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Minister Inaugurates Information Centres in UER

Government is to establish Community Information Centres (CIC) in all the 230 constituencies to help create awareness on Information and Communication Technology (ICT) in the rural communities. It will also bridge the ICT gap between rural and urban centres and expose the people to the relevant information needed to combat poverty. Mr Albert Kan Dapaah, Minister of Communications, made this known at the inauguration of two Community Information Centres at Bawku and Bolgatanga in the U...

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GNA

Trickle-Up Economics, by David Armstrong with Naazneen Karmali

How low-tech, low-cost designs are helping the poorest farmers on Earth grow their way out of poverty. The famed economist Jeffrey Sachs prescribes classic foreign aid in his recent book, The End of Poverty : hundreds of billions of dollars, overseen by the United Nations and the World Bank, for health clinics, schools, bridges, roads and water supplies. Then there’s Paul Polak, the 71-year-old founder of a nonprofit group that takes a minimalist app...

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Forbes

Designs On Poverty, by David Armstrong

Village Internet kiosks, rural wireless networks and solar-powered electricity generation all have been touted as high-tech salvation for those living in poverty. But for the poorest of the poor, getting online market quotes or wireless access takes a backseat to simply increasing income from daily labor. A growing cadre of designers is creating smart, cheap, low-tech devices that can often provide a more immediate boost out of the poverty trap. XACCESS BICYCLES Many bicycles in...

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Forbes

Spreading services in rural areas ? RBI proposes two business models

Banks may soon be allowed to use business correspondents for disbursal of credit and collection of interest, in the rural sector. This is one of the recommendations of the Reserve Bank of India’s Internal Group on Rural Credit and Micro Finance. The group has suggested the business facilitator model for providing non-financial services and the business correspondent model for providing financial support services to rural and farm sectors. Banks can use the business fac...

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The Hindu Business Line

World Bank, China join hands to fight poverty

The World Bank yesterday launched the China Development Marketplace (DM), a programme to identify and support innovative development ideas which can be expanded or replicated in China. The project is in partnership with the State Council Leading Group Office for Poverty Reduction and Development (LGOP) and the Ministry of Civil Affairs. Country-level Development Marketplaces (CDMs) are mini marketplaces for innovative ideas that address local development chal...

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China Daily

Bioenergy Touted to ’’Green’’ Cities and Aid Farmers, by Stephen Leahy

A pellet of dried grass. Not much to look at, but the tiny ball symbolises a technology that experts say can help meet our surging demand for energy while curbing poverty and global warming especially in developing countries where vast rural populations with no access to electricity and rapidly-expanding mega cities vie for material resources. Pelletised grass is just one form of bioenergy, which includes, biogas, bioethanol and biodiesel from crops such as sugar cane and beet, maize...

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IPS

ZABG Set to Upgrade E-Banking

The Zimbabwe Allied Banking Group (ZABG) is working towards upgrading its e-banking technology into a fully-fledged internet and phone banking system which it expects to be in full swing by the end of this month. In an interview with the Herald Business, an official from the banking group said: E-banking is already in operation. However, we are now working towards selecting the appropriate software for the system before implementing it. E-banking, an electronic...

e-choupal to cast the rural Net wide

The ITC e-choupal network aims to cover over 100,000 Indian villages, representing a sixth of rural India and linking up more than 10 million farmers, over the next decade. ITC today won the ?Corporate Social Responsibility Award 2004? from The Energy and Resources Institute (Teri) for its e-choupal initiative. The award is designed to encourage social responsibility processes within the corporate sector. ITC e-choupal, an information technology-based interventi...

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Business Standard