Are Handicrafts Intellectual Property? These Guatemalan Women Think So.

Ten years after the 2004 Indian Ocean Tsunami, researchers are looking at how one community used traditional cultural knowledge to avoid major casualties.

Hundreds of Indian oil workers were sent to the Gulf Coast after Katrina, but their working conditions were far below any human standard. In an unprecedented response, they brought a lawsuit against the company that hired them - and won.

In colonial times, diets and agricultural work in Kenya focused on corn and rice, alongside produce grown elsewhere. Health-consciousness is now restoring nutritious local fruits and vegetables to Kenyan tables, in part by teaching horticulture students in university.

Native American student graduation rates are much lower than that of any other demographic. The Red Cloud school teaches students on a reservation in South Dakota about the Lakota history to empower the kids and encourage resilience.

After a devastating cyclone changed the nature of local soil, NGOs preserved Indian rice crops by reintroducing traditional rice varieties that can be cultivated even in salt-ridden earth. Although some first met this idea with skepticism, many farmers have now adopted the practice after witnessing the success of the crops.

Property rights, circumscribed jurisdictions, and conflicts with neighbors exacerbate Native American efforts to restore tribal land and resources. Some tribes have found success by tapping into a trend of support from the government and conservationists.

With a global food crisis, farmers look for how to get long-term high yields out of difficult farmland. In Oaxaca, Mexico, farmers farm like a forest, eat low on the food chain, restore damaged land, and have reverence for the planet.

Immigrants from Laos farming in California are using traditional knowledge and small-scale farming to make farming economically viable. While Hmong farmers face cultural challenges, they are looking to sustain and expand their businesses to new markets.

Once-a-day generic AIDS drugs for poor countries are hard to make because each ingredient is patented by a different pharmaceutical company. The Patent Pool provides a way for companies to donate their intellectual property safely.

In the face of the deadliest Ebola outbreak in modern history, health officials found themselves struggling to prevent the virus from spreading due to clashes with local traditions, cultural mistrust of outsiders, conflict, and misconceptions about healthcare in West Africa. To effectively treat patients and stop the spread of the disease, organizations had to work closely with locals and adapt procedures to incorporate their culture.