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Rethinking the Flush Toilet: It’s Time to Move Sanitation Infrastructure Off the Grid
Virginia Gardiner, inventor of the Loowatt toilet system, says sanitation infrastructure has to move off the grid, just as mobile communications did in the 20th century. She points to a growing number of companies, including her own, that are piloting the provision of non-sewered sanitation to households thorough container-based sanitation, a system that presents the most viable alternative for urban areas in need of sanitation solutions.
- Categories
- Environment, Health Care, Social Enterprise, WASH
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Five Keys to Raising Social Enterprises’ ‘Talent Quotient’
Working toward social impact is a people business, but many organizations and enterprises struggle to find the time and resources to support the people who work for them. Nicole Etchart, co-founder and co-CEO of impact investing firm NESsT, offers leaders of social enterprises a guide to building their teams and optimizing their talent as an investor would.
- Categories
- Investing
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Innovations in Financial Inclusion: Delivering Capital to MSMEs and Growing Businesses in India
India's 51 million-plus micro, small and medium enterprises are critical drivers of growth in the nation's economy, employing an estimated 115 million people. But due to several factors, including information asymmetry, the sector has been unable to access credit as readily as larger corporations. Intellegrow CEO Akbar Khan discusses some innovations and initiatives that are helping deliver capital to these vital businesses.
- Categories
- Investing, Social Enterprise
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Entrepreneurship is a Skill, Not a Talent: The Power of the Group-Based Graduation Model
Village Enterprise implements a cost-effective, group-based, one-year graduation program for rural Africans who live on less than $1.90 per day. The organization believes that entrepreneurship is not just for the naturally business-minded, it's a skill like leadership or teamwork that can be fostered and learned. Its aim, therefore, is to unlock the potential of those who are entrepreneurs by nature and instill the skills of entrepreneurship in those who are not.
- Categories
- Social Enterprise
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What’s So Special About a Golden Banana?
Scientists at Queensland University (QUT) of Technology in Australia have announced a way to use fruit as a vehicle for solving the world's Vitamin A deficiency problem: They’ve developed the genes required to produce what they call “golden bananas.”
- Categories
- Health Care
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Alibaba executive chairman creates $10M African youth entrepreneur fund
Alibaba Group Executive Chairman Jack Ma launched a $10 million African Young Entrepreneurs Fund at the YouthConnekt Africa Summit. The fund is expected to be operational this year.
- Categories
- Investing
- Region
- Sub-Saharan Africa
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Want to Know How to Properly Measure Financial Inclusion? Copy the Retailers.
To better understand and measure how people use financial services, i2i looked outside the industry to the retail sector, which is at the forefront of how to collect and analyze data on how consumers engage with their services. In particular, retailers understand key usage indicators fundamental to their business; namely recency, frequency, monetary value and duration. That led i2i to apply these indicators while studying how to improve financial services.
- Categories
- Uncategorized
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Field of View: How a Chilli Cash Crop Helps Subsistence Farmers Shape Their Future
During a three-year process designed to assess the impact of growing a chilli cash crop on small farmers living in southern Africa, it was discovered that when a family earned just $500 more of net income per year, the money materially impacted at least two categories of their basic human needs. But the most profound impact, writes Tanner Methvin, was that of self-determination.
- Categories
- Agriculture