Hi, I'm Miranda Meehan, NDSU Extension Livestock Environmental Stewardship Specialist. Today we're going to be talking about water quality and how to sample to test water quality. Water is an important but often overlooked nutrient. Good quality water can have a major impact on cattle's intake and weight gains. Studies have shown the quality of water accessible to livestock is directly tied to the amount of forage they consume. Studies report improve gains by as much as 0.24 pounds per day in yearlings and 0.33 pounds per day in cows receiving good quality water. We recommend testing for totals of salt solids, sulfates, and nitrates. The salts or the TDS reduces the palatability of our water. While they decrease palatability, elevated levels of TDS may not be harmful to livestock health. However, some salts may be toxic at high levels. These levels should be less than 5,000 parts per million for most classes of grazing livestock. Sulfate recommendations are less than 500 parts per million for calves and less than 1,000 parts per million for adult cattle. High sulfate levels can reduce copper availability in the diet. Elevated levels of sulfates may cause loose stool whereas very high levels of sulfates can induce central nervous system problems and disorders. In North Dakota, we have a higher risk of elevated sulfates due to the geology of a lot of our aquifers. Nitrates themselves are not toxic to animals but elevated levels can cause nitrate poisoning. Nitrates should be monitored in areas adjacent to fields where they receive runoff for that field are adjacent to feedbots. Elevated levels of nitrates can also cause algal blooms. Most algae is not toxic to livestock. However, there's a bacteria called cyanobacteria which is more commonly known as blue-green algae. This algae or bacteria is toxic to livestock, wildlife and humans. It responds to sunlight and peers in stagnant water during hot dry weather so we often see it late summer and during periods of drought. We recommend that livestock producers test water quality prior to livestock turnout especially if their water sources have had water quality issues in the past. When collecting and submitting a sample for analysis, it is important to follow the livestock water testing guidelines. Collect sample in clean one quart or larger plastic or glass container. Plastic is preferred. Sample containers can be obtained from your extension agent or the watershed coordinator with your local soil conservation district. Collect sample from the area where livestock are drinking. If collecting cyanobacteria or blue-green algae, take sample in the bloom and wear gloves as it can be toxic to humans. Rinse container several times using the water to be sampled. Fill container completely being sure to collect water from both deeper in the water and the surface. Label the container with the following information. Name of water body, name of sampler, date collected, time collected. Seal the container tightly and wrap the top with tape to prevent leaking. Place the water in a sealed plastic bag. Complete laboratory sample custody form required to be submitted with the sample. Contact the laboratory if needed. If submitted cyanobacteria sample, ship immediately on an ice pack by next day delivery. Do not freeze sample or leave on the dash of your vehicle. Avoid temperature extremes as these can compromise the sample. It is recommended samples be collected and shipped before Friday to avoid shipping delays. Many commercial laboratories and then DSU Veterinary Diagnostic Laboratory provide testing for livestock water quality and specialized testing. The cost of basic water quality testing is approximately $25. Water quality should be monitored throughout the growing season or grazing period. This is important because water quality will fluctuate throughout the season depending on the amount of water in the pond and the weather. For example, during a drought as we lose water within our our pond, the salts and sulfates within the pond become more concentrated. This is similar to if you have a glass of salt water and the water evaporates. We have the same amount of salt but we have less water and so that component becomes more concentrated increasing the toxicity of the water. So it's important to continue monitoring throughout the grazing season. For more information on livestock water quality visit the NDSU livestock extension webpage.


AppalachianWireless.com is here to make your life easier, sign in or create a self-care account to pay bills, view usage or check contract dates. You can also apply for paperless billing and auto pay to save up to $5 per phone per month on post-paid plans. It's self-care from Appalachian Wireless. The city of Weizberg held its Valentine's Market, an event where vendors could set up for free and sell items on Friday, February 10th. We just wanted to offer an opportunity for people to shop local and also to help our local vendors out with arts and crafts and food and jewelry, different things. The event is one of a few held in Weizberg where vendors are welcome to set up at no cost to them and encourage people to buy locally as well as get everyone back into the streets of Weizberg. We want people to come back downtown Weizberg. The flood took a lot from us, but we want to show people that we are active again and we want to give opportunities to our folks here to make money also in downtown Weizberg. We hope that people will come downtown and shop with us. We wanted to give the vendors an opportunity to do that, but also our local business people here. It's an opportunity for them to shine a little bit today also, so we wanted to open it up and have a fun event and let people shop for Valentine's Day. After the flooding that devastated Weizberg, the city has been doing more and more to encourage patrons to shop locally, support small businesses and spend more time downtown. The Valentine's Market was an excellent way to get people out on a pretty day and spend some time doing some last minute Valentine's Day shopping. For Mountain Top News, I'm Kelsea Dean.


Everybody met here for late in sports cards ripping 20 packs of 2022 Panini Father's Day. These are for Amane S. Good luck and happy birthday. That's Yanis and Seiya Suzuki rookie. This will be our last one of the night. Ricardo Pepe. Rookie. And to 199 that's Bryce Harper. Max Crosby. Franz Wagner. Rookie. Ben Simmons. And John Moran. Nice job. Cooper Cope. And Rookie Spencer Torkelson. Tom Brady. To 50. G-League. Jaden Hardy. It's Luca. Sam Howell Rookie. There's Riley Green. Jason Tatum. Zion. And Jalen Green Rookie. All right come on let's see something big here. Bryce Harper and Paolo Boncero. Aaron Donald and Drake London. Oh nice. Trey Young. Joe Burrow. Cade Cunningham Rookie. Julio Rodriguez Rookie. It's a nice pair there. Good pack. James Harden and Cade Cunningham Rookie. Adley and Josh Giddy Rookie. Mookie. And another Cade Cunningham Rookie. Those are three Cades in the last four packs. A little pocket of Cades here. Damian Lillard and Freddie Freeman. Ken Griffey Jr. and Rookie Malik Willis. Steph Curry. And Rookie Evan Mobley. Yeah that's completely right. Some of these cards would look awesome to get in the monograph. They're definitely made for something like that. There's Messi. And on the back Rookie Jalen Green that's four of 199. Some solid packs there. That'll do it for your break. Come on in. Thank you for the purchase. Appreciate it. Happy birthday once again and we'll get these shipped right out to you.


