My friend and colleague Josie Buxton, who has died aged 52 of pancreatic cancer, made the world a better place. Except for short periods in Oxfam's UK headquarters, she spent most of her life working for the charity in Sierra Leone, Kenya, Mozambique and Burma, usually in charge of humanitarian programmes. In Kenya, she led the development of an ambitious programme for pastoralist communities in the drought-prone region of Turkana, and her work helped tens of thousands of people there to rebuild their lives.
She introduced an innovative programme under which cash-for-work schemes and grants helped people gain a livelihood (for instance by setting up small businesses) instead of being given goods or food. The use of such schemes in development and humanitarian work is now established good practice.
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