Happy New Year to all of our supporters. I’ve finally taken time out to pull together some of the ColaLife key milestones and lay them out on a timeline in Powerpoint. This timeline runs from 1985 when the ColaLife idea was born through to Dec-13 when we started to move from trial to scale-up. Please […]
Claire Ward wins Best Director for the ColaLife documentary
26 August 2013 by
On Saturday night (24/8/13) at the 2013 Action On Film Festival in Monrovia, California, Claire Ward won Best Director (Documentary) for her film The Cola Road which followed the ColaLife team in Zambia as they set-up to try and make a humble anti-diarrhoea kit – the Kit Yamoyo – as ubiquitous as Coca-Cola in remote rural […]
Trailer for ColaLife Documentary released
9 March 2013 by
Here it is, the 60 sec trailer for The Cola Road, the 40 minute documentary on ColaLife. The filmaker, Claire Ward, describes the film as follows: For years, it has baffled visitors to developing countries: Coca-Cola is everywhere, but basic medicines are not. This year, Zambia has become the first African country to embrace ColaLife, an […]
A day in the field in Katete
22 January 2013 by
Mothers and children (in their finest) at an under 5’s growth monitoring clinic in Mnthipa Village, Katete Today I had the pleasure to accompany the KZF staff of a field trip in Katete where we linked up with a group of women who had brought their children to an under 5s growth monitoring session. With […]
The COTZ Baseline Survey: Part 1
9 September 2012 by
[A ColaLife Mini Blog Mini Series by Rohit Ramchandani] I’m thrilled to be writing my first ColaLife Blog entry. It’s been quite some time since I’ve written in this style, so its nice to be back in the saddle as it were. Hopefully, I can keep you as engaged as Simon does. We’ll be posting […]
Demand-driven distribution chains – Step 1: Create a desirable product
3 September 2012 by
I have written before about supply-led versus demand-driven distribution systems. ColaLife is seeking to demonstrate that you can establish a demand-driven system which will pull a public health commodity into remote rural communities in Zambia. The tweet-sized version of this hypothesis goes like this: “You can get a product or service to anywhere in the […]
The end of the line – the test run
14 August 2012 by
Yesterday was a wonderful day, the when the first Kit Yamoyos actually made it into the hands of mothers (and fathers) of young children in a remote village – Siachitema – in rural Zambia. This was the end of my week-long trip to the field, following the Kit Yamoyos through the distribution chain looking for […]
Kalomo/Choma Day 4
11 August 2012 by
[postedl from my iPhone] Today the team split with Claire and Tracy embedding themselves in Siachitema with their guardian, Albert. Because of the superb groundwork we did yesterday, the women were given a room on the back of the Rural Health Centre and Albert is using the tent we brought with us. I then went […]
Kalomo Day 3
10 August 2012 by
We achieved a lot today but before I go into details let me introduce you to Agnes and Bonnie (not their real names). Agnes approached me while we were waiting to film the arrival of the MSL truck at Choma General Hospital for The Cola Road documentary. She was pretty desperate and spoke good English. […]
Test run – the wholesaler
9 August 2012 by
You don’t get many pictures on me on this blog but here I am in my element. I’m holding the first carton of Kit Yamoyos and delivering it to the Coca-Cola wholesaler in Choma. This was the start of the wholesale part of the test run which happened today (9/8/12). The box contains 7 bags […]