Everybody forced in Jeff here. We got 22-23 immaculate basketball hobby five box case number five pick your team style Let's go ahead and read off the names and teams Hold off on your guesses until I prompt you got Brad E with the thunder Brian C raptors Chack with the pelicans Chihuan Grizzlies Ching L rockets and Spurs Christopher J. Bucks Christopher to Christopher J It's Christopher J. Oh Bucks Christopher J. E nets David K wizards David B. Lakers Dominic with the nuggets Eric W. Blazers Eric B. Magic Evan M. Kings hero with the sixers Lee Juan Mavericks Martin at R with the nicks Matthew X Clippers or NW Warriors Pacers Orioles C. Hornets calves Patrick C. Sons Peng Jee with the Hawks Ryan a Celtic Shigenori pistons Tie with the heat sigh with the jazz Victor F bulls wing with the wolves there We're we're in the process of planning national stuff right now. So Yeah, we're get we're getting there Taco Bell. Yeah, I put I said talking now. It's gonna it's gonna it's gonna be legit. It's gonna be legit. I don't talk Well, if we're gonna be in Cleveland, what's good in Cleveland? 30 seconds Yeah, we'll have to we'll have to fly somewhere else go get food and then come back Make sure you guys check chat 20 seconds 10 seconds get him in get him in get him in five four three two and One time is up. No more guesses Again, we go by chat. You got to look at chat No more guesses so Chris with Chris Middleton is going to be the last one. I'll be the last guess Make sure you are Watching chat everybody 30 seconds is plenty of time. I just count by fives every time though That's all I'm just kidding. I set a timer on my phone. It's legit. It's legit. It's Let's hit that logo man bounty Let's get six filled up. I mark teams down for a lot of the remaining breaks a lot of them Gonna want to check it out. I'm telling you you're gonna want to check it out that logo man bounty's getting juicy That's not great. I guess Well, they have at the Jake those Drums those are cool I like to go meet that guy Just sit up at a game at the Jake Jacobs field and just pound like ninety five drums Would have been a fun team to watch you made your marriage in Tony Albert Bell like all that core or more of a skill I guess that's the only thing that came out of there. It was good. All right Scott Zion out of 99 for the pelicans Zion Williamson the base Human torch Terence Ross to 99 Jersey card for the Suns. That is a magic Jersey Suns card Now Nicola Yolkich out of 99 for the Nuggets you guys make sure you're live so you can guess on time I see some guesses coming in late. Those will not be counted Must be live in chat must be act. That's the that's the whole point is be active in chat Modern Mark's auto to 25 Nicholas Clarkson nets once I put time is up in chat time is up Shot clocks expired Hornets with a nice one prime Patrick. He ought out of 50 gonna be mark Williams. Good hit Hornets when he's healthy He's really good actually very nice car there and blazers Clyde the glide Drexler autograph one of ten Why the glide nice Clyde the glide Family went on a cruise and like middle school or something and Clyde Really?  I mean, that's what old people do. Go to like that is what old people do Sessions that listen the musical instrumentals. You did the buffet and go to the casino. That's what old people do. Yeah Lebron James 25 Lakers Jersey for the Suns TJ Warren the 99 that's right to me. I'm just trying to be consistent That's what it is if we start allowing late guesses We'll just allow all the late guesses. That's not fair that people that are live and participating the correct way For the guests anyway, there's no bad way to participate alone. It's only fall on the rules, but Yeah Jersey again TJ Warren sons. Oh, let's go to recycle the metaphor. You better believe it triple jersey Durin Mark Williams and Kessler out of 49 There you go, Noah That's gonna be most likely around. I'll check the list here. So Charlotte would be Oriole Detroit is Shigenori and Utah It's side random at the end on that triple jersey Modern marks autograph number to 99 George Nyang for the Sixers Nyang for the Sixers. Oh cool one next Very cool actually Phoenix on the virtuoso autograph to 99. I'm Ari Stottemeyer Cool Amare dude was a baller dude those sons teams with the Matrix and Steve Nash and Marry Stottemeyer Boris Diao Good teams man title contenders for years Okay, all right Yeah, they never won. They never won. They ran into Charles Barkley Couldn't do a man. Dude. This is this is fire. This is so sick Sonics dual auto Sean Kemp Gary Payton to 25 on card The sonics moved to okay, he became the thunder this is a thunder card in the break Awesome vet hit for okay. See there Brad E Kemp and Peyton 25 ready to get that Mac. That's really cool actually. It's a lot of Sonics fans that did not become Thunderfans for obvious reasons Like most most people like of like st. Louis Rams fans are not Rams fans anymore. No, like oh, they're like, yeah Brutal dude brutal See what I think a lot of Raiders fans kind of stayed a lot of Raiders fans. I feel like have stayed It's like they're gonna lose some regardless. Yeah, the Niners the Raiders the Cowboys KPJ Rockets those are like the only ones that were televised base 25. That's why there's so many fans Yeah, no in fact Jersey is on an obi to 99 or Raptors here Dual Jersey gonna be a random at the end Walker Kessler and Mark Williams at of 75 All right, y'all still plenty of teams left here. I did mark down the remaining ones plenty of teams left in case number six Celtics are still there. They are on sale Pistons at 399 do that is such a deal Okay, see still available. That's kind of surprising. Yeah, we've been hitting Just hit that jet Okay, see still available. Let's get the brakes filled up y'all Next up is a new door auto for okay. See 80 of 99 the door to your chamber Yeah, Sonic's car is fire. Oh Prime patch rookie autographed Marshawn Bochamp six of 10 Milwaukee He's hit Milwaukee Charlotte gone in one of the brakes that may have been the next one May have been the next one Nope, not the next one. They're gone. They're gone a break. They just came in for a break. There you go. Take that nice Bochamp And milestones autos Josh giddy out of 75 for okay, see Thunder having a great break Let's see a monster. I've hit a monster RP last break. Let's do it again here or a logo man I want to see a logo man God break right to give out to 99 Luca Donchich Mavericks rookie Jersey for Memphis Kenneth Lofton, Jr. Out of 99 bowls jumbo Jersey Zach Lavinian out of 99 vets are game-warning this Precious a Chua Raptors auto to 99 Chua Next is a bull's auto of IO does soon move number to 99 virtuoso autograph on card to soon move and a redemption here Oh, that's a good name premium patch autograph Paul George PG that's really cool. Especially because he does not he hasn't signed until like honestly this year and sign in a long time What since like 13 or 14 or 15? It's been a long time That would be a clippers Paul George on the premium patch auto Very nice clippers hit there. That'll be sick when she get it. I guess you made your point. He doesn't actually sign Yeah, and sign him. He's signable. I think it was on flawless checklist. He's on NT checklist No, he wasn't a flawless Remember I think the premium patches Pacers. Let me look at it again. I will make sure buyer for PG Now he's only clippers in this He has some like dual cards with other people, but he's only clippers in this he has a He has a Pacers card, but I think it's part of like a dual or like a multi Even that doesn't say I don't know if I see any Pacers Paul. I don't see any on the What's it called prime patch? premium patch autographs For Yeah, it is clippers number to seven. Wow Yeah, so premium patch auto card for is clips Paul George. I don't like Beckett, dude Come on Beckett. Come on clean up your checklist. That'd be awesome. That's an awesome PG We're gonna get that redemption maggots. That's gonna be pretty big one. It says it on the checklist says number to seven So that sounds awesome Number to five Jeremy Grant Blazers Where's that at Danny on each rule booklet A big card pretty big It's all right Jersey for Miami BAM out of bio six of ten to the owner's looking to sell for like 10% of comps. Let me know That's a joke. I'm gonna Dude, what did rich pull that just good ten BAM out of bio heat a patch That's sweet Jalen Green Jersey for the Rockets out of 99 the each year of This honestly probably gonna side One of one of those two together Jesus, dude, I didn't hear him yelling. He must have just held it there in silence He just might dropped it Mac McClung whoa rookie Jersey auto to 49 for the 76ers Mac McClung rookie patch auto All good Pothora We'll go to apologize for that. We want to make sure the car goes the right place Go sixers Mac McClung Scores club auto to 99 Mitch Richmond for the Warriors But I started jokingly calling him rich Mitch Mendes once and I couldn't like not say it that way for forever It's one of those things you joke about you like you can't stop saying it like that We just recreate his name and sounds like I call them rich Mitch Mendes. It works both ways Yeah, that's true. I got messed up so bad I didn't I didn't know what his name was for like for like a year. I was like, I don't know I couldn't tell you if it's Mitch Richmond or rich Mitch Mendes Bad bad. I think everyone knows what you're talking about. Yeah, RPA Benedict Matherin the 99 Pacers Pacers with a great hits going to Oren Be that mad for you sir. Thank you for joining Benedict Matherin Some guys are like that unfortunately JD. That's how Luca is. Hey, every's chase gonna like Luca Still pretty pretty good dude. Everyone's like, oh, look at wines. If that dude was on the magic I wouldn't say a word. I wouldn't say oh he wines. I don't care Keep keep being great for to go in the next one first Phoenix is sold out. That's awesome Like to see that so here's a link for the next one Come on Robert B. Is that what you typed in? Yeah, I guess he never had cuz he was not my clone was technically a rookie a while ago, right? But he never he never had ever had cards. I don't think or rookie. You never had rookie cards, so Someone will go like that card though. Pistons pelicans thunder last three. Oh No, come on Dan a couple of multis to do If you guys want to get in this break, don't forget we have that 101 Guess the logo man chase. So all you got to do is be present or buying the break as well And guess whatever you want to do Okay Jazz Hornets dual Jersey here Kessler and Mark Williams and then triple relic will be Pistons Hornets and jazz. We got Duran Williams and Kessler big men there that the centers rookie centers Eleven yeah, and like it's gonna be probably Considering he's whoa dude. I just hit my heel against the Mike I put my heel against the thing and I just I don't want to get turf toe How'd you get turf toe doing that something athletic? Yeah Yeah, for sure One two three four five six seven eight nine ten and eleven that's Hornets on the dual and then the triple One two three four five six seven eight nine ten and eleven Pistons on the triple. Let's recap Yeah, it's gonna be one of those cars like oh Mac McClung. You didn't have a ton of cards. You know, he probably won't get a ton of NBA run Put him back in the dunk contest we There's room for guys like that as long as the dunk contest is entertaining. We need doing you guys like that Relics of Yolk it's he Ross green out of bio Lofton Levine TJ Warren and og on an obi Autos now we got Mitch Richmond's Mac McClung RPA for the Sixers precious a Chua. I ought to soon move George's Nyang Mark Williams. I'm Ari Stottemeyer Josh Giddy That was to 10 Marjong Bo champ on the prime Patrick. You auto bucks is a very nice hit there Lou Dort, Clyde the glide Nicholas Klaxon Dual auto Kemp and Peyton on card for the Seattle Sonics goes to the Thunder RPA math are in the 99 Pacers And then we've got Clippers redemption Paul George premium patch auto checklist says number to seven on that Sick stuff. Thanks everybody moving on out of number six


