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Ghana Launches Free High School Education
Ghana introduced free compulsory education at the primary and junior high school levels in 1995 as required by the constitution, but implementation took time. It wasn't until 2014 that the World Bank said Ghana had achieved near-universal access at the primary level.
- Categories
- Education
- Region
- Sub-Saharan Africa
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Africa a guinea pig for the feasibility of digital payment systems
The term “leapfrog” is popular among Africa tech analysts, who point to how the continent embraced mobile phones at a time when few African countries had a properly developed fixed-line network.
- Categories
- Finance, Technology
- Region
- Sub-Saharan Africa
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The surprising place where cash is becoming extinct
Somaliland, a self-declared republic in East Africa, faces high illiteracy and has an economy ravaged by a civil war. But it might just become the first cashless society on Earth.
- Categories
- Technology
- Region
- Sub-Saharan Africa
- Tags
- fintech
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This aid agency is using chatbots to beat world hunger
WFP first began to assess food needs using text messages and interactive voice response systems in Somalia and the Democratic Republic of Congo in 2014, with help from global information and audience measurement company Nielsen. This year, they expanded to using chatbots on the Facebook messenger platform. Approximately 170 million Africans use Facebook, mostly on their phones.
- Categories
- Technology
- Region
- Sub-Saharan Africa
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Huge remittances milestone for Africa as TerraPay gets South Africa license
A mobile payments and remittances startup called TerraPay may have achieved what could turn out to be a huge industry milestone in the remittances space in Africa. The startup announced today that it has secured a license from the Reserve Bank of South Africa to conduct low-value international money transfers in the country.
- Categories
- Technology
- Region
- Sub-Saharan Africa
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Vodafone launches financial inclusion project for women
The project would see groups of women under the Village Savings and Loans Scheme and Rural Project Support Network, introduced to financial inclusion opportunities including the use of Vodafone cash.
- Categories
- Uncategorized
- Region
- Sub-Saharan Africa
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Gates Foundation and PATH wire up health data in Africa using a novel approach
The partnership is digitizing and connecting Tanzania’s healthcare system, linking a fragmented array of databases and information sources. A unified system could dramatically improve efficiency, accountability and cost savings for a country of 45 million people that struggles with infectious diseases including HIV/AIDS.
- Categories
- Health Care, Technology
- Region
- Sub-Saharan Africa
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Rise of pan-African banking could raise between $490-$950bn in additional credit for sub-Saharan Africa
To date, Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA)’s financial sector remains relatively small and underdeveloped. However, African banks have started to expand their footprint across Sub- Saharan Africa. The number of cross border subsidiaries of African banks has almost tripled since 2002 and there are now ten pan-African banks (PABs) with a presence in at least ten SSA countries, and one with a presence in over 30 SSA countries.
- Categories
- Uncategorized
- Region
- Sub-Saharan Africa