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The Big Idea: (UPDATED) Simple Truths About Mobile Money
Wow, the role of mobile money has been hotly discussed across the mainstream media in recent weeks - even in Slate. There is much that I agree with in that article, and in a related critique of technology-centered development by Kentaro Toyama in CNN. So let’s unpack some of the conclusions presented in these two articles. (UPDATED: The Slate authors respond to this post).
- Categories
- Technology
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Weekly Roundup – 2-26-12: Making a Better Cookstove
Global Alliance for Clean Cookstoves’ ‘100 by 20’ goal calls for 100 million homes to adopt clean and efficient stoves and fuels by 2020.
Key to reaching that goal is creating one industry standard defining what constitutes a “clean” cookstove.- Categories
- Technology
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Kenya: Total’s Solar Kits Target Poor Households
Total Kenya is banking on portable solar kits for lighting and charging of mobile phones to break into the Kenyan renewable energy market.
- Categories
- Energy, Technology
- Region
- Sub-Saharan Africa
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NexThought Monday: Imaginary Engineers
The dabbawallahs, or "box people," deliver about 200,000 home cooked meals daily to about 80,000 offices at lunch time and have achieved six sigma status. This low-tech operation shows systems improvement is not just about applying the newest technology or management principle to an organization.
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- Education, Technology
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The Quiet Revolution in Social Impact
There are currently 30 million African migrants who have left their home countries to find work elsewhere. They support more than 300 million people in their home countries, remitting essential food and goods, and in aggregate represent more than $10b in annual economic activity. This is an economy without an infrastructure, however, relying on informal channels and bribes to function.South African entrepreneur Suzana Moreira is working to change that. Her startup moWozauses SMS to help African migrants order, pay for, and select a place for parcel pickup.
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- Impact Assessment, Technology
- Region
- Sub-Saharan Africa
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The Future of mHealth: Mobile Phones Improve Care in Developing World
People in developing nations depend on mobile phones to access health services and prevent disease, as mobile technology creates a platform for improving healthcare in remote, underserved areas.
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- Health Care, Technology
- Tags
- public health
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Mobile Phones Will Not Save the Poorest of the Poor
Entrepreneurs, businesses, NGOs, and governments exalt mobile technology as a game-changing tool to fight global poverty. But what if our eagerness to connect the world is inadvertently exacerbating the global economic divide? The cost of cellphone-based services is hurting huge swaths of the developing world.
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- Technology
- Region
- Sub-Saharan Africa
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Are Mobile Solutions Overhyped?
Are mobiles just another high-tech solution to what are essentially systemic and deeply rooted problems? Are mobile solutions for combating global poverty overhyped?
- Categories
- Technology