NextBillion - A WDI Publication

GFUSA Designs ?Poverty Progress Index? to Measure Social Performance of MFIs

Innovative Tool to Determine Client Needs, Program Effectiveness, Factors to Overcome Poverty? Through the UN Millennium Development Goals, the global community has challenged itself to halve the number of people living in extreme poverty by 2015. To adequately respond to the scale of global poverty, however, microfinance institutions (MFIs) must operate more efficiently, provide products and services that meet the changing needs of their communities, and show results.

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microfinance gateway (link opens in a new window)

Citigroup to give loans to Bangladeshi beggars

DHAKA, Bangladesh (AFP) - Beggars in impoverished Bangladesh are to receive interest-free loans from US banking giant Citigroup to help them become self-employed, the bank said in a statement.? The bank has donated 250,000 dollars to expand a four-year-old project run by micro-finance pioneer Grameen Bank. Grameen is credited with developing a unique microcredit system that has been used by some five million people in Bangladesh and replicated worldwide over the last 30 years. Pr...

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Yahoo! News (link opens in a new window)

Moto Debuts Credit Card Phone

Motorola added a new feature on Wednesday to the already versatile cell phone: credit card capability. The world?s second-largest cell phone maker unwrapped M-Wallet, a technology that allows users to pay bills, purchase products, or transfer money using their cell phones. M-Wallet, a software application that consumers and merchants alike can download from the Internet, also allows retailers to market goods and services directly to customers? cell phones. M-W...

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Red Herring (link opens in a new window)

GENEVA, Feb 7 (KUNA) -- The International Organizatioon for Migration (IOM) said Tuesday that migrants now number between an estimated 185-192 million people who last year officially sent an estimated USD 232 billion in remittances, USD167 billion to developing countries. IOM spokesperson Jemini Pandya noted that sending remittances through informal channels is estimated to be at least 50 per cent of recorded flows, implying that the true size of remittances reaching development coun...

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MENAFM.com (link opens in a new window)

Rural artisans and SSI better, proves Bangladesh

Can farm mechanisation lead to greater employment generation and poverty alleviation? The answer is ?yes?, provided the mechanisation is on a small-scale and equipment are manufactured by rural artisans and small-scale industry. A case in point is Bangladesh, which has been experimenting with this concept for sometime now (...) Bangladesh, Dr Kabir said, had gone for small-scale farm mechanisation, wherein tillage operations are mechanised and most of the farm equipment are manufacture...

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Oneworld South Asia (link opens in a new window)

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creative economy

C K Prahlad shares his views on how Indian companies can take centrestage in the global economy

He believes in ?fortune at the bottom of the pyramid?. Management guru C K Prahlad?s message for Indian companies has always been to concentrate on the economic needs of the society they operate in. At the just concluded Delhi Sustainable Development Summit organised by Teri, the world renowned expert spoke about corporates? increasing role in fulfilling the needs of the poor. So, how do we wed together a commercial approach and needs of the poor for utilities like water and energy? ...

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Financial Express (link opens in a new window)

The perception of corporate social responsibility, once and for long, as an extra effort made by a company, is now undergoing a sea change. The realisation came up prominently at the recent World Economic Forum at Davos. All those present at the forum realised their responsibility towards core basic universal problems like water, air, climate change and health issues like HIV/AIDS. These problems don?t see borders. The progress all over the world ? whether we talk about poverty, healt...

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Financial Express (link opens in a new window)

DSDS 2006 focussed on innovative partnerships and governance to achieve MDGs

The recently culminated Delhi Sustainable Development Summit 2006 (DSDS 2006) organised by The Energy and Resources Institute (Teri) focussed on ?Linking across MDGs: towards innovative partnerships and governance.? The three-day summit interlinked economy and environment on topics like poverty and hunger, agriculture, water, sanitation, health, environmental threats and climate change and energy. The summit was attended by eminent thinkers on the subjects, besides heads of state, min...

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Financial Express (link opens in a new window)