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Improving COVID-19 Vaccine Distribution Around the World: Leveraging Partnerships and Technology to Optimize Medical Supply Chains
Effective vaccine distribution is key to overcoming the COVID-19 pandemic in low- and middle-income countries. Similar vaccination efforts for routine childhood diseases have been widely successful, but targeting an adult population presents unique challenges, say Wade Warren at Deloitte Consulting and Marian W. Wentworth at Management Sciences for Health. They explore four challenges that vaccine distribution efforts will face – and four tried-and-proven ways to improve the process.
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- Coronavirus, Health Care, Transportation
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Delivering Babies in the Dark: How Solar Systems Can Enhance Health Service Delivery in Rural Medical Facilities
The healthcare systems of vulnerable communities across the globe are being hindered by a lack of electricity, but solar technology can offer solutions, say Tokozile N. Ngwenya and John Keane at SolarAid and Hannah Blair and Siena Hacker at CLASP. They explain how the Efficiency for Access Coalition has partnered with SolarAid to equip rural health facilities in Malawi and Zambia with solar systems, and explore what needs to happen to scale these approaches.
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- Energy, Health Care
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Doing Good By Selling Well: How Social Enterprises Can Transform Their Sales Strategies by Boosting Customers’ ‘Decision Intelligence’
A social enterprise may have a brilliant product, local production and an affordable price point – but unless it has an effective and ethical sales strategy, it will struggle to fulfill its mission, says Roy Whitten of Whitten & Roy Partnership. He explains how traditional, pressure-filled sales methods can create distrust among customers and encourage bad behavior among salespeople, and explores the advantages of a more ethical approach based on boosting customers' "decision intelligence."
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- Social Enterprise
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Creativity, Culture and Capital: Why Impact Investors Should Recognize the Untapped Potential of the Global Creative Economy
Impact investors have been overlooking a large and rapidly growing sector, one driven by women, youth and other overlooked workers and entrepreneurs and aligned with many key impact priorities: the creative economy. Laura Callanan at Upstart Co-Lab, Fran Sanderson at Nesta and Carolina Biquard at Fundación Compromiso explain why the industry is a powerful force for social and economic development, and share insights from a recent report from Creativity, Culture & Capital, a new initiative that seeks to develop the global creative economy through impact investing.
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- Investing, Social Enterprise
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The Resilience of Indian Microfinance: Why the Sector Has Successfully Navigated the COVID-19 Pandemic
When a crisis hits a financial system or economy at large, the microfinance sector is usually among the worst impacted, since it caters to the most economically vulnerable segments of the population. As Sudip Bandyopadhyay at Inditrade explains, that's what happened to Indian microfinance when COVID-19 struck — yet the sector has shown remarkable resilience in weathering the pandemic. He explores some effective measures Indian microfinance institutions and policymakers have taken to address these historic challenges.
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- Coronavirus, Finance
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Below the Tip of the Iceberg: Why Systems Change is the Key to Scaling Innovations and Solving Development Challenges
In recent years there has been an increased focus on systems change in the development sector, in response to growing awareness of how underlying systemic causes are perpetuating many global challenges. María Boa-Alvarado at CIMMYT, Lennart Woltering at One CGIAR and Marcos Sanjuán at CRS-El Salvador discuss the benefits of this approach, as applied to the issue of land degradation in Central America. They explore how their organizations are using a systems thinking tool, the iceberg model, to better understand the root causes of this problem – and to provide lasting solutions.
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- Agriculture, Environment, Technology
- Tags
- innovation, scale, systems change
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Supporting Microfinance During the Pandemic: Lessons From a COVID-19 Response Program
The COVID-19 crisis has had serious impacts on the microfinance industry and the micro and small enterprises it typically serves, leading to a decrease in both the quality and volume of microfinance institution (MFI) portfolios. Mathilde Bauwin of ADA explains how the organization designed and implemented a response program to help its partner MFIs overcome the pandemic's challenges. She shares lessons learned during the process, which could be useful in helping MFIs navigate future crises.
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- Coronavirus, Finance
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Opportunity or Threat: Are Healthy Partnerships Possible Between Digital Financial Services and Microfinance Institutions in Bangladesh?
Microfinance institutions in Bangladesh reach over 32 million customers with a loan portfolio of around US $9 billion. According to Jakirul Islam at Bank Asia, partnerships with digital financial services (DFS) could benefit both microfinance and DFS providers and their customers – but these partnerships are not functioning at their full potential. He shares four key benefits that are driving interest in these collaborations, and explores their inherent challenges – and some partnership models that could address them.
- Categories
- Finance, Technology
