NextBillion - A WDI Publication

Banking on a Mobile Business

I t sounds like the lead-up to a bad joke: What do a mobile phone and a bank clerk have in common? Certainly the differences are more obvious than any similarities, but the two do share one crucial likeness: they both provide access to financial services. Mobile banking is becoming an increasingly popular service across Africa, thanks to a combination of both simplicity and availability. The ability to access basic financial services, such as deposits and transfer...

Source

Business Today (link opens in a new window)

Region

Sub-Saharan Africa

Villgro Incubatee Raises VC Investment

Villgro Innovations Foundation is pleased to announce that Skymet, a company incubated by Villgro, has successfully raised a significant round of investment from Omnivore Capital for 33% of it’s equity. Jatin Singh founded and promotes Skymet ...

Region

South Asia

Backpack Farms: Targeted Solutions to Help African Farmers Become More Resistant to Drought

This is part of a series highlighting innovations and possibilities for action for the famine in Somalia. Most news frames the famine and political conflict as near unsolvable; we’re examining the on-the-ground measures that can help - from the large scale and political to the local and preventative. Looking at graphic photos of starving Somalis or reading about the perils of drought in East Afr...

Source

Dowser (link opens in a new window)

Region

Sub-Saharan Africa

Senegalese Village Wipes Out Malaria With Mosquito Nets And Fines For Not Using Them

We tend to think of innovation as something that happens at startups and dotcoms. But sometimes, the most powerful innovations happen at the end of a bumpy dirt road in rural Africa--in this case, a Senegalese village that has figured out how to virtually eradicate malaria. As the father of a 7-year-old daughter, I was touched and inspired by the story of another dad I met during my recent trip to Senegal. I visited El Hadj Diop in his hometown of Thienaba, Senegal, where he told me the...

Source

Fast Company (link opens in a new window)

Region

Sub-Saharan Africa

Rags2Riches Empowers Impoverished Women to Turn Recycled Scrap into Haute Couture

Reese Fernandez-Ruiz was teaching children math, science, and reading skills in Payatas--one of the Philippines’ biggest dump sites--when she noticed something: local mothers were making foot rugs out of scrap cloth that was furnished to them by a group of middlemen, who got the cloth directly from a factory and retrieved the finished products to sell. The mothers made a total of 20 cents per day. Before the middlemen came along, the mothers took the scrap cloth directly from the local du...

Source

Fast Company (link opens in a new window)

Region

Asia Pacific

CSR is Dead, Long Live Social Enterprise

Corporate social responsibility (CSR) has been around as a term since the 60s but it really came to prominence in the last decade when large multinationals began to adopt the phrase to demonstrate that they were serious about delivering a positive social impact on the communities in which they operated. Some cynics felt that CSR was simply a marketing exercise, an attempt to reassure employees, garner consumer favour and stave off government regulation. Other more hawkish economists suc...

Source

Guardian.co.uk (link opens in a new window)

SMES In Egypt, Jordan to Benefit from $500 Million in U.S. Loans

The Overseas Private Investment Corp., an independent agency of the U.S. government, secured $500 million for a lending facility , of which half will be provided to Egypt and the rest to Jordan. OPIC will guarantee loans by local banks to SMEs, microfinance institutions and other approved borrowers. By filling in the gap in access to credit by SMEs in Jordan and Egypt, the initiative aims to spu...

Source

Devex News (link opens in a new window)

Categories

Uncategorized

Region

North Africa & Near East

Target: Top of the pyramid

Mainstream food brands, which have long milked the bottom of the pyramid to drive volumes, are now eyeing the top end to build value. Last month, Hindustan Unilever’s coffee brand Bru stepped up its regular brew portfolio by bringing to market Bru Exotica, a super premium coffee in three variants: Brazil, Columbia and Kilimanjaro. GlaxoSmithKline’s Horlicks too bolstered its premium credentials with the launch of Horlicks Gold at a 30 per cent premium to the base variant, in sel...

Source

Business Standard (link opens in a new window)

Region

South Asia