With the same act, I would be supporting a new class of micro-entrepreneurs creating a lifestyle of self-sufficiency, rather than one of aid-dependence.

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Self-reliance and mutual voluntary aid has yielded to victimhood and entitlement.

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Malawians welcomed his focus on reducing reliance on food aid and attaining self-sufficiency.

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There are four ways self-employment works to your advantage on aid formulas.

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Alongside etiquette and deportment, the courses impart a smattering of self-esteem (public speaking, how to network) and common sense (first-aid, healthy eating), with one-hour sessions on chess, interior design and massage thrown in.

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With the reallocation of some 5 to 6% of the world's aid budgets, and using a self-help model, we could see a massive improvement in the living standards of the world's poor in the next 10 to 20 years.

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However, if Western fears of the Islamists did indeed hamstring the aid effort, they might be partially self-fulfilling.

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Many international aid advocates have pushed for notions of self-sufficiency and dignity in economic development, and their cause is one that should be promoted here in the United States.

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It was staged in aid of Pieta House, a suicide and self-harm awareness charity.

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At one point, it even tried financing itself from the tiny savings of the poor (ie, no aid at all), though this drastic form of self-help proved a step too far: hardly any lenders or borrowers put themselves forward.

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