At the Drucker Society of the Caribbean meeting on Wednesday night, Dr. Fernando Mora spoke on “Innovating in the Midst of Crisis”. He used Ushahidi as an example of a business that developed, grew, and improved during political turmoil and natural disasters. Ushahidi uses open source software and crowdsourcing to produce crisis maps of events. During the political uprising in Kenya in 2008, several bloggers received messages from people around the country reporting various types of violence. One blogger asked that someone compile the events and place them on a map… Ushahidi was formed. Since then, Ushahidi has been used in the Haiti earthquake, Russian wildfires, Christchurch earthquake, Pakistani floods, and other major events. It allows all people in the area to text or email information to a central location where volunteers from all over the world translate, geolocate, and compile the data onto a central map for all to see. The map helps volunteers, workers, and community members to see where help is needed the most. For every event, Ushahidi has been modified and improved to fit the needs of that particular event.
As a small island in Caribbean, Grenada has experienced hurricanes and earthquakes. It was very useful for all participants to hear how Ushahidi works so that if or when a natural disaster occurs, the government and community can quickly begin using Ushahidi for help. I personally found it very interesting as I’ve always wanted to help in a natural disaster crisis but never knew how. Ushahidi provides a way to help.
