-
Gates Foundation gives Heifer Intl $42.8M for Africa project
By Chuck Bartels A $42.8 million grant from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation that was announced Friday will enable Heifer International to expand a program designed to reduce poverty among 1 million people living on rural dairy farms in three East African countries. An important focus of the effort will be bringing more women into positions of responsibility, both on family farms and at regional milk chilling plants. The grant is for parts of Keny...
-
The Age of Ambition
By Nicholas D. Kristof With the American presidential campaign in full swing, the obvious way to change the world might seem to be through politics. But growing numbers of young people are leaping into the fray and doing the job themselves. These are the social entrepreneurs, the 21st-century answer to the student protesters of the 1960s, and they are some of the most interesting people here at the World Economic Forum (not only because they?re half the age of ever...
-
The Tata Invasion
If Tata is so powerful, why have so few Americans heard of it? In large part, because so much of its fortune has been made selling to its home market and to other developing countries, rather than to the U.S. and Europe. Historically, developing-country firms that have become global powerhouses?like Japanese companies decades ago or, more recently, Korean companies like Samsung?were companies that, in addition to dominating their domestic markets, were heavily oriented toward exports to the West...
-
Bill Gates Issues Call for Kinder Capitalism
Free enterprise has been good to Bill Gates. But later today, the Microsoft Corp. chairman will call for a revision of capitalism. In a speech at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, the software tycoon plans to call for a creative capitalism that uses market forces to address poor-country needs that he feels are being ignored. ? We have to find a way to make the aspects of capitalism that serve wealthier people serve poorer people as well,...
-
Unreasonable people power
The growing influence of social entrepreneurs Ten years ago, few people had heard the term social entrepreneur. Now, to be a social entrepreneur is to be sought after by politicians and businessmen alike for your potential to solve big social challenges in innovative ways. Governments, increasingly struggling to meet society?s demands, are desperate for help from someone more creative than the typical bureaucrat. Businesses, as this week?s special repor...
-
Going global
The British brand of corporate responsibility is seen as the gold standard, says Julia Cleverdon, chief executive of Business in the Community, which for 25 years has been championing the cause in Britain. And it is true that Britain, especially London, has been a hive of innovation in CSR since the mid-1990s, thanks to a creative cluster of think-tanks, NGOs, consultancies and inventive bosses. But according to Simon Zadek of AccountAbility, a think-tank that has been part of the cl...
-
Stove for the Developing World’s Health
Envirofit has been visiting rural areas to study factors like the ergonomics of cooking habits and preferred color schemes. In India, women tend to squat while cooking, making height an important consideration. Envirofit will offer a variety of sleek ceramic stoves from single to multipot, with and without chimneys, and with colors like apple red, baby blue and gold. The cost is to start at $10 to $20 and run to $150 to $200.. ?The women and the families that are buying...
-
Third World First
By Jeremy Khan Bapi Das, seated next to an open sewer in a teeming slum on the outskirts of this Indian city, combs his hand through his hair, smooths his moustache, and prepares to enter the global financial system. Das, a 42-year-old commercial painter, grins as a worker for a local micro-finance group frames his face with a digital camera and zooms in. It is an important moment. His photo will adorn a smart card that, with help from a mobile phone and a finge...
The Best of NextBillion in Your Inbox Each Week!
Subscribe to NB Notes for news, jobs & on-the-ground insights from the world of emerging markets business.
We respect your privacy. Your information is safe and will never be shared.
Don't miss out. Subscribe today.