NextBillion - A WDI Publication

Africa: Stanford University to Explore Entrepreneurship and Development in Continent

On Saturday, January 29th, Stanford University will host its fifth annual Stanford Africa Forum. This year the conference will explore Entrepreneurship and Development in Africa. The topic of entrepreneurship is particularly relevant to Africa. In recent years, there has been a lot of discussion in the development community that socioeconomic advancement is better achieved through business (entrepreneurship and social enterprise) than through traditional aid. Many iterations...

Source

allAfrica.com (link opens in a new window)

Region

Sub-Saharan Africa

SKS Cuts Interest Rate to 24.55%

SKS Microfinance, the only listed microfinance institution (MFI) in the country, has reduced interest rates from 26.69 per cent to 24.55 per cent. The change would apply uniformly across the country, with effect from January 11. "The company will not collect any credit shield charge, loan processing fee or card fee. With this, all effective interest rates will remain at 24.55 per cent (depreciating), or a flat 12.55 per cent a year, for all future disbursements," the company said in a f...

Source

Business Standard (link opens in a new window)

Region

South Asia

$2.5 Million Prize for Transforming Banking Sector in Haiti

SEATTLE and PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti, Jan. 10, 2011 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and the U.S. government, through the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), announced today that Haitian mobile operator Digicel won a $2.5 million award from the Haiti Mobile Money Initiative (HMMI). Digicel was recognized for being the first to launch a mobile money service in Haiti, Tcho Tcho Mobile, that meets the competition’s stringent criteria. This award,...

Source

PR Newswire (link opens in a new window)

Region

Latin America

Half of Tanzania?s Population on Phone

A research team at the University of Dar es Salaam says half the Tanzanian population is currently hooked to mobile phones, and that it takes just a handset to run a business in the country. Led by Prof Ophelia Mascarenhas of the university, there is no need for offices, visiting cards or huge capital investments. He is joined by Dr. Raphael Mmasi and Dr. Hezron Makundi of the Tanzania Commission for Science and Technology (COSTECH) in his findings. The team however re...

Source

AfricaNews.com (link opens in a new window)

Region

Sub-Saharan Africa

East Africa Poised to Tap a Reborn South Sudan

NAIROBI/KAMPALA, (Reuters) - East African nations could reap trade and investment opportunities worth billions of dollars to help develop south Sudan if it splits from the north, but they will have to compete with bigger rivals like China to do so. Southerners are expected to vote overwhelmingly in favour of separation in a referendum next week, a vote that follows decades of civil war with the north and, the south says, economic and political m...

Source

Stabroek News (link opens in a new window)

Region

Sub-Saharan Africa

Impact Investing in the Poor, the Next Big Thing

Over the next 10 years, investors across the world will not just be preoccupied with financial returns, but will also pay closer attention to the social, environmental and development impacts of their activities, says a report. This will see impact investment, as this trend is known, rake in up to $667 billion in profits over the period and achieve the billing of the newest emerging asset class of the next decade, according to the report prepared by JP Morgan and Rockefeller Foundation....

Source

The East African (link opens in a new window)

Region

Sub-Saharan Africa

Govt to De-risk Home Loans to Poor

New Delhi The government is in the process of setting up a mortgage guarantee fund which will cover the risk of home loans given to the poor by banks and housing finance companies, Minister of Housing and Urban Poverty Alleviation Kumari Selja said. "Housing finance companies (HFCs) and banks hesitate to serve the low-income market for a variety of reasons such as inability to assess credit worthiness, uncertain cash flows and lower profits," she said while addressing t...

Source

Express India (link opens in a new window)

Region

South Asia

The Profits of Nonprofit

In the beginning, they called her a fool. When pharmaceutical chemist Victoria Hale told friends and colleagues that she wanted to start a nonprofit pharma company, they laughed at her, said it was career suicide, that it couldn’t be done. "About 90 percent said that in strong or gentle words," recalls Hale, who had previously worked at the US Food and Drug Administration and Genentech. "But I knew I wanted to try." And so she did. In 1998, Hale wrote a business plan, gathered seed ...

Source

The Scientist (link opens in a new window)