Final Exam $(25\%)$

Winter $2022$

Read the following article, $$The tech that keeps World Central Kitchen cooking in times of disaster$$ by Rob Pegoraro, and answer the question:

Do we need to do more to address disasters globally? Argue that in addition to the work of charities to address disasters we need governments and$/$or multinational organizations to create better infrastructures to respond to both local and global disasters.

In a short, five$-$paragraph report, state your opinion and recommendations and support them with specific reasons and examples. You are required to contribute examples of your own or from the course material $($textbook$/$lessons$),$ and you are also required to cite correctly from the article at least two times. In$-$text citations are sufficient.

The tech that keeps World Central Kitchen cooking in times of disaster

Fast Company

Rob Pegoraro

January $5,2021$

The charity founded by chef Jos$$ Andr$$s feeds people in need$$pandemic$-$related or otherwise$$with help from essential apps, gadgets, and services. Whatever business$-$travel problems you$$ve encountered in the past, World Central Kitchen$$s have almost certainly been worse.

This Washington, D$.$C$.,$ nonprofit founded by chef Jos$$ Andr$$s in $2010$ has spent the past decade cooking for disaster survivors in some of the least convenient places on Earth. And since last winter, it$$s had to deal with a pandemic that$$s torn up social safety nets and left more people needing its help$$in the organization$$s home turf in the U$.$S$.$ as well as in more remote destinations. Two executives with World Central Kitchen $($a $2018$ Fast Company Most Innovative Companies honoree$)$ spared some time to talk about lessons they$$ve learned about how technology can best keep their organization in gear.

Communications Apps

Like a lot of organizations, World Central Kitchen has moved much of its interoffice banter from email to Slack. That messaging app, soon to be bought by Salesforce for almost $$28$ billion, offers task$-$management tools above what most email clients offer. $$It$$s the actual search, reminders, forwarding, assigning,$$ says Erich Broksas, WCK$$s chief strategy officer. $$I think it makes things a lot better.$$

But for all its virtues, Slack is also among the first apps to get set aside when WCK team members arrive in an area that$$s starved for robust connectivity. $$Slack just takes up too much bandwidth,$$ Broksas says. Instead, the team relies on Facebook$-$owned WhatsApp. $$It works really well in low$-$bandwidth environments,$$ says CEO Nate Mook, who notes that WhatsApp will heavily compress an image before sending, while Apple$$s iMessage strives to preserve the full$-$quality version.

Mook$$s chief complaint with WhatsApp may sound familiar: its requirement that you add somebody to your WhatsApp contacts list before texting or calling: $$You end up with these massive address books,$$ he says. WCK is now testing the encrypted, privacy$-$optimized messaging app Signal. Mook credits the service$$s recent feature upgrades as well as one enduring virtue: $$It$$s not owned by Facebook.$$

The pandemic, however, hasn$$t been that much of an issue for WCK beyond greatly increasing the team$$s time spent on Zoom. $$Half the team are usually traveling and responding to disaster,$$ Broksas says. $$It was already natural for us to have a remote, disparate workforce.$$

Connectivity

WCK employs satellite connectivity less often than you might expect for an organization that routinely lands in areas that have been leveled by wildfires, hurricanes, or earthquakes. $$What we generally see is that the reliance on our planet right now for cellular technologies means that it is almost universally the number$-$one priority to get up and running after a disaster,$$ Mook says. Adds Broksas: $$In the U$.$S$.,$ for the most part, it$$s $48$ hours before the cell connectivity comes back.$$

During disasters such as $2019$s Hurricane Barry, technology has helped WCK deal with extreme disruptions to everyday life. Because individual carriers may not bring up service equally rapidly, WCK uses unlocked phones that can switch from one service to another with a swap of a SIM card. Team members also often rely on an old$-$school hack: forcing their phones into $3$G mode to avoid crowded $4$G frequencies. But $5$G may complicate that; for example, Apple$$s new $5$G iPhones only allow falling back to $4$G$.$

For that first day or two in the field when cellular may be a no$-$go$,$ satellite remains a valuable but expensive option. $$It kind of sucks,$$ Mook says, noting issues like its line$-$of$-$sight requirement and the potential for rain to interrupt the signal. $$But it works in a pinch.$$

The organization is now testing the Iridium Go$,$ a $$999$ hot spot that lets team members use their regular smartphones via a satellite connection. SpaceX$$s growing Starlink constellation of low$-$Earth$-$orbit satellites also looks promising, but WCK hasn$$t yet had a chance to test it$.$ However, WCK is already skeptical over the disaster$-$recovery potential of