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Lending to Rwandan Farmers Boosts Financial Position of MFIs
With commercial banks shying away from financing the agriculture sector because they consider it to be highly risky, MFIs remain the biggest lenders to farmers--especially smallholder farmers.
- Categories
- Agriculture, Finance
- Region
- Sub-Saharan Africa
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Viewpoint: Can South Asia be a fintech leader?
The World Bank reckons 560 million people, including 180 million in Pakistan and Bangladesh, are detached from the financial system. Perfect, you would think, for nimble mobile money services or challenger banks.
- Categories
- Finance, Technology
- Region
- South Asia
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Impact Investing Must Hold Chinese Companies to Same Ethical Standards
As China stocks gain foreign investors, their ESG impact should be assessed lest global investors practice hypocrisy.
- Categories
- Investing
- Region
- Asia Pacific
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NatSave, Mastercard partner to drive digital transformation and financial inclusion in Zambia
The partnership supports Zambia’s National Financial Inclusion Strategy 2017 to 2022, which aims to increase financial inclusion from 59 per cent to 80 per cent.
- Categories
- Finance
- Region
- Sub-Saharan Africa
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Viewpoint: Bill McGlashan’s firing exposes hypocrisy in impact investing
McGlashan, who was once described by the New York Times as resembling "a Buddhist monk," led a multibillion-dollar investing vehicle designed (among other things) to "expand access to educational attainment." Simultaneously, he was allegedly spending $250,000 of his own money to bribe his son's way into a selective university.
- Categories
- Investing
- Region
- North America
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Viewpoint: Why CEOs are still missing the point on social impact
According to the survey, while American business leaders feel more pressure than ever to speak out on social issues, they still would rather not. Instead, they’d prefer to focus on the bottom line: a plurality say their most important communications goal this year is to sell their products and services.
- Categories
- Entrepreneurship
- Region
- North America
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A microloan can help poor people in Bangladesh. What about New Jersey?
The Grameen Bank, one of the pioneers of microfinance, which has been operating its program in Bangladesh since the 1970s, released a study on one of its programs in New Jersey. The program works like this: Low-income women apply for a microloan as part of a small group, and all members of the group are accountable for ensuring each member makes payments.
- Categories
- Finance
- Region
- North America
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Nala has built a hassle-free, offline mobile money payment platform for Africa
While at least a hundred million Africans hold mobile money accounts, the process of transacting over the services is difficult, so Nala made an application that acts as an interface on top of the unstructured supplementary service data layer to make money transfers and payments much easier.
- Categories
- Finance
- Region
- Sub-Saharan Africa
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After the scandal and schadenfreude of #VarsityBlues (link opens in a new window) fade away, will TPG and other big #impactinvesting (link opens in a new window) players lea… https://t.co/MazecTx8lP (link opens in a new window) -
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ATTN #Jobseekers (link opens in a new window): @mix_market (link opens in a new window) seeks applicants for MIX Ambassador internships in Hyderabad, India. Apply by 4/30:… https://t.co/394QGvtNfM (link opens in a new window)