Global Journalism with a Purpose

By Joshua Cooper Ramo, World Editor

For much of the past year, TIME's World section--which covers news of happenings outside the U.S.--has been trying to develop stories designed to connect our readers with what they see in the magazine. The project began almost a year ago, when the magazine published a special report on amputees in Sierra Leone and coordinated with the International Rescue Committee so that readers could make donations to help the injured people they read about. It continued with stories that encouraged readers to assist Latin America's hurricane victims and, in the fall, a similar project to help children orphaned by AIDS in Zimbabwe.

This week we turn to East Africa, with Karl Taro Greenfeld's story and James Nachtwey's photographs about mother and child mortality in Rwanda. (Nachtwey last week won an Eisie photography award for his image of a Kosovar refugee that ran in TIME last spring.) The continuing tragedy of that African nation is that it cannot even repopulate itself: 1 out of every 9 mothers dies in childbirth--compared with 1 in 4,000 in the U.S.--and 40% of children die before age five. When we developed this story idea, we wanted to ensure it would be supplemented by an aid effort that would allow readers to help out. Working with the IRC and NetAid--a U.N. group that uses the Internet to help emerging nations--we developed the idea of creating "birthing kits," which will be distributed in Rwanda. The medical content of the kits was developed by the IRC, which has extensive experience working in Africa on child-care issues and which will also be responsible for distributing the kits. Readers can purchase kits--for $8 each--at www.netaid.org All the money goes directly for kits; none of it will be used for overhead expenses by the IRC or NetAid.

TIME's earlier efforts at this kind of global-community journalism have received terrific response. Thousands reacted to our Sierra Leone story, including a group that flew some amputees to the U.S. for treatment. And a wealthy businessman, after reading our AIDS-orphans story, written by Nairobi bureau chief Simon Robinson, plucked some of the children from the hellhole where they were living and relocated them to a house in suburban Harare, Zimbabwe. For people residing in the world's worst places, that kind of generous help is as close to a miracle as anything they could ask for.

Joshua Cooper Ramo, World Editor