Articles by Rob Katz
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Thursday
May 4
2006Gardening at the Base of the Pyramid
It?s easy to overlook food when thinking about BOP business and strategy. Food and agriculture often lack the ?wow? factor that comes with microfinance, technology, or even innovative health models. We brush by it at our own peril, however ? according to available data, food accounts...
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Wednesday
May 3
2006Microfinance and IT: Glass Half Full or Glass Half Empty?
Optimists often cite microfinance as a “development success story,” but realists know the truth - it suffers from high interest, misrepresentation of repayment rates, poor risk management, and insufficient scale. (More on the “dirty little secrets” of microfinance at the...
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Tuesday
May 2
2006IDB Launches Dedicated BOP Web Site
The Inter-American Development Bank’s Multilateral Investment Fund (MIF) has just launched a web site dedicated to base of the pyramid strategies. Curious? Check out the site: This is not about providing the same, existing products and services that have been developed for the top of...
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Tuesday
May 2
2006India’s IT Ecosystem – A BOP Success Story?
Eric Cantor blogs over at Acumen Fund about the emerging ecosystem of businesses, NGOs, development folks, and government agencies working in the Indian BOP tech sector to close the digital divide and empower low-income communities. First, an excerpt - then my take: This ecosystem is made...
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Thursday
April 27
2006BOP Geometry Lessons – From Pyramids to Circles
We talk a lot about pyramids - as in bottom of the pyramid and base of the pyramid - here at NextBillion. Now, (apologies to the math department at Council Rock High School) it?s time to start talking circles. As a follow up to last September?s Mexico conference, WRI, FMCN (New Ventures...
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Friday
April 21
2006Internship Opportunity: Emerging Markets Private Equity Association
Are you a graduate or undergraduate student interested in emerging markets and/or private equity? Want to spend the summer in Washington, D.C.? Well, EMPEA?s got a job for you: the Emerging Markets Private Equity Association (EMPEA) is hiring 2 graduate interns and 1 undergraduate intern...
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Tuesday
April 18
2006Remittances – My Two Cents
Remittances are not a substitute for aid, but their aggregate size encourages positive private sector activity that helps the BOP. This was my first thought when I saw Ignacio?s posting at the Poverty and Growth blog. He quotes the World Bank?s Raj Nallari, who criticizes government...
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Monday
April 17
2006Microcredit: More Harm Than Good?
Thomas Dichter, a returned Peace Corps volunteer and development consultant to USAID and the World Bank, has written what Alex aptly calls a ?provocative and controversial essay?in which he claims that microcredit is not nearly as good a tool as it’s made out to be, and that what the...
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