U.S. destroyed Iranian forces with F-15 fighter jets. The United States has conducted an airstrike on a military facility in Syria that was reportedly being used by the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps and other affiliated groups according to the U.S. Central Command. They stated that the strike was carried out in response to a series of attacks on American bases in Syria. We will take all necessary measures to defend our people against those who are responsible for the attacks and will respond at a time and place of our choosing, said the Central Command. It is noted that two U.S. F-15 fighter jets dropped multiple bombs on a weapons storage facility near Meisulun in Deir El-Zor that was known to be used by Iran's Revolutionary Guard U.S. officials said. The president has no higher priority than the safety of U.S. personnel and he directed today's action to make clear that the United States will defend itself, its personnel and its interests. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said in a statement. The precision strike said the defense official was deliberate and designed not to escalate the conflict in the region. The military official said a de-confliction phone line linking U.S. military personnel to Russian forces in Syria was used to let them know about the attack. This is the second time in less than two weeks that the U.S. has bombed facilities used by the militant groups, many operating under the umbrella of the Islamic resistance in Iraq, which U.S. officials say have carried out at least 40 such attacks since October 17th.


Hello, hi. It's really nice to see so many people joining, really looking forward to our discussion today. It's London Climate Action Week event that's looking at enhanced direct access, what I wish I knew at the start. My name is Clara Gallagher. I'm a researcher on climate finance at IED. And today we're going to be talking about one specific mechanism that is really valuable for trying to access climate finance in a way that can help deliver locally led adaptation. This process is called Enhanced Direct Access or EDA. So as people come in, I'll introduce the format of our discussion today. We're going to be having this as like quite an informal kind of chat. The idea of it is that it's a talk show, and we're going to be having some interviews, some reporting. I'm going to pretend to be a correspondent at some point, so you have that to look forward to. And we'll be all centering around this idea of what can be done to get better access to climate finance to the local level. So we're going to be having this honest and quite frank discussion, so look forward to it and we can crack on. And we're going to start with just explaining what Enhanced Direct Access is, what is locally led adaptation, why am I here banging on about it. So locally adaptation is important because as an approach it seeks to give local stakeholders opportunities and support to really lead adapting their communities to climate change. It gives communities on the frontline of climate impact a voice and decisions that directly affect their lives and livelihoods. And over the last few years, quite a lot of momentum has grown around these eight principles for locally led adaptation, which can be used to guide those that are seeking to support LLA. And there's some some more information available about the LLA principles that were kind of co developed over quite a long time available here. And the typical way that the climate finance is accessed at the moment through the major climate funds isn't isn't great for LLA. The processes are long, they're really complex, very difficult to understand and pretty top down countries and local stakeholders are demanding great efforts and commitments on putting more resources into the hands of local adaptation priorities. And so one response to this is the mechanism called Enhanced Direct Access that we're talking about today. It's a way that the Green Climate Fund and Adaptation Fund have kind of tried to develop to allow for devolved decision making, which is principle number one of the principles for locally led adaptation. So to have more localised decision making on what climate finance is spent on. And the process doesn't have to be contained to these two climate funds so it's a model that could be adopted by other finance providers. And the key elements of EDA are that the funds, the climate funds, so people like the Green Climate Fund like the Adaptation Fund, they approve the mechanism that's used to disperse the use of the climate finance they give out. And so it's the process of fund disbursement that they're interested in, not whether they approve of you know how, when and where every last dollar of a project is being spent. So that's the kind of the shift of what's different for Enhanced Direct Access. And it takes that decision making on what EDA, on what the finance should be spent on away from the board level and to a more devolved level to the national level. And that's quite a big change from the way that usual projects are managed. It requires multi-stakeholder input on the plan for dispersing the funds. There's a high emphasis on consultation and meaningful consultation in how these EDA projects are put together. And it allows for a lot more country and context specific approaches and flexibility in the way that you choose how to disperse the finance which gives more control to in-country entities. So really quickly I'll just run through some of the key terms that you might hear in the discussion as we go through so you can kind of stay grounded in the tech, in the terms. So we have the climate funds. So we're talking about the GCF and the Adaptation Fund at the moment. And these approve the Enhanced Direct Access projects that have been proposed by the direct access entities and national implementing entities. So these are entities that have got this status of having direct access to the funds and the ability to on-grant the money to entities kind of in country. Direct access means that they don't need to have any intermediary handling the funds for the project on their behalf. They're able to access them directly. So they handle the Enhanced Direct Access funds. They're responsible for complying with all the standards and guiding the executing entities. And these executing entities then is the next term. These are organizations that implement Enhanced Direct Access with and within communities and they can be all kinds of different legal organization depending on how each country wants to organize themselves. There might be community-based organizations or national NGOs or the private sector or indigenous peoples associations. And they work with the local communities themselves to build capacities in climate adaptation skills or project management skills as well, how to handle the funds, how to engage with external climate finance. And then all of this is overseen by another term, the National Designated Authority. So these are the kind of overwatching body that makes sure that all of the work that's going on aligns with what the country wants, what's kind of in their policies and laws and making sure and they have a strong kind of monitoring oversight and approval role in the process rather than in a regular project. So before we begin our chat, it will be useful maybe just to frame this in terms of why are we talking about this. So if this is such a great way of delivering finance, how come it's still considered new and innovative and why is it not happening everywhere? Like direct access is a priority for the least developed country, the LDC group and enhanced direct access is also essential to the LDC initiative for effective adaptation and resilience. And in part of this they're seeking to have at least 70% of climate finance flows supporting local level action by 2030. So this way of moving finance around from the boards, devolving that decision making and then dispersing it onwards is one key mechanism that could support that long term aim. But it's really difficult to manage. It's really difficult to do the standards that you have to meet are incredibly high. And it takes a long time to achieve direct access alone, but not even moving on to enhance direct access. It also represents a shift in the way that the funds themselves have to work. And for them to be okay with flexibility and with having, you know, trust that the direct access entities are, you know, suggesting things that are right for their context and circumstances and it requires a great deal of learning and learning takes time on how to implement EDA. So I hope that sets the scene so it is a bit of a whistle stop tour to try and make up some time last, but let me introduce in a May Gordon the principal director of climate change and the government of Jamaica and host of our LLA chat show so I'm looking forward to this really informal and frank discussion in a male flaws yours. Thank you so much Clara. Lots of information this morning. Morning colleagues morning everyone from Jamaica. Good afternoon. It's it's a sunny morning here. Jamaica is known for chat shows and talk shows and all of that so we are delighted to be in this space. We know adaptation is really local and power setting the scene really very well, and locally led adaptation, as we know, and what