PART 1

Step 1: Determine the facts in the situation – obtain all of the unbiased facts possible. Clearly state the ethical issue.

• 35% of the children in this East African region have stunted growth.
• If children are breastfed for too long they have a higher chance of contracting HIV
• Maize and banana gruel is the common food for babies starting around 2 months to 24 months and accompanies breastfeeding. The gruel isn’t that nutritious despite common opinion among the locals
• People are skeptical of the pesticides and the adverse health effects these pesticides can give to the babies
• You have a grant to establish a women’s cooperative to improve the nutritional status of the children and improve the livelihoods of rural households.
  • The funds will help the women’s group make a nutritious self stable porridge to help children wean off breastfeeding.
  • Approximately 500 women in the area are willing to join
• WHO says to breastfeed exclusively until 6 months 
• The longer someone with HIV breastfeeds the more likely they are to transmit their diseases to their child 

 

Step 2: Define the Stakeholders – those with a vested interest in the outcome

1. Children at breastfeeding ages
2. Lactating mothers
3. Women joining the co-op 
4. Women’s cooperative grant donor
5. You as a researcher
6. Local farmers
7. Doctors / Health network 
8. The actual co-op 

 

Step 3: Assess the motivations of the Stakeholders

1. Children at breastfeeding ages
   1. Are not old enough to understand their stake in this situation, thus have no needs other than food
2. Lactating mothers
   1. Want their babies to grow up healthy
   2. Want to prevent them from getting health complications from HIV, pesticides, malnutrition, etc
3. Other Women
   1. They may be in the women’s cooperative making the porridge as part of the project
   2. Potential employment opportunity with the cooperative
   3. Will want their future children to be healthy 
4. Women’s cooperative Grant Donor
   1. Want women to be healthier 
   2. Want their money to go towards a productive venture (worthy investment)
5. You as a researcher
   1. Want to make everyone happy
   2. Professionally need to develop a successful co-operative  
6. Local Farmers
   1. Your crops may be used to produce the porridge that will be created with the women’s cooperative. 
   2. You will make money 
7. Doctors
   1. Want healthy communities 
   2. Be equipped in the case of new health problems arise because of pesticide use?
8. The future co-op
   1. Motivated to stay open 
   2. Be useful – help women 
   3. Make money 

 

Step 4: Formulate (at least three) alternative solutions – based on information available, using

basic ethical core values as guide

Approaches [1/2/3: repeat for every action]

 

Solution 1:

• Potential solution: Form a section on the cooperative and educate women on the different risks of the porridge and HIV and let them decide, also produce the porridge and sell it. 
• Ethical Principle: virtue-based because a good person would educate the community about the problems so that you engage them in the decision-making process. 
• Pros: Promotes healthy choices among the women and they 
• Cons: the women could possibly make the wrong decision and put their child in danger

 

Solution 2: 

• Potential solution : Form the porridge – privately test the new supplement for pesticides, based on the assumption that pesticides are better than HIV. Don’t tell women about the dangers of pesticides. Teach women that after 6 months they have to stop breastfeeding. 
• Ethical Principle or code- consequence based thinking because if your goal is just to choose the healthier option, just take the fastest path by telling the women to make the porridge without educating them about anything.
• Pros: You don’t risk damaging the reputation of the porridge and thus don’t give babies HIV
• Cons: Is this moral? No 

 

Solution 3: 

• Potential solution: Create the cooperative. Have a questionnaire about the symptoms of HIV, give the porridge to women who may have HIV and tell them not to keep breastfeeding after 6 months, make all mothers aware of the risk of breastfeeding/HIV and give them the option of porridge or not, but also letting them know about the risk of porridge as well. 
• Ethical Principle or code: duty-based. It’s your duty to use the grant to get the best results and take the safest route. 
• Pros: educating women of their risks and offer them the choice to take the porridge or not. 
• Cons: not time-efficient. 

 

Step 5: Seek additional assistance, as appropriate – engineering codes of ethics, previous cases,

peers, reliance on personal experience, inner reflection

Additional assistance was sought. 

 

Step 6: Select the best course of action – that which satisfies the highest core ethical values.

Explain reasoning and justify. Discuss your stance vis-a-vis other approaches discussed in the class.

 Go with SOLUTION 3. Most ethical while also staying cost-efficient because it does more than the other 2 options to make sure HIV+ women are not continuing to breastfeed their children, but also educates the community.

 

Step 7: (If applicable) What are the implications of your solution on the venture. Explain the

impact of your proposed solution on the venture’s technology, economic, social and environmental aspects.

Sending out the questionnaire is not time-efficient, especially if your time is limited and the grant donor wants to see results as soon as possible. 

 

PART 2

Step 1: Determine the facts in the situation – obtain all of the unbiased facts possible. Clearly state the ethical issue.

