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These Hilarious Inflated Backpacks Are Actually Delivering Cheap Local Energy To The Rural Poor
Millions of rural villagers around the world still cook with wood and charcoal, with all the limitations and inconveniences that implies. Women spend time and energy collecting and hauling wood, which contributes to deforestation and takes them away from more productive uses of their time. Worse, burning wood and charcoal inside homes produces extremely unhealthy fumes.Biogas produced from organic waste, such as cow dung and farm cuttings is a good alternative, because it's lightweight and clean burning. But it's not possible to have a bio-digester—a system for breaking down the waste to produce biogas—in every person's home. That's too expensive and impractical. You need upwards of five or six households invested in a digester to cover its costs.
- Categories
- Energy
- Region
- Sub-Saharan Africa
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Community Foundations Embrace Impact Investing
A small, but growing, number of community foundations are starting to embrace impact investing in a big way.
- Categories
- Uncategorized
- Tags
- impact investing, lending
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Q&A On Impact Investing In Africa With Issam Chleuh
Africa Impact Group has been identified as a leader in impact investing across the continent, investing in funds, organizations and companies with the intention of generating measurable social and environmental impact along with financial return.
- Categories
- Impact Assessment
- Region
- Sub-Saharan Africa
- Tags
- impact investing
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Lok Capital aims to raise $45 million fund by June
MUMBAI: Lok Capital, the Rockefeller Foundation-backed impact investor, aims to raise $45 million (about Rs 270 crore) by June as part of the initial close of its third India-focused fund. Lok Fund III, announced a couple of months ago, has a final target corpus of $100 million and expects to raise capital commitments from development financial institutions such as International Finance Corporation (IFC), Proparco and CDC Group.
- Categories
- Uncategorized
- Region
- South Asia
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Kerala to Build Largest Social Entrepreneur Network of Women
After the success of its women empowerment initiatives such as Kudumbashree — a women oriented, community-based, poverty reduction project — and She-Taxi, South Indian state Kerala is gearing up to set another landmark seeking to create the country’s largest social entrepreneurship network of women.
- Categories
- Uncategorized
- Region
- South Asia
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Never Mind Corporate Responsibility, Companies Can Solve Actual Social Problems
In the world of management research, Michael Porter is a rockstar. His "Five Forces" framework is a key tool in the field of strategy and his books have canonical status within MBA programs (even if most students haven't actually read all 592 pages of Competitive Advantage). In an industry known for fast-talking gurus, Porter—who teaches at Harvard Business School—is an intellectual.
- Categories
- Impact Assessment
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Bill Gates’ Plan to Help the Developing World Profit From Its Sewage
Bill Gates walks up to the water tap, but before he can drink, his entourage pulls him to one side. One woman takes off his glasses and rearranges his hair. Another dabs on a little makeup. And, at one point, someone hands him a Mason jar.
- Categories
- Agriculture, Health Care
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7 Family Planning Trends to Watch for in 2015
This year promises to be an interesting one for international family planning. Here are seven issues and trends to watch for:
- Categories
- Health Care
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