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Study: Mobile Money Lifts Kenyan Households Out of Poverty
Since 2008, MIT economist Tavneet Suri has studied the financial and social impacts of Kenyan mobile-money services, which allow users to store and exchange monetary values via mobile phone. Her work has shown that these services have helped Kenyans save more money and weather financial storms, among other benefits.
- Categories
- Technology
- Region
- Sub-Saharan Africa
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It’s Never Been Better, Say Fintech Startups in India
One month of demonetisation has brought about an unprecedented surge in business volume for startups connecting customers with vendors cashlessly via a mobile wallet or simply a payment gateway.
- Categories
- Technology
- Region
- South Asia
- Tags
- fintech
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“Civic Tech” is One Antidote to Trumpism, and the Omidyar Network is Doubling Down Here
If you think about it, the age of Trump is tailor made for the Omidyar Network, and on several counts. First, this has never been an outfit that's placed lots of chips on securing big public policy wins in Washington, D.C.—or really even been fixated on policy at all. Instead, Omidyar has placed much of its faith in market solutions, as well as social entrepreneurs working in a decentralized fashion to reinvent the nonprofit sector and revitalize civic life. The fact that the capital of the free world is now in the hands of backward-looking reactionaries aiming to gut government makes Omidyar's vision of change all the more appealing.
- Categories
- Technology
- Tags
- innovation
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Weekly Roundup: Romanticizing Castro, Bridge’s Troubled Waters and the Benefits of Cash
NB's Weekly Roundup makes the call on whether Cuba's high quality of health care justified Castro’s means of achieving it; ponders the future of a private education company under attack from public sector foes; helps debunk the assumption that poor people, when given cash, will squander it on cigarettes and alcohol; and brings up the possibility that data, as it relates to public health, is a business opportunity.
- Categories
- Education, Health Care, Technology
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Cash Still Trumps Mobile Payments and Bitcoin in Africa
According to the World Bank’s Global Financial Inclusion Index, Africa has the highest mobile money adoption rate in the world. Worldwide, only 2 percent of the population possesses a mobile money account; in Africa, 12 percent of the population uses mobile money.
- Categories
- Technology
- Region
- Sub-Saharan Africa
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Telcos to bankroll Zimbabwe’s Health Fund
Zimbabwe telecommunications companies are in for another fiscal whammy - a new 5 cents levy on every US$1 worth of airtime and data top ups which will go into a Health Fund to resource the country's ailing health delivery sector.
- Categories
- Health Care, Technology
- Region
- Sub-Saharan Africa
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Mobile wallet firms see positive impact from new authentication rule in India
The removal of two-factor authentication for card transactions below Rs2,000 has made it easier for credit and debit card users, but digital wallets do not have much to worry from the change, industry executives and analysts said.
- Categories
- Technology
- Region
- South Asia
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Stellar Partners ICICI Bank, Enables Blockchain Money Transfers in India, Africa and Philippines
Stellar, the open blockchain platform and non-profit payment protocol has unveiled a slew of new partners including, notably, India’s largest private bank by consolidated assets ICICI, to bring low-cost, near instantaneous remittance solutions in India, the Philippines, Africa and Europe.
- Categories
- Technology
- Tags
- blockchain, fintech, remittances
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