The foundation for this course lies with unique synergies between pioneering research, teaching, and social initiatives through the Subsistence Marketplaces Initiative. Unique to this approach is a bottom-up understanding of the intersection of poverty and the marketplace. The goals of this course are to help you develop an understanding of marketplace activity in the radically different context of subsistence where much of humanity resides and survives, and for you to design solutions that can be implemented by individuals, businesses, and social enterprises through economically, ecologically, and socially sustainable products for subsistence marketplaces.
Module 5 Live Session: February 15, 2014
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来自 University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign 的课程
自给自足的市场
21 个评分
从本节课中
Identifying Needs and Generating Ideas
In this module you will learn about understanding needs in subsistence contexts. You will also learn about a structured approach to generating ideas for addressing the needs in subsistence marketplaces.
与讲师见面
Madhu ViswanathanDiane and Steven N. Miller Professor in Business
Department of Business Administration
Welcome, I am Madhu Viswanathan and we are continuing
with our broadcast video from the University of Illinois.
This is pre-recorded because of upcoming problem.
We are in the applied part of the course, this means analyzing several examples.
And it means you'll get more out of the course if you focus on a problem.
We see students taking a number of parts to participate in the project.
Using the contextual information we provided.
One student analyzed an interview transcript.
Another student conducted an interview with an underemployed person
in a state, in the United States of America.
Another student working in Cambodia in a floating village used observations
from a previous visit and an interview conducted by a local person.
One student visited a training center for low income immigrants in Italy.
Students have also posted the types of questions they've asked.
One student could not conduct interviews but
has posted a very good set of questions.
She could not conduct interviews due to an ice storm.
We are learning from your creativity in finding contexts to work in.
Once student described the emotional connection
a subsistence seller has to have
with his place of business as well as with the other sellers.
The student is focusing on a floating village
in Cambodia describes an observation of boats from the
interview as to how the waste goes into the
water and how close knit a fishing community is.
There is one rule we follow in our research when transcribing interviews.
To translate word for word, even if does not come out seeming okay.
This way we know we are studying and
chatting what is closest to the voices from subsistence.
One student conducted an interview on an island
with women who sell pickles and pies and handicrafts.
A large constraint in making more pickles was that bats were eating the fruit.
She describes how being open and honest was important,
not maintaining a distance allows for freeer exchange of information.
Recurring themes were lack of control and uncertainty
surrounding the lives of people living in subsistence.
One student.
Interviews a couple in a low-income agricultural community
in Ecuador who sell pastries on the highway
and grow fruits and vegetables, focusing on both
sides of the coin as buyers and as sellers.
Another student studied a the street market in
Brazil and writes about how each context is different.
One student interviewed two food vendors in a village in India and discussed how
survival is the immediate concern rather than
environmental issues which are beyond ones control.
The same theme is mentioned by a student
who interacted with a village vendor in Honduras.
One student described what happens when there
is uncollected garbage in a low income community.
Another student visited an orphanage in Nairobi and
learned about the life stories of the children there.
We learn from each of these interviews.
That is what is amazing and draws you back with work in this arena.
Everyone has a story to tell.
Now that is true whether they live in subsistence or not.
But the stories of resilience and subsistence context often have
the added dimension of learning about the things we don't anticipate.
They're about contexts that are so different from
each other, and so unfamiliar to most of us.
I've been thinking about some of the questions from the last broadcast.
One of them was, what to do when approaching a new community.
If I have a few days, or if I were to design the
program for a short student trip, I would divide it into three parts.
Exclusive listening and learning.
Regrouping and designing.
And trying out the beginnings of a solution, which is another way to learn.
I said exclusive listening and learning for several reasons.
This phase permeates every phase.
But it also needs to be done without
thought to solutions, or presumptions that we have solutions.
Regrouping in design is important, to take the understanding
from an intensive field experience and put it in perspective.
Finally, I emphasize trying out solutions, learning by doing.
This is another very important way to learn, and see how
actually trying to provide a solution breaks up into many elements.
If I had a few months, I would try to find a local person who
cared deeply about the community and who
can be semi-dedicated or dedicated to this project.
Breaking up a large promise into smaller promises that
will actually be delivered is a very important aspect.
It is also important to keep the ultimate
focus on activities that have a positive impact.
In addition to the means of getting there through entities and processes.
Thank you for participating.
We will see you soon from Tanzania.