we're talking about here this morning will have global impact. If it is done correctly, but it needs this elusive climate finance that we all talk about really really lose it. And finance for us is a huge challenge as as you hear Clara saying, and why is it so difficult still. I think an answer direct access. I hear you saying there. It is long complex and understanding maybe a new acronym that we really there. This mechanism that was established to move decision making move the decision making power of the funds adaptation and the GCF, and to bring it down to local level, but it's still, as you said remains really really very hard. So this morning I have my very August team here with me and we are going to interrogate a little bit. I have here with me. And, and I'm going to kick off with you marinella foil, and she's the executive director from from the fund corporation hi marinella welcome into the space. I'm going to start with you. I'm going to start with you marinella and I'll introduce my other team members as we go along really going to start with you to see to know to understand, because there is no question that an answer direct access can serve a purpose and be effective in the in the access architecture, but early understanding, and it's modality is really really paramount to us so I'm going to start with you, because you have been in the space you have tried, and you have some lessons to share. So I'll kick off with you on a question. What are some of the benefits that you see here. Really just be, be very honest with us and to all what are really some of the benefits that you see from this elusive mechanism still here as we go along and I'll hand over to you marinella you have the floor. Share with us. Thank you and I may and I think you really use the very powerful and rightful objectives there.  We have been implementing a program as an entity of direct access for the adaptation fund and we have been implementing a program that evolved or was born as an EDA, even before EDA was named EDA. So we have really learned from the process. It really is very interesting because adaptation is about zooming in. And this is pretty much what the enhanced direct access is so it's, we have a program where there is more than different 40 different executing entities. Usually projects are just one or two executing entities, but when you go down, you reach out to the local communities you reach out and move the decision making to the local organizations and identify and okay. Yeah, we need to, you know, act in this or do this activities adaptation activities or actions to reduce vulnerability.  There's also more commitment among them on what to do and how to make sure that they are there in group. We had in all in all of our cases we had more results than before expected when the local organizations were really committed. And that really makes a difference. The involvement and responsibility and the reaching out in a in a in a far away. I mean, in a farther way than at first expect. Okay, let me let me hold you there a little bit. When you started, when you started this process.  What were some of the surprises that you, you, you got on the way in this journey to, to, to get you here. That was a really interesting question because when we started. Yeah, we were, it was kind of a new mechanism and we kind of say well we want to do it, but there was not so much so many previous experiences we actually at that time. We had with Sambi which in in South Africa where we knew that they were kind of going through the same and that was also very interesting for us on on saying how are you doing it and what and we kind of share under our first learning lessons, but we we definitely were impressed on the results we got afterwards they were a lot better this is a process where you learn on the process, I mean I know in general you say well yeah you learn by doing and you have to keep on working on the capacity building and everything, but this is it. I mean you need to know that working with so many organizations with so many challenges, you need to do perhaps a lot more efforts on capacity building on on on developing mutual mechanisms on so you're learning to and you're evolving as a direct access organization. But it also means that the and you mentioned it and Karen mentioned it to the flexibility on on on managing the project and the funding and everything it's very important, because you need to to kind of understand that things.  What would what did you expect. How would you prepare differently. What do you wish you know at the beginning that that took you to the end what did you expect. I think that it's one of the issues is to understand how to to to dedicate. I mean, let me rephrase it differently. We're now in the process of scaling up. And now we have we're really taking into the learning lessons because now we have the opportunity now we know some things. So one of the things is put a lot more effort on capacity building up your local local organizations to make a better communication back and forth communication with different stakeholders that is something very relevant to take into account. And another issue is really the more than a follow up or a monitoring mechanism is a growing up mutual growing up mechanism I mean it. It's it's a yeah follow up and monitor and everything but understand that it's not just a kind of a supervising kind of monitoring way it's more like an evolving monitoring and growing up together. Thank you. Thank you. Let me stop you there. I'm sure audience will have a lot of input, a lot to do to digest with you pivot. I'm going to pivot straight into my next set of of of of of participants Mackay Mackay you have been in this space. And as we know you can't have direct access direct access without direct access it is impossible. So, this is the first step. And I want to ask you Mackay, what did you wish you know as one of the strong boys in the in the finance architecture what did you say what what would you say you wish you knew at the beginning. Yeah, thanks to me and I hope everyone can hear me. So I think just a step quickly, a bit back is that one thing before even when we got into the process of getting direct access through the AF and the GCF is that we were a part of the design of those two entities. I think it's very important. And not a lot of entities do follow in intimate detail, the policy sort of developments of the Green Climate Fund and adaptation fund but it gives you a comprehensive understanding of how things have, you know, developed and why certain things are in place versus why other things are not in place. So, I think then to go to the quick, the question I had. One thing is the magnitude of resources that are needed for a government entity to support accreditation. So we talk a lot about all the readiness that you get. I can tell you for the fact I think the area at least at a minimum we got 620,000 USD for GCF for to getting our processes and procedures up to speed. And that didn't include all the time and the cost of the government staff and ancillary services that we would need to complement all of those consultants and what have you that would have been spent on that. It's a huge undertaking. And I think government entities need to be realistic with their cabinet. I know at least our director was very frank with our cabinet to make sure that they had a clear understanding of that. And I think another one key point to look at as well, one of my is as well, you having an appreciation as a smaller developing state developing country that those that are in the multilateral climate funds don't necessarily have that understanding and appreciation of your local context. And it's actually your job, as much as possible, to be prepared to educate and educating in great detail. I think that is where that is where my kind of the frankness of the conversation comes in that honesty, both at the local level but also at the international level and the political leadership that is required. To be honest, I'm going to jump to Christa joy because I think and Tegan Barbuda is an is almost a model for us here. Christa joy. You have this wonderful surf on open running in Antigua, and you had to crowding a lot. The civil society organization and the community based organizations. What were the benefits from upskilling these communities what can you share with us from from where the surf on is now and where you started. So, right now, hope everyone can hear me. Thanks for your question. So, with the surf fund, we would have already provided a number of persons grants as well as loans. And this is for community based organizations as well as households, we're looking at vulnerable communities a lot to make sure that they're, they're able to actually like be more resilient. So, from getting the grants and the loans we've seen that we tried not to make sure that they're just getting grants for their buildings, but we also want to make sure that we're building their capacity as well so that it can be more sustainable. So over time. Before we even start projects with them we try to make sure that there are a lot of workshops that are held with the applicants. We go like step by step through the process so that they understand what the grants processes we develop a lot of templates to make sure that they have the procedural manuals or guidelines. They completely understand what it takes to provide a proposal from start to finish and then to actually implement their project. And we also try to provide them with a lot of recommendations for service providers that could also assist them with completing their projects. And the workshops that we have for them would range from waterway management to climate change adaptation, and the grant proposal writing workshops and then from that they're able to understand more about climate change adaptation, understanding the risks associated with it, and they can then go into their communities and not just build resilience but they can also teach other persons. And from that they can continue to have more projects and they can apply for more grants more loans, some other persons aside from just the Department of Environment. So we've seen that it's definitely improved their learning and their understanding. Excellent and I think what you're saying here that it needs in terms of capacity that technical, financial and also the management of the risk as we see. I am going to run across now, we're across to Mandy. Mandy are you there? Are you going to join us this morning? And we know that partnership really is key to achieve success when we when we look for climate finance and I want to ask you Mandy, how do you, do you get