Humanitarian Organizations Address Tech’s Role in Solving Global Challenges

This week, we are proud to host the NetHope Global Member Summit at our San Jose, California campus. NetHope is an important organization – especially at a time when news feeds are filled with stories about disease outbreaks, natural disasters, and social conflict.

NetHope is a coalition of more than 40 international humanitarian and conservation organizations that provide programs to underserved people globally – often during natural disasters and other crises. NetHope helps its members use technology to deliver services better and faster, to improve communication while reducing its cost, and to reach more people.

After an earthquake in Haiti in 2010, NetHope restored broadband access, enabling 15 of its members to speed delivery of food, water, shelter, and medical assistance.

NetHope and some of its member organizations have:

Networked the world’s largest refugee camp in Dadaab, Kenya

Established voice and data service in areas of the Philippines hard hit by Typhoon Haiyan in 2013

Restored communications after the massive Haiti earthquake in 2010

Cisco has supported NetHope for 13 years. In fact, we helped found the organization in 2001 in collaboration with Save the Children. Early on, 2 Cisco executives served as NetHope executive directors through the Cisco Leadership Fellows Program. We continue to support the organization with equipment, employee time, and expertise. NetHope often works with the Cisco Tactical Operations team to establish emergency communications systems after disasters.

NetHope, Cisco, and other organizations installed a high-speed network at the world’s largest refugee camp to help humanitarian organizations save money and communicate better.

NetHope member organizations collaborate year-round to solve common technology problems. This week in San Jose, they’ll participate in nearly 30 sessions on topics like:

Data visualization

Security standards

Open data and data standards

Digital cash

I’ll be attending some of these sessions and will report more on the conference next week.

Read more about Cisco and NetHope at csr.cisco.com.