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Scaling the Last-Mile Distribution Industry With Data-Driven Lending
Low-income consumers in emerging markets rely heavily on last-mile distributors (LMDs) for access to life-changing products, from smartphones to solar home systems. But as Erin Junio at Angaza explains, despite the critical role they play in the sale and distribution of these products, LMDs struggle to access the funding they need to scale. She explores the funding challenges these businesses face — and how data-driven innovations in lending are emerging to close this financing gap.
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Beyond Risk: How Addressing Transaction Costs Can Boost Lending to Agricultural SMEs in Africa
Providing loans to agricultural enterprises in East Africa can be a complicated task, with challenges ranging from higher origination costs to arduous journeys to conduct due diligence. As Brian Milder of Aceli Africa explains, that makes many lenders reluctant to serve these businesses — and this lack of capital is stunting the growth of local agri-SMEs. In this third article in a four-part series, he explores the barriers to financing in the industry – particularly the under-recognized role of high transaction costs in limiting capital flows – and shares how Aceli is addressing them.
- Categories
- Agriculture, Investing
- Tags
- impact investing, lending
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21st Century Investing: Why Today’s Global Challenges Call for a System-Level Approach to Impact
From climate change and embedded social inequities to global pandemics, the scope and scale of the risks facing our world have increased. But according to William Burckart and Steve Lydenberg at The Investment Integration Project, these overlapping crises are serving as wake-up calls to many investors, leading them to take a more holistic approach to today's complex challenges. They describe this growing class of “system-level investors,” and how they're going beyond both conventional and sustainable investing to address global problems on a deep, systemic level.
- Categories
- Investing
- Tags
- corporations, ESG, impact investing
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‘Earn While You Learn’: Empowering Indigenous Students with Professional Skills in India and Beyond
Some 8.6% of India’s population is indigenous, and this tribal population faces a vicious cycle of poverty fueled by a lack of formal learning opportunities. After growing up in poverty himself, Achyuta Samanta founded the Kalinga Institute of Social Sciences to provide vocational training to tribal students. He explains how the model, which includes an "earn while you learn" program, supports economic growth, entrepreneurship and community development, enabling students to work themselves and their families out of poverty.
- Categories
- Education
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Climate-Positive Agriculture: How Investors Can Support Smallholder Farmers – While Also Regenerating the Environment
Global agricultural demand is expected to increase by about 50% from 2013 to 2050, as the world's population is projected to reach nearly 10 billion. Smallholder farmers in Africa and Latin America are well-positioned to meet this growing need – but expanding their current unsustainable farming practices could cause massive climate and environmental consequences. Bianca Samson, Flavia Howard and Kusi Hornberger at Dalberg share how investing in regenerative, climate-smart agriculture can boost food security and benefit smallholders, investors and the environment.
- Categories
- Agriculture, Environment, Investing
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Achieving an Equitable COVID-19 Recovery Through Safe Housing: Why it’s Time for Financial Institutions to Step Up
Over 1.5 billion people around the world live in crowded housing with limited sanitary amenities — and during COVID-19, these households are at a particularly high risk of contracting or spreading the virus. Patrick McAllister explains how private-sector financial institutions can play a critical role in achieving equitable social and economic COVID-19 recovery by supporting home-related financing for low-income essential workers.
- Categories
- Coronavirus, Finance
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India Needs Over $900 Billion in Climate Finance by 2030: This Roadmap Can Mobilize Private Sector Investment
India is committed to lowering its greenhouse gas emissions, but its goals under the Paris Agreement are not ambitious enough. Simmi Sareen at GreenFunder and Shravan Shankar at the BIG Green Collaborative argue that the country must focus on increasing energy storage and efficiency, decreasing agriculture and manufacturing emissions, and adapting to a more hostile climate. They explore how innovative and scalable technology can address these priorities by 2030 — and how strengthening India’s climate financing structures can help generate the $100 billion in yearly private investment this will require.
- Categories
- Energy, Environment, Investing
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Recovery 2021: Introducing NextBillion’s New COVID-19 Series
For over a year, COVID-19 and its economic fallout have been inescapable facts of life, taking a particularly heavy toll on vulnerable communities – and the businesses that serve them. Now, with a vaccine promising to gradually bring an end to this historic crisis, we anticipate that the conversation around the pandemic will evolve, as impact-focused businesses and development organizations move to a longer-term effort to “build back better.” To highlight these discussions, NextBillion is expanding upon our COVID-19 coverage through a new special series called “Recovery 2021.”
- Categories
- Coronavirus, Social Enterprise
