Important update: It turns out that the breast-feeding groups who issued this urgent call might have jumped the gun. Click here for more information. Disaster-relief organizations including the American Red Cross say donating milk will cause more problems than it solves, at least for now, and that it might go to waste. Other than this update, this post has not been revised or edited since it was posted earlier Friday.

Haitian infants urgently need breast milk, according to breast-feeding groups cited by the Los Angeles Times‘ health blog, Booster Shots.

The logistics and infrastructure are now in place to get donated breast milk to the babies, most of them premature or orphaned. Donors need to have their blood tested and answer some health questions (obviously, you can’t be a smoker or on illegal drugs. But also: no herbal supplements.) Donations must be at least 100 ounces. Milk can be taken to the closest chapter of the Human Milk Banking Association of North America. Most of those chapters seem to be located in metropolitan areas, and there are just 13 of them.

Keeping the milk fresh and cold on the journey is “a tall order,” says Booster Shots’ Melissa Healy. As of last week, UNICEF was saying it was still not possible, but, at least according to Healy’s sources, it apparently is now. Healy points out several reasons that donating infant formula is not a good idea. 

Meanwhile, distribution of food and water to the rest of Haiti’s population is still uneven, according to the U.S. military. Some areas are still hard to reach, and there has been some violence at distribution points, where people are fighting over places in line. Prices on the open market are soaring, making matters worse.

“We are still not up to meeting the needs of the Haitian people as far as the amount of supplies that are there,” said Air Force General Douglas Frasier, quoted by Voice of America. “There have been some isolated instances where we have been out to distribute aid to citizens, and there has not been enough food.  We have not anticipated the demand at each site.”

Still, amid the mayhem and confusion, commercial food sales have restarted – there is even fresh fruit available in some neighborhoods of Port-au-Prince. Wholesale rices, though, are reported to be more than 50 percent higher than their pre-quake levels, angering both retail vendors and customers. Adding to the problem is the fact that the biggest wholesale food market in downtown Port-au-Prince was destroyed. The market is now “a wasteland,” according to Voice of America. 

It’s time to start thinking of special gifts for special people in your life since the holidays are nearly right around the corner. Every week or so, we’ll feature a unique item made from a different part of the world and will include a link on where you can buy it.

We have no tie or affiliations to these organizations. It’s our way to shine a spotlight on businesses worldwide who are doing remarkable things and many for a very long time. If you have a remarkable product that you would like to have featured on The Global Small Business Blog, send us an email and we’ll get our team right on it. Here goes …

Country of Origin: Portugal

From Oprah’s Favorite Things 2007

Established in 1887 in Porto, Portugal, the Ach Brito Company (site in Portugues or English) is the oldest family owned soap and perfume manufacturer in Portugal. Until the 1960′s Ach Brito specialized in producing soaps and perfumes for the wealthiest of Porto’s merchant families. The products were made and packaged specifically for certain families. The bath products produced in this factory are still made today, using the same turn of the century methods and techniques.

A place to buy? Try here.

Or go direct:

Top photo: Claus Porto, Classico E Fantasia
Bottom photo: Claus Porto, Madrigal – Water Lily

 

Europe shares hit a 11-month closing high

European stock markets ended the week in positive territory on Friday, swept along by investors optimistic about global economic prospects and a strong reading on a US consumer confidence index.

The pan-European FTSEurofirst 300 .FTEU3 index of top shares provisionally ended 0.6 percent higher at 993.97 points, its highest closing level in 11 months.

Elsewhere in Europe there were gains of 0.7 per cent in Amsterdam, 0.4 per cent on the Swiss Market Index, 0.8 per cent in Milan, 0.3 per cent in Brussels and 1 per cent in Madrid.

European shares closed higher on Friday, rising for the sixth consecutive day, as hopes about a swift global recovery pushed miners and banks into positive territory, while overseas macroeconomic data also helped.

