Case studies

Wednesday

Aug232017

GOSH Child Health Portal Graphic Design | 2001 - 2003

Publisher: Great Ormond Street Hospital for Children NHS Trust (GOSH)/Institute of Child Health (ICH)

Location: London, UK

Project Manager: David South

Charity Content Coordinator: Ramita Navai

The brochure launching the GOSH Child Health Web Portal in September 2001.

Screen grabs from the first phase of development of the GOSH Child Health Portal.
A poster used in Phase 1 to launch the GOSH Child Health Portal.

An illustration from the child-friendly resources welcoming children to the hospital.

Each phase was communicated in the hospital's staff newsletter, Roundabout.

Screen grabs from the third phase of the project. It included many new microsites and the re-design and re-launching of the GOSH Charity web portal in 2003.

There is no better way to show the transformation than this image.

Business card for the GOSH Child Health Web Portal Project.

© David South Consulting 2017

Monday

Aug142017

UNDP Mongolia Handbooks and Books | 1997 - 1999

Publisher: UNDP Mongolia Communications Office

UNDP Mongolia Communications Coordinator: David South

Environmental Public Awareness Handbook: Case Studies and Lessons Learned in Mongolia by Robert Ferguson.

Mongolian Green Book by Robert Ferguson et al.

Mongolian Rock and Pop Book: Mongolia Sings its Own Song by Peter Marsh.

Pop music helps fuel Mongolia's market economy by Oyuntungalag.

As cited in the book Collaborative Nationalism: The Politics of Friendship on China's Mongolian Frontier by Uradyn E. Bulag (Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, 2010).

Mongolia Update 1998 by David South and G. Enkhtungalug.

Other

Wild East: Travels in the New Mongolia by Jill Lawless (ECW Press, 2000) is one of many books featuring content and resources resulting from the two-year publishing programme of the UNDP Mongolia Communications Office (1997-1999).

Wild East: Travels in the New Mongolia by Jill Lawless.

A review of Wild East: Travels in the New Mongolia in the journal Mongolian Studies (2002) by Alicia J. Campi.

"Yet Ulaanbaatar is often ignored or downplayed in Western accounts (see, for example, Croner (1999) and Severin (1991); but see Lawless (2000) for a partial exception). Most Westerners who visit Mongolia seem anxious to get out to the countryside, to see the “real” Mongolia of nomads ..." from Truth, History and Politics in Mongolia by Christopher Kaplonski (2004).

In their own words: Selected writings by journalists on Mongolia, 1997-1999 by David South and Julie Schneiderman.

ORCID iD: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-5311-1052

© David South Consulting 2017

Sunday

Aug132017

UNDP Mongolia Reports | 1997 - 1999

Publisher: UNDP Mongolia Communications Office

UNDP Mongolia Communications Coordinator: David South

The transition years of the 1990s had been especially brutal for Mongolia. The country experienced "one of the biggest peacetime economic collapses ever" (Mongolia's Economic Reforms: Background, Content and Prospects, Richard Pomfret, University of Adelaide, 1994) and it was a turbulent time. By the mid-1990s, the country had a long way to go to catch up with global developments in computer-based publishing and graphic design (and the Internet revolution was just getting started). However, UNDP's investments in encouraging high-quality graphic design and publishing were reflected in improvements to reports published by the UNDP Mongolia Communications Office. Unlike other development actors in Mongolia, who often chose to contract graphic design and publishing services from outside the country, the UNDP Mongolia Communications Office contracted Mongolian graphic designers and publishers for all of its publications. This investment in local talent paid off, not just for UN Mongolia publications, but also for Mongolia's publishing sector. The reports also garnered international attention for being “clear, well-written, attractive and colourful (UN Under-Secretary-General Nafis Sadik).” Examples of some of the many reports published by the Office are below:

Human Development Report Mongolia 1997 published by the UNDP Mongolia Communications Office. Highly influential, it showed the extent of poverty in the transition years but also painted a positive vision for how human development could improve with the right policies.

The Guide in the Mongolian language.

The Guide in English.

The 1998 UN Mongolia Annual Report as it appeared in the Blue Sky Bulletin newsletter.

Mongolia Update - Coverage of 1998 Political Changes by David South.

Reports were timely and addressed demands for more information, such as the report Tackling Y2K in Mongolia.

New publications and reports were announced and made available to the general public. Anyone could drop by the UN Info Shop and read or acquire a publication.

© David South Consulting 2017

Saturday

Aug122017

UNDP in Mongolia: The Guide | 1997 - 1999

Publisher: UNDP Mongolia Communications Office

UNDP Mongolia Communications Coordinator: David South

Editor: David South

Researcher and Writer: Jill Lawless

The Guide, first published in 1997, provided a rolling update on UNDP's programmes and projects in Mongolia during a turbulent time (1997-1999). The mission simultaneously had to deal with the 1997 Asian Crisis (en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1997_Asian_Financial_Crisis) and the worst peacetime economic collapse in post-WWII history.

Each edition came with short project and context summaries, key staff contacts, and facts and figures on how the country was changing. For the first time, any member of the public could grasp what the UN was up to in the country and be able to contact the project staff. It also provided transparency on how international money was being spent in the country, which Government agencies were receiving these funds, and who was responsible and accountable.

UNDP in Mongolia: The Guide was published as required from 1997 to 1999.

The Guide: Society and Culture showed how young Mongolia's population is.

© David South Consulting 2017

Saturday

Aug122017

Blue Sky Bulletin Newsletter, UNDP Mongolia | 1997 - 1999

Publisher: UNDP Mongolia Communications Office

Editor: David South

BSkyB Reporter: A. Delgermaa

The Blue Sky Bulletin was the internal newsletter of UNDP's Partnership for Progress in Mongolia. Launched in the middle of a major crisis in 1997, the newsletter became a critical resource on developments in Mongolia and has been cited in many books and other publications about this period.

It was distributed around the world via email and in hard copy to subscribers and was posted on the UN Mongolia Development Web Portal (www.un-mongolia.mn). The bilingual newsletter (English/Mongolian) broke new ground by publishing quality Mongolian development data, news and stories, rather than just presenting the usual grip-and-grin vanity photos of various development actors posing for handshakes. This proved especially useful for journalists, authors and scholars seeking to cover Mongolia's late 1990s development challenges.