the success in your approach to partnership? Thank you so much for the question and I'd like to answer this your question a little bit of a roundabout way by sharing some recent experiences we've had because, as Maria and Ellis said, Sanby began this journey with enhanced direct access, a very long time ago in fact in 2013, the concept of EDA was born, it wasn't called EDA, but it was our proposal to the adaptation fund saying we can't do direct access unless we deliver finance into the hands of local communities themselves. And we began the project in 2015, close out in 2020, which was just as COVID hit. And we visited the projects, there were 12 of them in different areas in South Africa over the last couple of months. And there's some very interesting lessons that have emerged from those visits that I think are quite instructive for how we conceptualize partnerships, but also how we think about EDA. And, you know, what was interesting about the visits was that some of the projects were amazing. They really were two years after COVID, everything is happening and more. Some were really disappointing. And of course that what causes for us is to ask why and what might we do differently if we're wanting to achieve a higher success rate. So just a couple of those things I think are quite instructive. First of all, we need a long time for implementation. Our projects were between 18 months and two and a half years, because it took a long time to get the EDA processes up and running. And so what that meant in a five year implementation period, there was only a really short time for implementation and it's not long enough. If you're trying to do systemic changes if you're trying to do adaptive management, those sorts of things. The process is critical. You've heard it from the colleagues capacity building investing in institutional strengthening investing in the non climate change adaptation things are as important as investing in the climate change adaptation things. And I don't think the funds recognize that they want to count the number of people who benefited or the number of assets that were invested in. And they don't factor in that again if you wanting to close the missing middle if you wanting to do system systemic change. It's those other things how do you count for your budgets that are already critical. Then the third point I've only got for the third point is how easily compliance is misunderstood. It's required to cascade really complicated well intended directives from the funds, often in the form of the safeguards to the ground. And when they hit the ground, they often result in my adaptation. And I think there's quite a lot to be said about re interpreting the way we apply the safeguards no one means for things to go wrong but they have and they do. And I think we need to have a frank discussion about when the board member says, we need to mainstream gender into whatever whatever. Let's look at what it really means on the ground for how we read this. I'm going to, I'm going to shoot another another question because I hear you saying, as we all know in this space that we really it's a long term effort, a real real long term effort, and that they, if we're talking adaptation it has to be local. And therefore, the build out of the type of partnership. It's everybody's business. And it's everything all rock top, not just the focus on climate change. But I want to ask you specifically and honestly if you are to change some aspects about at the beginning because we are looking. If you had to change anything at the beginning, and all of what you're saying now is what you learned if you had to change anything at the beginning, what would that have been. I think I would change two things I'm going to be cheeky and say two things the one is our change expectations, because this work is very difficult. I think that if we sugarcoated and pretend that it's easy. I think we will create a misunderstanding around what it takes to do this and what it takes to resource this. And then the second thing, you need the right intermediary partners, because for climate finance to get to the ground, the local communities need to have partners that were there before, and that will be there after. So when we talk about sustainability, we need to practice sustainability before the projects close so that when they close the intermediary partners are still there to help solve the things that inevitably go wrong. So I think it's all about partnerships actually I think it's about putting the right kinds of partnerships together in a way that we really really build local agency for this work. And for that it needs to be uncomplicated. It needs to be easy. It needs to be all these things and sadly, in the climate finance space. I think if we were to bring the Sanby enhanced direct access project today to the climate funds, I don't think it would be funded, because I think I'm going to jump in again Monday and you can look me straight in the eye look straight in the camera, and if for somebody out there in the space that is going to begin this process and it's in that position to start this process, give me one thing just one in one little sentence what would you tell that person. I would say it's worth it do it because the transformative difference it makes on the ground is profound. Thank you Monday. All right so audience you have heard from from from all my panelists you have heard from all my speakers. No, no holds barred here.   What did you hear from as a correspondent on the road. What did you hear give us that give us that report and a recap from the recent meeting that we had and I bring you in here, so that you can, you can say, and you can say where some of the myths that we we heard are some of the honesty that we heard here. Thanks. So, yeah, as you're saying, Sylvia Mancini here, you recently hosted a workshop on EDA. And so do you just want to tell us quickly what happened and what kind of entities participated. And I will not stop the honesty here. I think it's fantastic. Absolutely. So from the from the mandate project and long way up to really hosting a workshop that adaptation funding cooperation with the cooperation parallel disorder sustainability and has organized a three days workshop on and announced direct access in Costa Rica from the 21st to the 23rd of June so we recently came back this is very recent. And the workshop was attended by the National Implementing Entity by the designated authority that wish to start the accreditation for the second night in the country, and also from representative of course from the existing EDA projects that presented their experience with EDA, and also some executive entities so it was a great experience. Brilliant. And what was kind of the strongest themes then that came out of the workshop. Well, I believe I continue with what already is said but definitely one of the, one of the, the feeding that we got was really the increased the country ownership with regard to the project activities that really strengthened locally led option adoption, sorry, adaptation, and the strengthen institutional and really individual capacity also sub national level so really the strengthening of locally led adaptation at all levels sees has been very key. So, of course, we at the adaptation fund are in her doing are developing the medium term strategy for the 2023 2027 period. And let me tell you how locally land adaptation is considered definitely key area. And of course EDA has been a specific category of local adaptation. So, I believe that all of this, all the experience that we have had in Costa Rica, in terms of knowledge sharing and in terms of all the, all the elements that you brought up on all of those wonderful words that you mentioned flexibility partnership sustainable capacity meeting all of that was part of the workshop and it will be considered also in the medium term strategy of the adaptation. So if you go through these processes, we, and then reflecting at the workshop, were there ever times when you're like, oh, we're surprised by this like, you know, what, I wasn't, I really wasn't expecting this to come out as an answer is there something then that you can, you can learn from this, this moment and kind of reapply it in in your processes going forward, you know, with the adaptation fund being an endorser of the locally led adaptation principles. And one of the, I think one of the beauty of the adaptation fund is the number of staff of the I have had been there for a long time to see also how we went from the experience of all of the even the EDA how in matured over the years, in conjunction with the direct access so I was, we have been, we call it in the adaptation fund a family a community so we have always the surprise is almost never there because we know it from from all of us but this time we continue to be really surprised by the commitment that the national implementing entities have with regard to locally led adaptation. So really to how the demand for adaptation adaptation of financing is higher, and how the national implementing entities have responded to, to this commitment, you know, to the commitment and to this, you know, request of engagement so we have at the level of the adaptation fund. So we have opened a window in 2020 the board has approved at five million per country fund with which will be additional to the 20 million per country so it's outside of the camp. So of course we'll really provide an opportunity for for national implementing entity to do what you are requiring in terms of capacity building, so then to design and implement their own project to locally led actions. That's great. So we've had, then from our from our correspondence interview that there's, there's a lot of emphasis being put behind this program and that this, the people are committed to making this work. But we'll go back to in a man other interviewees to see what's resonated what's familiar what's what's need some tweaking. I'll hand back over to you. And I see we we having in the chat here this issue of the climate rationale. Really, I've shown and I heard you Sylvia but I'm going to ask my, my interview is now really really you have heard from the correspondent report. Usually, these are no holds barred report you stick the mic in the face, but what I want to ask you what resonated most you participated in this what resonated most with with each of you and I'm going to ask you. If you had a magic wish this one one that we raise to to change something about the rules you have to follow about the climate rationale set by the front to access. What would that be. I'll start with you Christa joy. Alright, so. Well, I, I don't know, I would say, in terms