Atlas Network is a nonprofit organization connecting a global network of more than 475 free-market organizations in over 90 countries to the ideas and resources needed to advance the cause of liberty.
Imagine you own a parcel of fertile farmland, but you’re too old to work it, cannot sell it, nor use it as collateral in a bank loan. Would you say that land is really yours? That hypothetical question is the reality for roughly seven million Ukrainian landowners who, after the collapse of the U.S.S.R., received…
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Ona Raudeliūnienė whisks 36 eggs together on a breezy, rainy Saturday afternoon in Zūbiškės, a small rural town in central Lithuania. She is preparing the batter for a traditional šakotis, a local, spit-baked cake that is shaped like a tree, that she will spend hours baking for a client. Šakotis holds a special place in…
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Nepal is a landlocked country wedged between India and China in the Himalayas, with gigantic mountains, incredible natural beauty, and irreplaceable World Heritage sites. The country is multicultural, multilingual, multiethnic—rich in diversity, and endlessly interesting. This year I experienced some of Nepal’s breathtaking views, culture, as well as some of the challenges that her people…
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Located in the heart of Costa Rica, San José is home to exquisite architecture, lush rainforests, and friendly locals. It is also home to an abundance of entrepreneurs and bustling small businesses. One family-owned business in particular stands out to its community—Costa Rica Beer Factory, co-founded six years ago by Mónica Mendoza and Jaime Zuluaga…
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More than 125,000 people live in the Zakir Nagar neighborhood of New Delhi, but this close-knit community feels more like a small town where everyone knows each other. Famous for its “food walk” that comes alive during Ramadan celebrations, this Muslim corner of the city breathes a cultural vibrancy into the diverse social fabric of…
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An early morning haze blankets Tigre—a vast and quiet neighborhood an hour away from the hustle and bustle of Buenos Aires. The only sounds are that of children running through the streets and the howls of the stray dogs following behind. This is not a wealthy neighborhood—it’s a place where hundreds of children are waking…
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A thick fog blankets the wide expanse of farmland each morning in the small village of Sugauli Birta, an agrarian community near the Indian border of Nepal. There is an accompanying silence as women and men rise with the sun to work. Sugauli Birta is a 9-hour drive—or an 11-minute flight—from the Nepali capital of…
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The process of making nougat—a gooey candy traditionally eaten at Christmastime—can take up to four hours and requires the utmost attention to detail. A creamy mixture of egg whites, honey, and caramelized sugar sprinkled with slivers of assorted nuts is quickly poured into trays lined with thin, edible paper. The warm, sticky mass is laid…
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Street vendors are an integral part of life in India. Vegetables, fruits, milk, clothing—everything people need for day-to-day living is available from sellers who trade in the open-air. Dinesh Kumar Dixit is one of those street vendors—known locally as a “rehri-patri walla”—and he’s spent the last 40 years standing on a Delhi street, selling the…
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Colorful stands of fruit line the streets, the tang of assorted spices fills the air, tuk tuk taxis flutter along dirt roads in orderly chaos, and vendors scurry to open up shop for eager customers. This is Mercado Mayorista—a market located in the heart of Cañete province, 70 miles outside of Lima. The huge market…
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In the early hours of the morning, a remote neighborhood on the outskirts of Buenos Aires awakens. Streets begin swarming with cars, shopkeepers roll up metal doors, and families accompany their eager children to school. We are in Dock Sud, one of the most dangerous and poverty-stricken areas of Argentina—but in the midst of the…
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The smell of freshly baked pan dulce fills the air outside of Cooperativa La Juanita, a brightly painted cluster of community buildings in Buenos Aires’ La Matanza neighborhood. With a full slate of educational programming and growing business enterprises, the cooperative, which is located in a busy urban neighborhood about 5 miles outside of Argentina’s…
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An estimated 200,000 people live in the Pamplona region, and a vast majority don’t have running water. This daily struggle affects everything Marisol and her family does.
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Economies can’t flourish when it’s difficult to start a business. The Samriddhi Foundation, an Atlas Network partner based in Nepal, had a recent victory reforming business registration procedures with the country’s Office of Company Registrar (OCR), reducing the time it takes to register a new domestic business from several days down to a maximum of 30 hours. Businesses…
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As Mrs. Maria Mothupi held the official deed to her land for the first time, her face spread into a wide smile. Until she was 99 years old, she had never experienced living in her own home or in a home legally owned by her family, because she was only two years old when the…
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Ukraine’s people have been crushed for years under the weight of an authoritarian regime and a stagnant economy, but new Atlas Network partners are working to change the country’s direction. Ukrainian Economic Freedoms Foundation (UEFF), founded in 2015, is working on several projects to help reform the judicial system, streamline bureaucratic obstacles to business activity, provide taxpayers…
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India long has been known for its Permit Raj, also known as the Licensing Raj, which makes it difficult to establish a legal business and pushes many people into the informal economy. Indeed, more than 90 percent of Indians, accounting for nearly two-thirds of the nation’s GDP, work outside of the law. Street vendors play…
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To protect private property effectively, rights must be clearly defined. In Côte d’Ivoire, only four percent of all rural land is legally registered, which leaves virtually all of the non-urban population vulnerable to disputes. Part of the challenge lies in the prohibitive costs associated with engaging the formal system. For example, even small farming parcels…
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Every day, Atlas Network partners are doing amazing work around the globe, being the doers, the shakers and movers, the champions of freedom.
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