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NexThought Monday: On the Eve of Rio+20, Creating a Lasting Cookstove Market
The Global Village Energy Partnership works with a group of 400 entrepreneurs to promote clean cookstoves in East Africa. Last year, these entrepreneurs sold more than 275,000 improved cookstoves, indicating that people have accepted the value of more efficient cookstoves, and that they provide a market opportunity for creating a sustainable business model.
- Categories
- Environment
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Rio+20: Are We There Yet?
No, we are not yet there, but we may be getting closer. On Saturday, the Brazilians took over the once again informal negotiations on the outcome document. The world is fortunate in this regard, as Brazil has one of the best diplomatic corps in the business.
- Categories
- Environment
- Region
- Latin America
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Guest Post: A Letter to Rio+20 – Sustainable Development Isn’t Possible Without Land Rights
Approximately 3 billion people in the developing world live without secure legal rights to their lands, forests, and pastures. Community land rights should be a key priority in our pursuit of environmentally sustainable development. But these rights are not mentioned in the Zero Draft resolution for the upcoming Rio+20 Conference on Sustainable Development in Rio de Janeiro. This is a mistake.
- Categories
- Environment
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CleanStar Mozambique: Food, Fuel and Forests at the Bottom of the Pyramid
What on earth is Novozymes, a $1.8-billion industrial biotechnology company headquartered in Denmark, doing in Mozambique, a poor African country (per capita income: $440) where corruption is rampant and more than half of the government’s budget comes from foreign aid?
- Categories
- Environment
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A Day at Husk Power University
Acumen Fund invested in Husk Power Systems (HPS) in 2010 to help scale their innovative business model of using discarded rice husks as a source for rural off-grid electricity generation. HPS has since expanded to over 90 plants all over Bihar, India, and has launched Husk Power University (HPU), a technical training institute for future mechanics and operators for HPS. I spent a day there.
- Categories
- Education, Energy, Environment
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SOCAP: Designing the Future – New Ways of Thinking to Fix Problems from Old Ways of Thinking
Göran Carstedt, chairman of The Natural Step and former executive at Volvo and Ikea, shared his perspective on how to re-engineer capitalism during the SOCAP: Designing the Future, in Malmö, Sweden earlier this month.
"We need a new way of thinking to solve the problems caused by the old way of thinking." This was the case for many ventures presenting at the European forum.- Categories
- Environment
- Tags
- impact investing
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Avina’s Evolution: After 16 Years, the Foundation Focuses on Building Multiple Bridges
Fundación Avina describes itself as a “broker, co-investor and facilitator” across many countries in Latin America. Indeed, the organization is often working behind the scenes, building both consensus and bridges between multinational companies, governments and microenterprises, often with the goal of bringing marginalized workers into the formal economy. It’s a strategy aimed not merely at reducing poverty in the short term, but breaking the cycle for future generations.
- Categories
- Agriculture, Environment
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Achieving Sustainable Energy for All Hinges on International Cooperation and Leadership
This year was designated the International Year of Sustainable Energy for All by the UN General Assembly to raise awareness and promote the three objectives: clean energy access, energy efficiency, and renewable energy. 2012 is also the year of the Rio+20 UN Conference on Sustainable Development, to be held in late June. The moment is ripe for action, and lofty goals have been set, but where to begin?
- Categories
- Energy, Environment
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