NextBillion - A WDI Publication

African Aid Projects That Work: Partnerships on the Ground, Not Donations from a Distance

Not long ago, an unnamed global corporation decided that it wanted to help children in the southern African nation of Namibia -- and so it spent millions to donate scores of new computers and television sets for the classrooms in a particular region of this poverty-plagued, mostly rural nation. They should have talked to someone like Jonathan Johnnidis first. Currently pursuing his doctoral studies at the University of Pennsylvania w...

Source

Knowledge@Wharton (link opens in a new window)

Region

Sub-Saharan Africa

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...

Source

Financial Times (link opens in a new window)

Region

Sub-Saharan Africa

Technology Giants Push to Alleviate African Poverty

Some of the world’s leading information technology corporations are in the Rwandan capital, Kigali, for what organizers are calling a historic summit focusing on Africa’s growing IT sector. Representatives of tech giants are calling for business solutions to alleviate poverty. Noel King has this report from Kigali. Industry leaders say chronic poverty in Africa will be alleviated by investment in information technology, rather...

Source

Voa News (link opens in a new window)

Region

Sub-Saharan Africa

Connecting Africans to Web potential

Today, technology experts are meeting with leaders of 10 African countries in the Rwandan capital of Kigali. It’s the Connect Africa Summit . The goal is to increase the continent’s access to the Internet, and attract investment opportunities for economic growth. Gretchen Wilson reports from rural South Africa. On the side of the road, 20-year-old Esther Tlou sells plastic gas c...

Source

Marketplace (link opens in a new window)

Region

Sub-Saharan Africa

Drug Delivery

How do you get basic care to the remotest villages in Africa? One clever idea is to borrow tactics from retail chains like McDonald’s and Subway --operate an easy-to-replicate, owner-operated franchise system focusing on health care. Minnesota lawyer and businessman Scott Hillstrom started HealthStor...

Source

Forbes.com (link opens in a new window)

Region

Sub-Saharan Africa

How to release energies of the poor

For Richard Ndungu, the CEO at KPMG, when a company re-organises or repackages her products to facilitate access by the poor people, it is engaging in corporate social responsibility. Speaking at a SIFE Kenya CEO?s luncheon, Ndung?u pointed out that by unbundling a ?Bamba Fifty? Safaricom empowered millions of Kenyans who would otherwise have never used cell phone services. Equity Bank was also cited as another example of a fast growing bank in the East Afric...

Source

Business Daily Africa (link opens in a new window)

Region

Sub-Saharan Africa

Scojo Foundation and Population Services International (PSI) have signed a five-year pan-Africa agreement to make reading glasses available to the millions of Africans who lack this simple, essential health product and tool for economic development. For most Africans living in poverty, reading glasses are unobtainable due to barriers of cost, access, and awareness. Without reading glasses, people who need to see up close to earn a living, such as weavers, farmers, electricians, and artisans, ...

Source

Scojo Foundation News

Region

Sub-Saharan Africa

How big a change have cellphones made to Africa? I shout the question at Isis Nyong’o, over the throbbing bassline of a Kenyan ragga track. She tells me calmly: It’s had about the same effect as a democratic change of leadership. I’d expected hype from a Kenyan-American executive at MTV Networks Africa but by now I believed the hype myself. It was not the bling, the fashion models with candy-floss hair - it was the Nairobi teenagers mobbing the entr...

Source

BBC (link opens in a new window)

Region

Sub-Saharan Africa