NextBillion - A WDI Publication

Doing business in a world divided. Where to from here?

Last week, a group of political consultants from all over the world gathered in Bali to discuss, promote and celebrate democracy. The 3-day annual conference was opened by the President, with substantive speeches reaffirming Indonesia’s commitment to the democratic way of life. The views of the leaders from the world’s single-largest Moslem population had significant impact on the attending delega...

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The Jakarta Post, Via Thomson Dialog NewsEdge (link opens in a new window)

Food for thought for financiers

When executive education students go on field trips to India, they usually head to big corporate headquarters in cities such as Bangalore, where they can see the country?s high-tech industry at work. They do not often find themselves walking the streets of Mumbai, following a group of delivery men dressed in white cotton kurtas and Gandhi caps and carrying tins of curry, rice and chapattis. But this is what a group of financiers found themselves doing as part of an executive educat...

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Financial Times (link opens in a new window)

Unilever looks to clean up in Africa

The residents of Muko stand transfixed yet suspicious, arms crossed and frowning, as the strangers who arrived that morning dance on a stage they have erected from the back of a truck. With the aid of a sound system - rare enough in south-west Uganda to draw a crowd of 150 - three easygoing young visitors pump out music and try to strike up casual conversations with the villagers. How many people ate breakfast this morning? one asks the audience, composed of women in kaleidos...

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Financial Times (link opens in a new window)

Region

Sub-Saharan Africa

Sustainable Development for the Base of the Pyramid?

Could the pitch-black villages and shantytowns of the developing world present an opportunity to alleviate poverty, improve education, goose green technology, save some energy, and create jobs -- all in one package? Count us as skeptics: We aren’t buying pie-in-the-sky this week. Yet consider the Light Up the World Foundation, a Canadian non-profit that has wedded cutting-edge electronics to solar electric Smiling children raise their hands in the air behind small woode...

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The Why Files (link opens in a new window)

Rickshaws Drive Entrepreneurship

By the moment I got down [out of the rickshaw], I forgot about it, but when I got home and had dinner and went to go to sleep, his words came back to me, he says. So I got up and went to my calculator. A few sums indicated that the driver paid nearly half his earnings in rent -- and many times over had covered the approximate 6,500-rupee cost of a rickshaw. Mr. Sarmah decided to learn more, and the next day he prepared a questionnaire. He quickly learned that f...

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Wall Street Journal (link opens in a new window)

IFC and FT Launch 2008 Sustainable Banking Awards

IFC and the Financial Times have launched the 2008 FT Sustainable Banking Awards, the leading awards for triple bottom line banking. Two new categories?Banking at the Bottom of the Pyramid, and Sustainable Investor of the Year ? have been added to the groundbreaking program. Now in their third year, the awards were created by IFC and the FT to recognize banks that have shown leadership and innovation in integrating social, environmental, and corporate governance obj...

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IFC News (link opens in a new window)

Public solutions or private enterprise?

Can the profit motive solve our energy problems? Management professor Stuart Hart of Cornell University, and physics professor emeritus Marty Hoffert of New York University consider that question with host Kai Ryssdal. ( Click here to listen to the broadcast ) TEXT OF DISCUSSION KAI RYSSDAL: If it’s tough for a small town li...

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Marketplace (link opens in a new window)

Oil PSUs board rickshaws to keep losses under check

This could turn out to be a unique protest against government?s populist decision to keep retail prices of petrol and diesel insulated from global crude prices, forcing public sector oil companies to sell at a loss. Soon you will find oil marketing companies (OMCs) like IOC , BPCL and HPCL promoting ...

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Economic Times (link opens in a new window)