NextBillion - A WDI Publication

Mary Jo Foley Cut-rate PC/hardware Windows XP Starter Edition bundles aren’t Microsoft’s only solution for bringing computing to the masses. Microsoft (MSFT) unveiled a new financing program designed to make PCs more affordable to emerging-market customers on May 22, the day before the kick-off of its annual Windows Hardware Engineering Conference (WinHEC) in Seattle. The new pay-as-you-go program and associated metering technology that enables it are k...

Source

Foxnews.com (link opens in a new window)

Region

Latin America

Lighting Off the Grid

Sitting in a brightly lit classroom at the Stanford Business School three years ago, Matt Scott got to wondering what it would take to light the rest of the world. Artificial lighting may not seem a necessity like food or shelter, but 1.6 billion people around the globe lack access to electricity and the on-off switches we take for granted. Inspired by the Light Up the World Foundation, which promotes the use of energy-efficient light-emitting diodes (LEDs), Scott, now 31, traveled to India and ...

Source

Time (link opens in a new window)

By Abraham M. George ? According to the World Bank, by the broader international definition of poverty ($2.00 or less per day per person), there are more poor people in the world today than there were a quarter century ago. Yet, during the same period, the strategy for alleviating poverty across practically every developing nation has remained essentially the same. The assumptions that underlie the present approach to combating poverty are flawed on at least three count...

Source

The George Foundation (link opens in a new window)

Excerpt:? PAHF aims to provide long-term solutions by helping establish local African production facilities for essential medical products, to increase their availability and affordability. It selects vital medical technologies, such as AD syringes and ITNs, which are identified by the WHO as effective at preventing or treating one of Africa’s major diseases. It targets cost-effective medical supplies which can be manufactured from raw materials available in Africa. PAHF wor...

Source

Vanguard (link opens in a new window)

Region

Sub-Saharan Africa

Moody?s upgrades Indonesia on improved finances

Global rating agency Moody?s Investors Service raised Indonesia?s rating to B1 from B2 on Friday, commending an improvement in public finance and a record of sound fiscal management in the past few years. Government debt as a percent of gross domestic product had fallen to 50 percent in end-2005, Moody?s said, adding that it expected further declines. ?Although somewhat more than half the debt is in foreign currency, the great majo...

Source

Financial Times (link opens in a new window)

NAIROBI, Kenya (AP) -- African Internet users pay on average 90 times what Americans pay, crippling efforts by the world’s poorest continent to become competitive, a senior Kenyan official said. Internet users in America pay $20 for one gigabyte of data per month, but people in Africa pay about $1,800 for the same amount of data, Minister for Information and Communication Mutahi Kagwe said in a speech read on his behalf by Permanent Secretary Bitange Ndemo. That’...

Source

CNN (link opens in a new window)

By Abimbola Akosile The Growth of Women in Nigeria (GOWIN), a pan Nigeria women group has commended Nigerian Bottling Company (NBC) Plc for lending support to efforts to alleviate poverty in the country. The commendation came during the presentation by NBC, of various items worth several thousands of naira, as seed capital to GOWIN in Ajegunle, Ajeromi-Ifelodun Council Area in Lagos. Above items...

Source

This Day (Lagos) (link opens in a new window)

Workshop aims to help Vietnam’s poor take advantage of markets

An organization called M4P is exploring how poor Vietnamese can escape poverty by taking advantage of the free market. At a recent workshop in Hanoi, experts said that using market forc es to fight poverty is promising, but far from easy.

Source

Voice of America (link opens in a new window)

Region

Asia Pacific