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Seeing Beyond Silos: A More Holistic Approach to Supporting Social Entrepreneurs
If it takes a village to raise a child, then it takes an entire ecosystem to shepherd a social enterprise from inception to scale. But that ecosystem too often is splintered with investors, accelerators and other advisors sorting themselves into silos. Alex Pan and Mark Correnti, with the Miller Center for Social Entrepreneurship, advocate for a "structured collaboration," with accelerators taking the lead as honest brokers.
- Categories
- Impact Assessment, Investing, Social Enterprise
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The Under-Recognized Threat of ‘Ultra-Poverty’ – And How the World Can Tackle It
The world is likely to fall short of Sustainable Development Goal 1 to end poverty in all its forms everywhere by 2030 – unless it addresses the estimated 394 million people living in “ultra-poverty.” Concentrated in 14 countries in Africa and Asia, the ultra-poor have largely been overlooked by the movement to end poverty, receiving a small fraction of official development assistance. The Global State of Ultra Poverty report aims to change that, and Jesse Marsden, Veronica Brown and Aaron Merchen of RESULTS explore strategies that could turn the tide.
- Categories
- Impact Assessment
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From Haiti to China: 5 Pilots Begin to Reveal Digital Credit’s Uneven Impact
Demand for digital credit is growing in emerging markets, sparking opportunities for providers – and critical questions about its impact on low-income borrowers. CEGA's Digital Credit Observatory awarded five short-term pilot grants to studies in Haiti, the Dominican Republic, India and China, which provided some intriguing answers. Alexandra Wall, Natasha Beale and Carson Christiano of CEGA explore some of the studies' takeaways.
- Categories
- Finance, Impact Assessment
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How to Address the Power Imbalance in Impact Investing? Shut Up and Listen
It started with a USD 22 million investment in a farm in Ghana’s Afram Plains District. The investment was designed to reduce hunger, create jobs and provide economic opportunities for 80,000 smallholder farmers. That's not how it turned out. Gayle Peterson of Oxford's Impact Investing Programme and her colleagues explore a real-world case of impact investing gone wrong.
- Categories
- Impact Assessment, Investing
- Tags
- impact investing, research
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What was the Most Influential NextBillion Post of 2017? Vote for Your Favorite
“Fast away the old year passes.” That lyric from “Deck the Halls” always hits home this time of year – and in 2017, it resonates particularly strongly. Across the social sectors, the year often felt like a race against time (or against competing societal forces) and many of our most popular posts reflect that sense of urgency. Here are the most influential posts from the last twelve months, one from each month, in our sixth annual holiday contest. Vote early, vote often.
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Can Digital Credit Outperform Microcredit in the Developing World?
Microfinance has been hailed as a transformative force for poor households and entrepreneurs in emerging markets. But recent evidence suggests it is not the silver bullet it was once thought to be. Meanwhile, mobile phones have become ubiquitous in most developing countries, and Alexandra Wall, Natasha Beale and Carson Christiano explore whether digital credit can do a better job than microcredit in meeting the needs of the underserved.
- Categories
- Impact Assessment, Investing
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Viewpoint: Impact funds not scaling fast enough in India
There isn’t any doubt that impact investors such as Aavishkaar have made tremendous progress over the past decade since venture capital as an asset class returned in earnest to this market. Over the last seven years, 2010-2016, impact investors have put $5.2 billion to work across 485 deals, according to a McKinsey & Co. report in September. It wasn’t until 2010 that impact investments in India started to gather momentum and the last two years have been quite exceptional. Investments touched the billion-dollar mark for the first time in 2015 and scaled to nearly $1.1 billion last year.
- Categories
- Impact Assessment, Investing
- Region
- South Asia
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When Failure is Hard to Recognize: Facing Hard Truths about Microfinance
After decades of faith in the ability of tiny loans to transform people’s lives, quantitative research has revealed that microfinance rarely lives up to the hype. But in spite of their lackluster impact, microfinance projects have persisted – the question is, why? After seven years of observing various actors throughout the microfinance value chain, Erin Beck, an assistant professor at the University of Oregon, has an answer. She discusses how policymakers, MFI leaders, employees and even customers contribute to microfinance’s persistence.
- Categories
- Impact Assessment