Fifty-six percent of two-year olds in Baltimore have received all of their childhood immunizations. In contrast, 80 percent of all Kenyan two-year olds have received these same shots.

The high rate of success in Kenya has been attributed largely to effective social mobilization techniques that ensure community participation in health services. The immunization statistics suggest that countries like Kenya may hold the key to finding solutions for some of America's gravest economic and social concerns.

One way cities can share solutions is through the "Lessons without Boarders" program. Created by the US Agency for International Development (USAID) and launched by Vice President Al Gore two years ago, "Lessons" draws international leaders together to share common experiences. "Lessons" has encouraged local leaders in places such as Baltimore, Boston and Seattle to take an innovative approach, forming partnerships that cross continents, to find global solutions to local problems.

Richard Cash, a fellow at the Harvard Institute for International Development, says, "The United States can learn a great deal from other societies. Information no longer simply flows from the rich to the poor." Proof of Cash's view is found in some of the programs highlighted below.

Health Care and Environmental Protection
Health care workers in Boston are studying USAID's family planning strategies in Bangladesh. Based on lessons learned from the Bangladesh family planning program, which provides information to most Bangladeshi couples through the aid of 28,000 community based volunteers, Boston is taking steps to increase private sector participation in its own health care system. And in Seattle, people are looking to their peers in Cairo, Egypt, for solutions to environmental problems.

Seattle's Pike's Market, the largest generator of organic waste in the city, currently does not recycle that waste. Cairo has developed two successful models of organic waste management programs. "Lessons" linked these two groups, as well as development professionals from sixteen other countries. Seattle Mayor Norm Rice says, "Issues like protecting and promoting our environment do not fit into neat little packages of neighborhoods or districts, and neither do their solutions."

Small Business Start Up
Women Entrepreneurs of Baltimore (WEB) is starting small business lending programs modeled after those developed by small villages in Africa. In Kenya, for example, low-income people pool their money in peer lending programs. This informal lending is supported by a community that encourages high levels of loan repayment and therefore low levels of risk.

Today, WEB is putting together similar programs with assistance from the Foundation for International Community Assistance and the American National Savings Bank. The Bank has provided interest-bearing free checking and has set up savings accounts for the first group of loan recipients. So far, nine recipients have succeeded in starting up various economic ventures.

Education
Florida's School Year 2000 project, which seeks to revamp a faltering educational system, builds directly on a USAID-funded program run by Florida State University to improve South Korea's Educational System. South Korea, has succeeded in reducing overall costs while improving the quality of education.

Each of the pilot projects contain two key elements that lead to success: empowerment of the community and individual, and the integration of services. The experiences of participants in USAID's "Lessons" program illustrate the significance of information-sharing and partnership in the global era. The same problems can be found in cities throughout the world, thus it seems only logical that so, too, can their solutions.

For more information on the "Lessons" program contact Allison King, USAID Public Liaison officer, phone (202) 647-7597, fax (202) 647-8321.

Kiera Gans is an intern in the Center for Member Programs of the National League of Cities with James Brooks, Manager, International Programs.

September 1996 / Illinois Municipal Review / Page 19