How can marginalised people find a new identity through entrepreneurship? How do women help their families survive in foreign lands by undertaking new endeavours? And all of this when ‘most of all, they just want to go home’.

Dr Sophie Alkhaled, Director of the Academy for Gender Equality and Social Justice Research in Organisations in Lancaster University Management School, joins us to talk about the lives of refugees in camps and communities outside their homelands, and how women there have discovered business to help their families live.

She tells us how her personal life experience and heritage shaped her interest in both refugees and gender equity, from seeing her mother prohibited from driving in Saudi Arabia, to living under the Assad regime in Syria, and travelling to refugee camps that are home to her countrymen and women.

We find out how millions of Syrians were forced to flee their homeland, how entrepreneurship takes hold in unexpected places, and how women came to reimagine what an entrepreneur and business leader is as they try to make sure they have food on the table.

Sophie tells us how entrepreneurship is a means of survival and empowerment for these women; how their Syrian products can keep national identity and pride alive among the refugees; how in many cases the money from these businesses was the only thing ensuring that refugees could eat and pay rent; and we talk about how refugees can leave a country with war or famine and move to another with difficulties of its own.

We also look at the Academy and its work on gender equality in business schools and beyond. This takes the discussion into business realms and countries all around the world, and Sophie talks about the importance of being a hopeaholic when it comes to seeing changes around gender equality.

Plus, why did Jan leave New Zealand? How bad are the All Whites football team if someone who played for Barrow once represented them? And is Paul dead inside?

Find out more about Sophie and her work here: https://www.lancaster.ac.uk/lums/people/sophie-alkhaled

Read about her research on Syrian women refugees here: https://doc.your-brochure-online.co.uk/Lancaster-University_FiftyFourDegrees_Issue_17/26/

And this is where you can discover the Academy for Gender Equality and Social Justice Research in Organisations: https://www.lancaster.ac.uk/lums/research/research-initiatives/gender-equality/

Episode Transcript

There are always humanitarian crises somewhere in the world. We just don’t know about all of them.

Lancaster University’s Dr Nonhlanhla Dube, an ‘accidental humanitarian’ turned expert humanitarian logistician, joins us to fill in the gaps in our knowledge on the humanitarian sector, particularly on refugees.

We think about how we learn of humanitarian crises around the world, how our knowledge can be limited by what the media in our home countries reports on, and where there might be ‘hidden’ issues in parts of the world we do not think about – including Noni’s home country of Zimbabwe.

We learn what events trigger a humanitarian effort and how long-term issues can tip over to require larger and more immediate responses; consider the Boxing Day Tsunami of 2004 and its effects on 2.3 million people in many countries around the Indian Ocean; and look at how ‘CNN disasters’ can affect why some funding appeals are more successful than others.

Noni tells us about examples of good practice in response operations, how long-term planning is essential, why adapting tents according to your needs plays such a key role, where refugees comes from, how some people can spend most of their lives in a refugee camp, and what individuals and businesses can do to help when a disaster happens.

And we discuss problems and challenges with disaster responses; where good intentions can go wrong; why local people and their needs and perspectives can be ignored by international organisations; and the impact of aid cuts because of political shifts worldwide.

Read about Noni’s work on improving emergency response efforts for refugees here: https://doc.your-brochure-online.co.uk/Lancaster-University_FiftyFourDegrees_Issue_19/34/

An example of organisation that supports people at times of disaster is Doctors without Borders: https://msf.org.uk/who-we-are

Rawls’ veil of ignorance is explained here: https://ethicsunwrapped.utexas.edu/glossary/veil-of-ignorance

Episode Transcript

Step into the Transforming Tomorrow time machine, as we head back to look at the work between Lancaster University and Lake District Farmers on working towards net-zero meat production.

Dr Laura Giles – now studying for another doctorate at the University of Dundee – brings us up to date on the final outcomes of a partnership that looked at carbon stocks in farm soil and carbon accounting across several holdings in Cumbria.

We find out what work on to complete the project, what lab analysis of soil samples revealed about carbon contents of soil, and just what we mean when we talk about carbon in soil.

Laura tells us about the varied benefits of having more carbon in the soil, from food production to flood prevention; shares the results of the surveys, and how they varied across farms; and warns against the belief in a universal cure-all for problems.

We consider how past farming practice has made a difference to the land, and what this might mean for current landowners; discuss the importance of caring for the land, but balancing change with the impact on the farming system; raise a smile at the pride farmers have in the quality of their soils; and see how the project has raised awareness of just what soil carbon means to Lake District Farmers’ customers.

There is time to look at other effects of less intensive farming, including the benefits to biodiversity; consider the nutritional quality of meat produced on these same farms; and realise that judging on carbon footprinting alone is not always the best idea.

Plus, what’s scarier – a sheep or a cow? And why? Do sheep from different countries share a common personality and a universal language? Are cows cold-blooded killers? And other important questions from the world of farming.

Watch a film summarising the findings of the Knowledge Transfer Partnership here: https://www.lancaster.ac.uk/research/research-enterprise-services/knowledge-transfer-partnerships/case-studies/lake-district-farmers-case-study/

The background on the project can be found here: https://www.lancaster.ac.uk/pentland/activities/cross-cutting/transition-and-transformation/lake-district-farmers-ktp/

And to listen to the previous podcasts on this topic, connect here: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL3AVTRXxixXpldapfTZvCCoyzvCzSDyB9

Episode Transcript