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Learning From Failure: Lessons From Nigeria About Integrating Technology Into Rural Health Systems
A study showed that most people living in a Nigerian territory lacked access to health care, leading to a radical eHealth pilot project. That pilot failed, but lessons learned ultimately led to a stronger and more sustainable eHealth framework in Nigeria and can help others who hope to integrate technology into health systems, especially in limited-resource settings.
- Categories
- Health Care, Technology
- Tags
- data, failure, rural development
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Social Business Roundup: Building Our Immunity to Anti-Vaxxers, Solar Loans With a Side of Health, and SRI Goes Robo
There’s a crisis of trust in the world, some of it well earned – and some, like skepticism about vaccines, completely unwarranted. We cover an alarming uptick in the anti-vax movement's profile, an effort to pair solar loans with health care in Ghana, and the emergence of "robo-SRI" in this news roundup.
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- Energy, Health Care, Investing, Social Enterprise, Technology
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Digital Tools for Impact and Scale to Reduce Extreme Poverty
Ana Pantelic writes that Fundación Capital is using tablet-based applications and e-learning platforms to change the way that families living in extreme poverty – and the program mentors who work with them – access information and build local capacity. By integrating digital solutions into its work, the organization has improved and standardized the quality of training, and as a result, scaled national responses to eliminating poverty.
- Categories
- Education, Technology
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Beyond Imagination: GE, Miller Center Helping Keep Moms, Children Healthy
A pilot called healthymagination Mother and Child – a unique partnership between Santa Clara University’s Miller Center for Social Entrepreneurship, based in Silicon Valley, and GE, which is investing $20 million in the joint venture – accelerates much-needed medical innovations in nine countries across sub-Saharan Africa.
- Categories
- Health Care, Social Enterprise, Technology
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It’s the Ecosystem, Stupid: Exploring the “digital poverty stack” – Part 2
In the first post in this series, we proposed that donors and governments advance digital and financial inclusion by focusing more on creating public goods that enable the broader ecosystem, rather than on peripheral innovation in service delivery. In this second post, we discuss the implications of this shift and highlight some new efforts to move the fields in the right direction.
- Categories
- Social Enterprise, Technology
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The AgTech Pedestal Problem: How to Bring Innovation Down to Earth
Without the knowledge to operate it and systems to maintain it, technology is a liability rather than an asset to a farmer. It cannot work in isolation. We must be careful not to place AgTech on a pedestal; AgTech can only be successful if it is grounded in the realities of the developing world farmer. But we're already seeing several examples of that emerging from "Silicon Plateau."
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- Agriculture, Social Enterprise, Technology
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Curing Silicon Valley’s Myopia: Ross Baird, on How to Change the Narrative Around Investment and Innovation
Silicon Valley is home to some of the most brilliant innovators and deep-pocketed investors in the world. So why are they focusing so much of their time and resources on solving petty problems, while ignoring countless more pressing concerns? Village Capital's executive director Ross Baird discusses the problem and some potential solutions in this podcast.
- Categories
- Investing, Social Enterprise, Technology
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Weekly Roundup: Uruguay smokes ‘Big Tobacco’, Safaricom ups the ante, critic pens a (RED) herring
Uruguay wins a major legal battle against a huge tobacco company, Safaricom ups the ante in its battle with banks in Kenya, and our editors take issue with a provocative critique of a popular "social venture" in this Roundup of the week's social business developments.
- Categories
- Health Care, Investing, Social Enterprise, Technology