of providing for persons. It's good for countries in general to be able to have this enhanced their access. I think it helps on taking bravado because then us being able to choose which projects that we want to, we want to select at the local level, it makes it easier for us. And then from there, the capacity that within within having those those projects and giving the local opportunity to build their own experience has definitely been improved so. I definitely saw the comments in terms of the climate rationale and I agree. It is a bit more difficult go with these projects and send submitting our concept concept so we hope that as as the GCF and adaptation fund listening to the smaller islands on the smaller developing states that were able to to change what those climate rational requirements are. It's over to you man hello and ask you the same set of questions what what is resonating with you from from this and if you if I wave my magic one to you as well which I have here in my hand and that you what would change some of the rules what would that be the and be talking here now we have still there from the age but we also have the GCF what would that be what would it be that you would want to change. Yes, that is a great question. I would say that really check on the mechanisms that are set for for EDA in terms of the rules and format and criteria that are being used to promote EDA because somehow when you when you look at the, the, the, you know, the documentation needs to be filled out and the criteria you know, it still seems that it's like you want a round thing, but you're trying to stick kind of square on it. So, you still need to see what this square looks like so let's make it round and then. So we have a good mechanism or rules and criteria and format and everything. So you're really promoting EDA that that is my wish. Well, in a square peg we know that will not work so a lot of work still needs to be done Monday. If I ask you the same set of question and I wave my one that's up to you what would that be. I'll answer this question maybe slightly differently and say that I think what is needed is for the direct access entities to have core support, because I think that if the direct access entities are properly capacitated they can problem solve. Whereas at the moment direct access entities get their resourcing mostly from from fees earned on projects that are approved. In developing countries, there's not a lot of spare money to keep creating extra posts for these sorts of things and I think that's a huge hindrance to building the institutional capacity at national and sub national level to sustain this work and to create the systems that are needed to make it happen. For support and we have this. I am the chair of the board of governance of the five C's with a direct access and yesterday, we were talking about core support, but I am going to come back to you and ask you same questions up in you with my magic one what would that be. As one of the strong voice in the in the climate and I think I think one key thing is allowing the direct access entities who are given devolved authority to actually execute their devolved responsibility. There's a lot of basically, you know babysitting and and and and over over over regulating direct access entities and you would never see that happen with the international access entity. So I think I think on comparison the board, the the secretary of its application sometimes of the board approved policies have become so draconian in the case of direct access entities, and it's simply because to be frank, they, they, they, they don't trust. And it's, and it's a perception thing right, and a lot of it has to do with because we're based in developing countries, and this is just being frank here, you know, and this it's obviously speculation, but it's, it's, it's, it's too much of a correlation. And maybe it's because a lot of the sector at staff and, you know, a lot of the bigger funds, they really and truly it's a revolving door between them and the MDB is a lot of the time. So, so, so the understanding of the context, it really is tough a lot and I think it's our job as direct access accredited entities, as much as power that we do have to make them and educate them on the local context and this is why it's so important to be at the level, and at the cop level to be there and be a part of adopting those policies, because then you can tell them no no no, that's not the case, because I was there when the policy was adopted, and it's just a misinterpretation and misapplication. And I think one last thing, Una, is that the GCF in the GCF case, international accredited entities and I think it speaks to the point of what that Mandy was saying, they have an obligation to support building capacity with indirect access accredited entities. I'm currently supporting a lot of the GCF board members the SIDS board member, and every time I look at the re accreditation application on that part of their accreditation. It is so wishy washy and generalized and doesn't say exactly how they are building the capacity for direct access accredited entities, and they should be ashamed of that. So we need to put them to task and I know at the next board meeting at the GCF, there are quite a few big international accredited acts in international accredited entities that the SIDS board member and a lot of developing country board members are going to ask, what exactly are those next steps that you're doing to increase the capacity as Mandy is saying because we don't get that core support, and they have an obligation on the duty of international accredited entities to do that. So I'll stop there Una. We could have this conversation like a strong language draconian there it is a trust issue and we fight for continued trust in the system and transparency in the system. But as you said there is this strong correlation and the revolving door. And I think as we continue this discussion. The going going forward. The design. We heard Sylvia a few questions are in the chat and I will encourage in my mind of you is to enter the chat and answer some of them, because the participants here I think, unless we continue to have this honest conversation, real honest conversation about what is going wrong and what is going right.  It is a family phone and you said one of the beauty of the adaptation fund. Some of us in developing countries use that language to and you want to, I'll give you one minute to elaborate a little bit about the beauty of the family. We cannot understand a little bit more and from what you hear from my kind of the rest. What else. Thank you. I really cherish this one minute. So let me just tell you. I really learned from the actions that national implementing entity are taking on the ground. Let's not forget what Monday said this came from a proposal to the adaptation fund. So from that, there was a learning there was a maturity. And you know the word that you use flexibility I am in charge of the accreditation re accreditation process so for the, for the adaptation fund. Let me tell you the endless discussions that we have had also when we started the streamline accreditation process which was the core of the country driven. The word approach about the country driven request for for listening what Mika is mentioning, you know, for for really building up together or something that is what we mean by by by family by really understanding the needs and trying together to to do to have adaptation actions that makes sense at the country level. So definitely the locally led adaptation actions, they do make sense and that's why the adaptation funded so engaged with with this mechanism. So this is what you know if there is a word that I have learned in the fun is really listening more than more than anything else. And we try to really, we try to really do that. I hope, even in the in the Costa Rican workshop, when I said we organize this in cooperation with from the corporation sometimes has been all the way around the Cooper has organized this in cooperation with us. So this has been, there isn't been a lot of a lot of exchange and from that exchange we learn also as a fund, and the board is extremely responsive through. We're running out of time here so I'm going to just so that we, we are respectful of our land and we continue to build the trust across the platform. We're going to end soon but I just wanted to to shout out about some of the things I'm hearing here this morning flexibility scaling trust accountability partnership, quite a bit of and a big one that came out is if we knew at the beginning in some of the things we know now I think we continue to share across region. If these lessons learned, I think I think Monday you have said that you'll be and Marinella, you were looking at the South Africa model such just sharing across as we continue in this space. The strong language you use by Mackay about the over regulating and this revolving door that the fund is set up to serve, but it is still a bank and therefore you have to prove yourself. I'm going to stop there but I think as we go forward I think we will continue this conversation we will continue to fight as developing countries as you know. And in the final analysis, we believe that the enhanced direct access modality is a mechanism that can work should work and must benefit the countries, but most importantly, must benefit the local communities so that we leave no one behind. Thank you for being in this space with me and Clara and back over to you so you can you can tell our audience how they can get the results of this this this program and oh what else as we move along thank you all. I'm out. Thanks for the million what a great session it was so good to have this frank discussion and to have some. Yeah, real good honest chat about some of the difficulties as well as the many strengths that we can see coming through and the dedication and kind of political interest as well behind making this work, because we see the benefits that can have for likely I've put some links in the chat there and I've been putting links to everybody's work as we've been going through so I hope you can continue to draw on those resources. And we'll follow up with a recording of this video for everybody that the registered so you can forward that onto your colleagues and networks. So please stay in touch for the links and you're welcome to get in touch with us anytime. All right, thank you so much have a lovely rest of your day and a huge thanks to our panelists for this discussion today, and for Matt who's keeping everything running smooth on the tech front. Have a great rest of your day. Bye everybody. Thank you all.