• The women in the cooperative are making alright money off of the venture (about $3 USD)
• Cooperative also gives the women the option to sell their own family’s crops to the cooperative, gives them a little more money
• Children of cooperative women aren’t getting fed
• Money is being wasted by the men

 

Step 2: Define the Stakeholders – those with a vested interest in the outcome

1. Cooperative women
2. 7 women on committee
3. You as the entrepreneur
4. Children
5. Husbands, brothers, fathers 
6. Grant donor

 

Step 3: Assess the personal and professional motivations of the Stakeholders

1. Cooperative women 
   1. Personal: they want the money to be used for their children. If they speak up, they might be subjected to domestic abuse. 
   2. Professional: they want their hard-earned money to be put into good use. 
2. 7 women on committee
   1. Personal: they want their fellow women to have control over their paycheck because “girls stick together”
   2. Professional: same thing but as committee members, they want to do what’s best for the cooperative
3. You as the entrepreneur
   1. Personal: the morally good person in you just wants equality
   2. Professional: you want the grant that went into creating the cooperative to be used wisely
4. Children: 
   1. Personal and professional: they want and need healthy food to grow up healthy
5. Husbands, brothers, fathers
   1. Personal and professional: they want that extra pocket money to spend on useless shit that will give them a good reputation among their men friends and have that cultural capital for socializing.
6. Grant donors
   1. Personal: they want to empower women
   2. Professional: they want their money to be used well.  

 

Step 4: Formulate (at least three) alternative solutions – based on the information available, using

basic ethical core values as guide

SOLUTION 1: 

• Potential Solution: Convince the board to: economically incentivise families to spend money responsibly by showing receipts spent on food, water, etc. If they are spending the money responsibly they get an X% raise so long as they continue spending responsibly
• How does it solve the problem?
  • Pros: incentivises the families to spend money better, gets 
  • Cons: more cost to the coop- HOWEVER this incentive may be as expensive as other solns
    • Also, this solution creates a need for much more bureaucracy which may be difficult to implement and enforce
• How does it save face of those involved?
  • It doesnt give the men a choice not to spend the money on food and necessities, so the women aren’t “taking” money from them
• Implications on relationships
  • Short-term: Gives women more power 
  • Long-term: might make the men upset once they catch on 
• Implications on the venture
  • Short-term: should solve the problem for the women 
  • Long-term: might not work at all, might lose money 

 

SOLUTION 2: 

• Potential Solution: Convince the board to:  Barter instead of money for the goods because then the women will have no money to give to their husbands 
• How does it solve the problem?
  • Pros: Takes away the ability for the men of the households to take the money and use it for their personal use
    • The women will still be rewarded for their work but will be given things that will benefit them and their whole family (not alc and shit)
  • Cons: Men might get heated, cooperative would probably have to create some sort of store that the women can go to and exchange their points for goods, goods offered to barter for might not be what the women need for themselves and fam
• How does it save face of those involved?
  • Women feel better knowing that there isn’t money being wasted and their kids can still get fed if some of the exchanges include the porridge itself. 
• Implications on relationships
  • Short-term: Women are bringing something home to their families that will 
  • Long-term: the men may want actual money and realize that the Co-op is trying to work around them
• Implications on the venture
  • Short-term: how do you get the goods to trade for- will give more responsibility to the co-op 
  • Long-term: the cost and logistics of finding goods may prove too expensive

 

SOLUTION 3: 

• Potential Solution:  Cooperative keeps the money and keeps track of what each woman has earned, this is like a “share” within the co-op: money reinvested results in better wages eventually. The co-op makes rules about what you can withdraw money for and there is a cool down period before you get the money. 
• How does it solve the problem? 
  • Pros: money isn’t being wasted
  • Cons: discrimination. 
    • A lot of members would have to leave the coop
• Implications on relationships
  • Short-term: The men may want to have liquid income from the co-op rather than illiquid
  • Long-term: the income is still theirs, so it will still benefit the family
• Implications on the venture
  • Short-term: some people may leave the organization in the short term
  • Long-term: over a longer period of time, this system will cost the co-op the least and act immediately

 

Step 5: Seek additional assistance, as appropriate – engineering codes of ethics, previous cases,

peers, reliance on personal experience, inner reflection

Additional assistance was sought

 

Step 6: Select the best course of action – that solves the problem, saves face and has the best short term and long-term implications for your relationship and venture. Explain reasoning and discuss your solution vis-a-vis other approaches discussed in class.

 

Best course of action: Option 3 is the best option because even though there will most likely be a drop off in the amount of members initially, over time it will solve the issue of the income money going to the wrong expenses in the household. Additionally, the other two options will prove to be much more expensive over time and thus make the organization less efficient.

 

Step 7: List the sequence of actions you will take to implement your solution

 

-announce that there will be a change in the way members of the co-op earn income over the next few months.

-hold a co-op wide meeting to show full transparency to the women in the organization about how the payment changes form but will ultimately not affect the women negatively

-clearly explain how the women can withdraw funds from the new system and how to most effectively make use of the new system.