The index plummeted 45 percent in 2008, but has gained nearly 20 percent this year, soaring 54 percent since falling to a record low in March.

However, it is still down almost 15 percent from its level in mid-September 2008, before the collapse of Lehman Brothers.

Mergers and acquisition activity has also made a return. This week, Kraft revealed a £10.2bn approach for Cadbury, while Deutsche Telekom and France Telecom announced plans to merge their UK operations.

Miners rose, with Rio Tinto (RIO.L), BHP Billiton (BLT.L), Anglo American (AAL.L) up between 1 and 3 percent.

Across Europe, Britain’s FTSE 100 index .FTSE was up 0.5 percent, Germany’s DAX index .GDAXI advanced 0.5 percent, and France’s CAC 40.FCHI rose 0.8 percent.

LONDON MARKET REPORT

Miners, bank gains see FTSE sail beyond 5,000
Friday, 11 Sep 2009 07:10am EDT

Oils, miners, banks drive FTSE back above 5,000
Friday, 11 Sep 2009 04:20am EDT

FTSE drifts below 5,000; oils, banks weigh
Thursday, 10 Sep 2009 12:29pm EDT

FTSE falls 0.6 percent weighed by oils and miners
Thursday, 10 Sep 2009 08:09am EDT

1. The Guiding Light soap opera is going black after a 72-year run.

2. Hulu has more viewers than Time Warner Cable.

3. Twitter’s fastest growing audience is 12- to 24-years old and Twitter now gets more visitors than MySpace.

4. Two-thirds of Americans now own a video-enabled mobile device

5. 52 percent of social network users fan or follow brands

An idea can change the world …
~ from “The Fortune at the Bottom of the Pyramid”

C.K. Prahalad, the business world’s great global influencer and co-author of another one of my all-time favorite business books, “Competing For the Future,” also wrote global bestseller business book, “The Fortune at the Bottom of the Pyramid: Eradicating Poverty Through Profits.“

“The Fortune at the Bottom of the Pyramid” has been talked about everywhere for its portrayal of a revolutionary way to do business in developing countries: Build a profitable business while fighting poverty and reducing human misery.

The reason I am bringing this book to your attention now — five years after the fact — is because it has been revised and updated for a special 5th anniversary edition by Wharton School Publishing.

The Fortune at the Bottom of the Pyramid offers a blueprint for driving the radical innovation you’ll need to profit in emerging markets–and using those innovations to become more competitive everywhere. This new paperback edition includes eleven concise, fast-paced success stories from India, Peru, Mexico, Brazil, and Venezuela–ranging from salt to soap, banking to cellphones, healthcare to housing.

Simply put, this book is about making a revolution: building profitable “bottom of the pyramid” markets, reducing poverty, and creating an inclusive capitalism that works for everyone.

Don’t miss out on the opportunity to capture the world’s fastest growing market — the bottom of the pyramid — where billions of poor people have enormous untapped buying power.

Buy the e-book version immediately here, check out Wharton School Publishing here or pre-order (available October, 2009) the hard copy edition here.

Read a sample: The Market at the Bottom of the Pyramid
Read online now: Safari Books Online

More about Prahalad:

CK Prahalad is Paul and Ruth McCracken Distinguished University Professor of Strategy at the Ross School of Business, The University of Michigan. He is a globally recognized management thinker. Times of London and Suntop Media elected him as the most influential management thinker alive today in 2007. He is coauthor of bestsellers in Management such as Competing for the Future, The Future of Competition and The New Age of Innovation. He has won the McKinsey Prize for the best article four times. He has received several honorary doctorates including one from the University of London and the Stevens School of Technology. He has worked with CEOs and senior management at many of the world’s top companies. He is also member of the Board of NCR corporation, Pearson plc., Hindustan Unilever ltd., World Resources Institute, and the Indus Entrepreneurs (TiE).

Books by C.K. Prahalad