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In Asia, more equality means less poverty
The fate of the poor is also linked to other sectors and regions through migration, trade and remittances. For growth in these areas to contribute to poverty reduction in a larger way, it is essential to establish incentives for companies to utilize labor-intensive production. This requires enabling investment and appropriate trade, industrial and labor policies that make it profitable for businesses to hire workers. ...
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- International Herald Tribune
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How to turn the poor into consumers
Growth opportunities in the region of 50 to 100 per cent are available if companies find that elusive ’sweet spot’ of function, price, distribution and volume. Take the Monsoon Hungama mobile phone. GSM mobile phones were first available in India for $1,000. As the price fell to $300, use gradually spread. When Reliance, a mobile phone provider, introduced the Monsoon Hungama promotion of 100 free minutes with a multimedia handset for $10 and a monthly payment of $9.25, the compan...
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- The Financial Times
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Microfinance key to poverty fight
With little income or collateral, poor people are seldom able to obtain loans from banks and other formal financial institutions. Microfinance is one way of fighting poverty in rural areas. Through microfinance institutions such as credit unions, financial non-governmental organisations and even commercial banks, poor people can obtain small loans, receive money from relatives working abroad and safeguard their savings. Microfinance has changed the perception that poor people are not cred...
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- The Financial Times
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The next computing Kumbh mela
I believe that the future of computing will be driven not by existing users but by new users. These are going to be from the world?s emerging markets. They need computing at the price of a cellphone. They need computing as a utility. The next big thing in computing will be about building a platform which makes the two most important creations of the past ? the computer and the internet ? available to the next users at a fraction of today?s prices. It will be about making hardware, softwar...
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- The Business Standard
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A Radical Approach that Delivers on Two Bottom Lines: Financial and Social
First discussed in a Harvard Business Review article and then in Foreign Affairs , this transformative business idea is the mission of C.K. Prahalad, who has been called one of the top 20 business thinkers today. He brings this radical concept to life in his book that launches Wharton School Publishing/Pearson new business imprint, THE FORTUNE AT THE BOTTOM OF THE PYRAMID: Eradicating Poverty Through Profits (Publication Date: August 25, 2004; $27.95 hardcover). T...
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- Press release from Wharton School Publishing
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Away on Business: Making a Difference
Working in poverty-stricken areas gives corporate travelers an up-close look at global problems such as disease, illiteracy or injustice. It also puts them in a position to bring about change. ’When executives are in disadvantaged areas, the first instinct is to do something immediately ... and reach into their pockets for money, said Lelei LeLaulu, president and chief executive of ...
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- Reuters
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Shipments of portable computers showed no signs of slowing in Central and Eastern Europe and the Mi
According to the latest PC Tracker numbers for the CEMA region from IDC, while the total PC market growth continues to slow, slipping 21.3% this year, portable shipments soared by more than 60% compared to the same quarter in 2003. In addition, the desktop market expanded by 16% and the x86 server market by 26.6% year-over-year. The sales figures from CEMA are vital trend indicators, because while the numbers are small compared to other areas of the globe, the region represents untapped gr...
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- eMarketer.com
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Trust in Poor Built Consumer Empire For Israeli Brothers
Jerry Azarkman, a 51-year-old former door-to-door peddler, and his brother Ron, 48, have built a small retail empire that caters to newcomers who are eager to join the consumer market but sometimes feel alienated from it. What the Azarkmans have grasped is that the poor can be good credit risks, if the retailer gives them reason to be grateful someone has taken a chance on them. Read full article here. ...
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- The Wall Street Journal
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