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Low-Cost Insurance Products Get the Nod
Products short-term insurers will offer include so-called shack insurance, covering structures and contents for about R15 a month, and cellphone insurance from about R10 a month. Life companies will offer insurance products that will be more flexible on payments, so that policies do not automatically lapse if payments are missed. THE insurance and collective investments industry will be able to proceed with low-cost Mzansi-style products in the new year,...
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Abuja Gets N670m First Wireless Internet Network
Minister of the Federal Capital Territory Administration (FCTA), Mallam Ahmed Nasir el-Rufai last weekend in Abuja launched the first citywide wireless Internet Network project in Nigeria termed CT Access in conjunction with Suburban Broadband Limited. The project is valued at N670 million. Speaking at the event, El-Rufai who noted the role of technology in modern development said that Suburban would invest an estimated N670million ($5m) in the project representing 80 per cent of the...
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Locally Raised Solutions: Brazilian small farms cater to a budding organic market
By Lucy Conger S mall family farms are an endangered species in Brazil, as in many countries of the developing world. Saving farmers from the threat of extinction?or migration to cities where their skills cannot be used and they lose their connection to the land?is the mission of ARCO Contestado, a regional marketing agency based in Mafra, a city of about 50,000 residents and the center of a micro-region of a dozen smaller towns in the sta...
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Millions to Benefit From Intervet Project in India
Akzo Nobel’s animal healthcare business, Intervet, has signed a Memorandum of Understanding to exclusively supply veterinary products for a special project in India which could benefit more than two million rural families. (CSRwire) Arnhem, the Netherlands ? Akzo Nobel’s animal healthcare business, Intervet, has signed a Memorandum of Understanding to exclusively supply veterinary products for a special project in India which could benefit more than two million rural families...
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Tanzania Receives Assistance for Private Sector Competitiveness Project
The World Bank Board of Executive Directors today approved an International Development Association (IDA) credit of US$95 million for a Private Sector Competitiveness Project which would support the implementation of Tanzania’s National Strategy for Growth and Poverty Reduction which, among other things, aims to transform the country’s economy through private sector growth. The Private Sector Competitiveness Project will help generate sustainable conditions for enterprise cre...
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Thank You for Your Purchase – a Mobile Phone Turns Into a Credit Card Terminal
There have been a number of obstacles to increasing e-transactions in Africa, even in those countries visited by large numbers of tourists. Two of the most important have been the cost of the Point of Sale equipment and the other has been the high cost of dealing with relatively small numbers of transactions. South African company iVeri Payment Technology has come up with a solution that tackles both of these obstacles. Isabelle Gross reports on how it works. In South Africa, Namibia...
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Muhammad Yunus: Microcredit Missionary
As a young economics professor at Chittagong University in Bangladesh in 1976, Muhammad Yunus lent $27 out of his own pocket to a group of poor craftsmen in the nearby town of Jobra. To boost the impact of that small sum, Yunus volunteered to serve as guarantor on a larger loan from a traditional bank, kindling the idea for a village-based enterprise called the Grameen Project. It never occurred to the professor that his gesture would inspire a whole category of lending and propel him to the to...
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The Honey Bee Network taps grassroots innovations.
Three months ago, at a CII symposium on decoding rural markets where rural marketing gurus spoke of their approach to capturing the largely unaccrued volumes of rural consumption, one person turned the entire focus of the meet on its head. Anil Gupta, executive chairperson, National Innovation Foundation, later said: I was shocked at how little those marketers knew about rural India. All they could talk about was dumbing down their advertising, and redesigning products for thei...
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