Live from New York, it's theCUBE. Covering Big Data New York City 2016. Brought to you by headline sponsors, Cisco, IBM, NVIDIA, and our ecosystem sponsors. Now, here are your hosts, Dave Vellante and Jeff Frick. Welcome back to New York City everybody. This is theCUBE, the worldwide leader in live tech coverage. Wendy Dunlap is here. She's the director of global agency partnerships for the Oracle Marketing Cloud. Wendy, good to see you. Welcome to theCUBE. Thank you for having me. I'm glad to be here. So, big week here in New York City. We're doing this Big Data stuff. You guys are also here for another event, right? Tell us about that. Yeah, we recently had a media round table with a group of our agency partners and consultancy partners, and invited select media vehicles to really talk about who should be leading the ad tech revolution. Should it be agencies, should it be consultancies? We have partners from Deloitte, Accenture, Merkle, Digitas, as well as Publisys One. So, it was a really lively morning, as you can imagine. No coffee was needed. And, you know, we started off with how do we define ad tech and mar tech? I think that's still a question for a lot of the agencies. And I love one of our Merkle partners gave a really succinct definition of when we think about ad tech, we should think about cookie based advertising, right? It's the stuff that we've been doing for the past 20 years. It's not really attached to an identity, but when we think about mar tech, that's really where we're getting into identity and the fidelity of getting down to that single user ID and being able to market directly to them. So, yeah, it's a really enthralling conversation. Yeah, just the whole segmentation of one is a very different kind of opportunity as well as a challenge that's finally now you can start to do, especially with these things. Yeah, absolutely. And with the right data partner, right? With the right technology partner. And that's really where the Oracle Marketing Cloud comes in. We have been really strategic in acquiring and developing best in class technology around data management, audience management, automation, personalization, CRM, all integrated into a system that enables our customers to really focus less on the technology and more on the innovation and the creativity of marketing. And so that's really where we've distinguished ourselves and my group in particular is working hand-in-hand with ad agencies and figuring out, well, how do we use this technology to bring innovation to our clients? So I gotta ask you, I come back to the round table. So the ad agencies, I'm sure, said we should be leading and the consultants said we should be leading, right? Actually, no. It was really surprising. The consensus in the room was that the lines are blurring between consultancies and agencies. And it's actually becoming a non-issue. It's really not about whether a marketer or a CMO hires a consultancy or an agency or maybe they have both, but it's who's able to drive the best experiences. So that was kind of the theme of the morning and I think that's what we're seeing in our industry, right? What institutions, what companies, what agencies are able to drive that end-to-end consumer experience that's integrated, that's personalized, that's relevant to the consumer and is ultimately driving sales, driving ROI. What's historically been the role of each? Can you just sort of educate us and describe it? Yeah, so historically, agencies have functioned really in the lane of media planning and buying. So they partnered primarily with the CMO, focusing on those marketing plans and specifically, as I said, those media buys, which is probably the largest expenditure in any CMO's budget. Consultancies have always had a wider breadth, right? Where their conversations will go from the CMO to the CFO and sometimes to the CIO. And so they were really focused on business operations and the bottom line of driving sales and driving efficiency that would drive those sales and a greater return on investment. So they weren't really as focused on the media side. Now we're seeing the two groups are really converging. Advertising agencies are becoming much more aggressive in being those business strategists because they know they control so much of the client's budget and consultancies are getting more involved in the operations, the execution of media, such as the model that you'll see at partners like Accenture. Which is sort of building out digital experiences, actually doing media buys, running analytics to see what's working. Exactly, yeah. And so what we're seeing is that agencies have been really playing catch up a little bit in terms of the learning curve in becoming those business partners and making marketers, their clients, comfortable in letting the agency really into their business. And there's a huge advantage for our ad agency partners to do that. But they need training, they need enablement. They need to understand how does the technology enable not just the effectiveness of the media, but the bottom line of the ROI bottom line for a marketer. And where my group at Oracle and the Oracle Marketing Cloud is actively enabling agencies to have those conversations with their clients through the use of our DMP and our other technology platforms. So let's go through kind of an example of how I would engage with the Oracle Marketing Cloud. I'm a marketer and I want a combination of brand amplification and I want leads because I can want to drive ROI. I mean, that's got to be pretty common, right? Yeah, it's actually really common. So a lot of the conversations will start with the clients and then they'll bring in their ad agency partner. There are many instances, however, where the agencies really see a need for a client to be smart and strategic about their technology to really innovate and enhance their marketing so the agency will come to us and they'll say, hey, we have ex-client and we really think that they need to invest in a data management platform. They've got tons, they have a huge CRM database. We'd like to do lookalike targeting and purchase some second party and third party data and really scale this out for them and we think we could be really efficient. And they'll come to us and ask us to be their partners and pitching that clients and selling through our technology solutions. On the other hand, it's sometimes the client and the conversation starts with the client. In that case, my team will engage with the agency, make sure that they're involved in the conversation because it's really essential that the agency POV is heard. I can't say enough, agencies are controlling the largest share of budget at any marketing organization. And so it's so key that their expertise, that their insight is involved in the decision-making process when you're looking at MarTech and AdTech. Often the agencies are the one deploying it, they're the ones that are going to be managing it and they're the single entity that has that end-to-end consumer view. No other organization has that. So what are the data sources and talk more about the data that I'm managing? Where's the data come from? Is it lists that I'm bringing in, a house list? Is it social data? I'm sure it's yes, yes, and yes. Yes, it's all of the above. Yeah, it's all of the above. I mean, first and foremost, clients really need to strategically leverage their CRM database. The customers that they already have, they probably already have a really robust e-marketing program and we have great solutions to automate that as well, but in addition to that, they should be using that to get smarter with their advertising and not just their display advertising, not just their social advertising, but their mobile advertising, their connected device advertising. I mean, one of the advantages of Oracle, one of the advantages is that, not only do we provide the technology platform to manage all those data sources, but we also provide data with our ODC. So we talk about this OMC, ODC, the Oracle Market Cloud, the Oracle Data Cloud One-Two Punch. So we're providing the technology platform and we're sourcing the data, both the client's own first-party data and then other data sources from strategic partners and we're allowing marketers to, enabling marketers to more efficiently than get their word out, not just to their customers, but people who have similar interests and needs as their customers and that enables them to scale their marketing and ultimately drives greater return. So talk more about the role of content, if you would, in terms of what you're seeing with your customers. So they're making an offer somewhere, could be a social offer, could be an email offer, whatever, and they're bringing them to something, typically or often, would be content, right? Yeah, I mean, it's all about personalization, right? Consumers are looking for experiences that are relevant to them. So when we talk about content from a marketing perspective, it's really about sending a message to those consumers that is related to a previous behavior and indicated interest, something that they've searched for before. It could be an upsell for a similar product. So the content really needs to be tailored to the consumer and what they're looking for. And fortunately, they're leaving a lot of cookie trails, a lot of footprints in terms of what that content should be. And so smart marketers need to pick up on that, right? And then develop the content accordingly. In order to do that, you need the right technology. Okay, but somebody still has to develop the content. Is that the agency? Is that the consultancy? Is that the brand? Is it a third party?  Consultancies are also advising on the content. You know, content is, content development is not, there's no single entity, I think that's in charge of that anymore, right? It's really who's controlling the data who can advise on the message. And it allows creative teams within ad agencies. It allows creative teams within consultancies and within the marketers own organization to be smarter. So I think you're gonna see all three parties coming to the table. And the technology helps me manage that content? Is that a part of it or is that not necessarily the case? The technology helps you to deliver those personalized content experiences so that when you land on a website, you know, it's saying hello, you know, and it maybe it's got, you know, a list of items and products that you've, you know, searched for before.  