Author: Liesl Hostetter

SEATTLE — Conservation agriculture in East Africa is a simple, yet transformative process to increase crop yields while preventing environmental degradation. It comprises three practices: minimizing soil disturbance without tilling or plowing the soil, maintaining soil cover by leaving crop residues or a growing ground cover crop and rotating the types of crops. Together, these practices help retain the moisture and nutrients in the soil. These conservation agriculture practices have both economic and environmental benefits. Conserving water is especially important in the semi-arid environments that many of the targeted farmers live in. The more efficient use of water and nutrients…

SEATTLE — Current mental health policy in East Africa is outdated and lacks the resources to be effective. This has a widespread effect on perpetuating poverty and limiting socioeconomic development. The strong correlation between poverty and mental illness is often cyclical: a mental health condition often decreases a person’s productivity and income, which decreases their ability to get the help they need. In addition, they may have less social support because of stigmatization. Together, these factors can exacerbate a person’s mental condition. Furthermore, the stressors of life in poverty increase the risk for mental disorders. So the very people who…

SEATTLE — Ethiopia’s new prime minister has been in power for less than five months, but he has already made history. Abiy Ahmed was sworn in by Parliament on April 2, 2018. He quickly got to work in order to deliver on one of his biggest promises: peace with neighboring Eritrea. End of Ethiopia-Eritrea Hostilities a Promising Sign for the Region The relationship between the two countries has been tense and often bloody. Three decades of guerrilla warfare ended with Eritrea’s independence in 1993, but war broke out again five years later over a border dispute. Over the next two years,…

WASHINGTON D.C. — The trade policies of a country as powerful as the U.S. can have global repercussions, and Trump’s recent use of protectionism has come to threaten developing countries. Over the course of this year, Trump has put steep tariffs on steel and aluminum imports from Canada, Mexico and the European Union. Most recently, the president implemented 25 percent tariffs on $34 billion worth of Chinese imports. Global Trade War Each of these economies has retaliated with similarly steep tariffs that target American producers, effectively putting the U.S. at the center of a global trade war. In addition to tariffs, the…