for evidence to feed into the International Development White Paper. We pulled these together into a submission and are pleased to see our calls for greater localisation, a focus on equitable partnerships, and longer term funding represented…
Three years of UK aid cuts: Where has ODA been hit the hardest?
This guest blog was written by Development Initiatives’ Paul Wozniak, based on a recent factsheet. You can read more resources about aid on the DI website. Following a consistent decline in UK official development assistance (ODA) over the past three years, this blog highlights that… … and considers what’s next for UK aid. In-donor refugee costs have…
