NextBillion - A WDI Publication

The Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) were a Utopian, feel-good scheme bound to fail because no single aid agency was held responsible for anything. That was the word from New York University economics professor, William Easterly, speaking at the World Economic Forum (WEF) on Africa in Cape Town this week . Easterly described the MDGs as the worst designed incentive scheme for public policy seen in my lifetime. The MDGs are a set o...

Source

Cape Times (link opens in a new window)

Region

Sub-Saharan Africa

African leaders are seeking Iqbal Surv?s counsel ? his company, Sekunjalo Investments, has been central to the facilitation of a yet to be announced $20bn infrastructure project in a neighbouring country. Walk out of a one-and-a-half hour discussion with Dr Iqbal Surv?, who describes himself as a ?medical doctor, philanthropist and social entrepreneur? and you will disregard all the skeptics and believe that there is hope for Africa to eradicate poverty, and not in our grandchildren...

Source

Business in Africa (link opens in a new window)

Region

Sub-Saharan Africa

IBM chief calls for end to colonial companies

Excerpt: In a rare public intervention, Big Blue?s chairman and chief executive writes in today?s Financial Times that traditional multinational companies need to abandon their almost colonial approach to operations outside their home country. He cites as examples of this old-style method the way GM, Ford and his own company built factories in Europe and Asia but kept all the research and development in the US....

Source

The Financial Times (link opens in a new window)

KUWAIT: For the world’s poor getting a loan to start up a business is almost impossible, because of the strict rules most banks follow including the necessity to borrow against collateral. However, microfinancing - though not a totally new financing concept - is growing more popular now that it helps the poor and yet manages to get a bit of cash for the lenders. Microfinance can be defined as the provision of comprehensive financial services to micro-entrepreneurs. Still, the i...

Source

KuwaitTimes.net (link opens in a new window)

Region

North Africa & Near East

INTER-AMERICAN DEVELOPMENT BANK UNVEILS SCHEME TO HELP LOW-INCOME FAMILIES

(Excerpt) The Inter-American Development Bank (IADB) has unveiled an initiative aimed at generating economic opportunities for low-income people in Latin America and the Caribbean. IADB President Luis Alberto Moreno told reporters Tuesday [6 June] that the "Building Opportunities for the Majority" initiative would seek innovative solutions to help low-income people develop their economic potential and accumulate assets. Moreno said that the benefits of economic growth had not trickled down to mo...

Source

BBC

UN boss urges business leaders to spread wealth to poor

(Abstract) In Nigeria, UN Secretary General Kofi Annan pressed business leaders to embrace practices that integrate the BOP into the global economy. Globalization, Annan remarked, has brought wealth and prosperity to many, but has also not addressed the needs of countless others....

Source

AFP (link opens in a new window)

By Moses Mackay (Excerpt) Five years ago Patrick Schofield and his partners set up a company with the sole purpose of creating jobs and reducing poverty. Today, Streetwires has grown beyond any of their expectations and continues to make a difference in people’s lives. At the time of our launch we were looking at ways of creating jobs and reducing poverty in the communities, said Schofield,...

Source

All Africa (link opens in a new window)

botswana: housing for poverty alleviation

By Onalenna Modikwa Selebi-Phikwe Phikwe Town Council has welcomed the pilot poverty alleviation and housing schemes by the Department of Housing. The programme was started in 1992 by government to facilitate economic empowerment of poor households who do not qualify for SHHA loans through employment creation, poverty alleviation and home ownership. The main objective of the programme by the government for low income housing was to integrate income generation ...

Source

All Africa (link opens in a new window)