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Financing the Farming of the Future
According to the World Bank, 78 percent of the world’s poor are rural poor, and many of them are farmers. If you are looking for social returns, there are few better places to invest than in agriculture. Yet, we see significant unmet capital needs. At Calvert Foundation is interested in bringing additional capital to grow this important sector and encouraging other private investors to join as well. Fair trade lending has been an important movement in the agriculture sector, and has led to the creation of critical jobs and economic activity. But how can we learn from pioneer investors and encourage capital to address the significant gaps in financing for innovations in the value chains for locally consumed crops?
- Categories
- Agriculture, Investing
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The Most Popular Posts of 2015: Which One Most Influenced You?
For the fourth year in a row, we're launching our Most Influential Post of the Year Contest – think of it as a listicle that you control. Below are the 12 most viewed articles on NB by month. Please read or re-read them and then vote for your favorite(s).
- Categories
- Agriculture, Education, Energy, Environment, Health Care, Impact Assessment, Investing, Social Enterprise, Technology
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NexThought Monday: Proof Points for a New Model of Aid
Partners in Food Solutions was founded five years ago on the conviction that Africa can and someday soon will feed itself, and that there are business solutions to humanitarian problems. Today, the CEO says, that conviction has been proved out by the organization's impact and by its growing ranks of corporate partners.
- Categories
- Agriculture
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Does Your Organization Actually Empower Women?
Although many organizations working in international development make grandiose claims of their programs’ ability to empower women, with few tools available to actually measure empowerment, it is hard to tell if these claims are based on fact. The Women’s Empowerment in Agriculture Index is one way to ensure that they are.
- Categories
- Agriculture, Impact Assessment
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Ethical Business Actions and Poverty Reduction
Poverty alleviation is the main concern of many countries. Poverty is said to be an economic, social, cultural, political and moral phenomenon. Like the issue, its solutions are multi-faceted. It requires a collective action from governments, corporations, citizens, consumers, workers, investors and educators.
- Categories
- Agriculture
- Region
- Asia Pacific
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NexThought Monday: Women Entrepreneurs to the Rescue
Ebola was always an emergency within an emergency, says Faruque Ahmed, executive director of BRAC International. Now, with the immediate threat of the disease gone, West Africans have the much-needed space to shift their energies back to tackling the even greater scourge of rural poverty and powerlessness.
- Categories
- Agriculture, Health Care
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Smallholder Farmers and Big Business: 5 Insights from the Field
Modern agricultural practices and new technologies have transformed the productivity and lives of large farmers, but often fail to reach small and very small farmers for a variety of reasons. However, some pioneer companies and organizations across the world have sustainably increased the income and livelihoods of millions of smallholder farmers, by sourcing produce from them or selling products to them. What do these pioneers tell us?
- Categories
- Agriculture, Impact Assessment
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Mercy Corps, MasterCard Foundation Launch Program to Boost Access to Financial, Informational Services for Smallholder Farmers in Kenya
New AgriFin Accelerate initiative to address barriers to access and use of financial services, especially for young women and youth.
- Categories
- Agriculture
- Region
- Sub-Saharan Africa
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