There's an ad that speaks to something that you've searched for previously. When you receive an email, it speaks to an interest that you've indicated that you have. So the messaging is very relevant to where you are at that point in time. It reminds me of a quote we've had on other CUBE shows where, you know, if it's done well, it's magical, right? If it's done poorly, it's creepy. And it's a fine line to make sure you're delivering the right thing to the right person. So it's not creepy, but it's relevant and it's contextual and it is what I want to see right now. And I think that's where the fidelity of the data comes in, right? I mean, at Oracle, we have something called the Oracle Data Graph, which really helps us to get to a true view of the consumer and who they are so that when our clients are using our technology, we can ensure that they're receiving the right message, the right time. And it's not creepy. It's actually relevant, useful, and helpful. And it's one of the many advantages that we bring to the table for marketers, you know, that type of ID fidelity, and not just on your desktop, but on your mobile device and across all of the screens that you're accessing on a daily basis. Oh, I just said the other thing on the content side, which I think is interesting, you look like brands like Red Bull and GoPro, which have taken kind of this, yes, there used to be kind of a lifestyle thing that would be expressed in a magazine ad or a commercial, but now they're doing much broader kind of experiences associated with the brand. I mean, I think nothing better than than when the guy jumped out of the space craft for the world's longest drop. I think it was GoPro and Red Bull on that one to build this sense of community around the content. And oh, by the way, our products are kind of part of this thing too. Yeah, and I think there's a huge opportunity for clients that are really investing in branded experiences and content development to get smarter and how they use data and the technology that's fueling that so that they can reach broader audiences. So they're not just preaching to the choir, but they're also reaching those consumers who are currently not in their database, who currently not Red Bull drinkers, right, but would be interested in the content and could potentially become evangelists as well. So you mentioned cookie crumbs or breadcrumbs. And we always talk about this notion of nonlinear consumption, which is sort of in terms of the way in which consumers find things.  What are you seeing in terms of just consumption patterns? Yeah, it's interesting. I mean, binge watching is still a huge trend. I think earlier this year Netflix experimented with releasing a show, one episode at the time. Consumers hated that, right? It's like, no, I wanna watch it in one weekend. So I think we're seeing that that is still very much a trend. But I think the trend that we're gonna see that's continuing to grow is mobile. Here at Ad Week, there was a great panel discussion with Sheryl Sandberg and some of the Facebook partners and just the stickiness of mobile content and how to be more effective in distributing content through mobile devices. I think consumers more and more are gonna be accessing content through those handheld devices. And that's why it's gonna be essential for marketers to have the right technology to be able to identify what content they're watching on those mobile devices and then market to them accordingly. So as a customer of the Oracle Marketing Cloud, what do I actually buy? I'm buying a subscription to the Marketing Cloud. Is it a annual agreement? You're buying individual solutions. So typically with working with our agency partners, our data management platform, our DNP, is the gateway, if you will, into the Oracle Marketing Cloud because our agency partners are working with their clients and really looking for opportunities to consolidate their data, to segment out their audiences and get smarter at how they market. In addition to that, we have other solutions such as Eloqua, Responses, and Maximizer, all of which are helping to enable the automation and the personalization of marketing. So those subscriptions each help drive that really relevant customer experience that we've been talking about, either through email, through really smart site design or through just really being intelligent about how you're segmenting your audiences. We talked to Eric Reynolds from Clorox at an event earlier or last year, and it was fascinating to me, because you think of CPG as pretty data-driven, smart, using all the tools at their disposal, and even he was like, but this is a complete transformation and a refresh of doing so many things a different way, which was fascinating to me that you think of them as being so data-driven in the first place that there's still this huge gap that they feel they need to get past. It is huge, right? It's a whole new world, and I think a lot of marketers are looking for the right partners to really help them navigate this new connected ecosystem. And I think that's really where the opportunity is, right, for ad agencies and for consultancies to come in and help drive those relationships and educate clients. And my job is to help educate the ad agencies so that they can get smarter at navigating the ecosystem, because it's one, really, it's about starting with the consumer, being consumer first, right? Once you can get that principle down, once you're convinced of that, then it's figuring out how do we do this, right? Where is the consumer, first of all, right? Mapping out that consumer journey, and then finding the right technologies and the data to track that consumer, and then the right technology to deliver the appropriate messages at the right time. And then, right, ultimately, the end piece is the right attribution model. So you understand where your investments are really working and how you can optimize. And the ROI measurement is the same traditional conversion and pipeline? Yeah, you know, it's really disappointing. I still see clients who are really invested in last-click attribution, right? So that's when that last click, the last action the consumer took, gets all the credits, right, for the sale or for the conversion.  Without any regard for all of the brand and product exposure that happened before that search term was even made, right? And so marketers, that's how it works, right? That's how we all respond to media. That's how we all respond to marketing. But yet marketers, right, are still figuring out how to measure that. Last-click attribution is easy, it's simple, right? When you start talking about multi-click attribution and marketing mix modeling, it gets really, the conversation becomes a lot more nuanced when you're a marketer and you have to explain to your organization how well this $50 million investment did, right? It's easy to say, well, we drove, you know, 50 million clicks and, you know, we drove, you know, 30 million hits to our site. And ultimately that resulted in X amount of sales. That's an easy conversation, it's very linear. The consumer, as we were saying, consumer journey isn't linear and neither should your attribution model. Well, it's true, right? If you see an ad for Nike versus, you know, Acme Shoes, what are you gonna click on first? But that thing that gets you to search for the Google, I mean, that is a terrific insight. Yeah.  Mopping up all the hard work. Yeah, it's seeing those TV ads, it's seeing, you know, the social media ads, right? It's seeing the billboard when you're driving in, it's opening the magazine, you know, it's seeing a banner, you know, looking on your phone and, you know, seeing an ad in an app. It's all of those exposures, you know, and it could take a few different exposures, frequency I think is still key before that consumer decides, let me figure out what this is. You know, I might want to get this. Right. And so it's important for marketers to understand what's driving the influence so they can distribute their budgets accordingly. Awesome, great topic, we got to go. Thanks very much, Wendy, for coming on. Okay, thank you. All right, keep it right there, we'll be back with our next guest. This is theCUBE, we're live from New York City, we'll be right back.


Mr. Chairman, the Secure World Foundation takes the floor under this agenda item to offer some views and observations that we believe may assist this subcommittee in its deliberations on the subject of space debris. While the issue of space debris has been an agenda item before this subcommittee for years, focus discussions and consensus decisions on actionable goals remain urgent. In particular, many of the discussions to date have focused solely on space debris mitigation, which is reducing the amount of orbital debris generated by space activities. While important, mitigation is only part of the solution to addressing the threat space debris poses to current and future space activities. We encourage this committee and member delegations to expand their consideration of this topic to include space debris remediation in addition to mitigation. Remediation is the action of reversing or stopping something often used in the context of environmental damage. In this context, space debris remediation refers to reversing the buildup of space debris that has already taken place over the last several decades of human activities in space. Space debris remediation is not one technology or concept, but rather a set of capabilities that includes active removal of orbital debris that pose a risk to active satellites, post-mission disposal of inactive satellites, just-in-time collision avoidance to prevent collisions between active satellites and debris objects, and future capabilities to reuse or recycle derelict space objects. These technologies are not just ideas on drawing boards of engineers. Some space actors are already starting to develop and test such capabilities in orbit. We therefore encourage this committee to add consideration of these activities to the broader set of discussions on space debris and the long-term sustainability space activities. Developing space debris remediation capabilities will require carefully considered discussion of the international best practices and norms of behavior for their use. In addition, there are many legal and policy questions regarding the use of these capabilities within the existing principles of international space law that must be considered and decided upon. We believe this committee is well-placed to lead many of these discussions. Mr. Chairman, distinguished delegates, thank you for your kind attention.


and I grew it for a few months. I took some cuttings and then once they rooted and I knew I had backup copies, I flipped it to see what was up. Yeah. Well, I flipped it at 12.12, you know, because it's like 1999 or something. Yeah, I made that mistake before too. Yeah, and it vaged for months with no pistols.     And I didn't know at the time that a lot of those guys over there will tell you that if you really wanna get your sativas to do well. Yeah. Clone them a few times and let the plant itself get to be six or seven months old. Yeah. Because that's its natural veg cycle before it would even start to bloom in the tropics. Yeah. You gotta.