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World Bank issues first-ever poverty bond, gets $1.5 billion
The World Bank’s International Development Association (IDA) launched the world’s first poverty bond this week, a debt offering representatives say is designed to lift up the poor, and global investors literally couldn’t get enough.
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- Investing
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Faster, Lighter Touch and Group-based: A Different Approach to Poverty Graduation
The poverty graduation model has continued to show great promise in helping ultra-poor people develop sustainable livelihoods. But Dianne Calvi of Village Enterprise points out that those programs, as currently practiced, are often too expensive to scale. In advocating a more streamlined approach to poverty graduation, Calvi reveals key findings from a randomized control trial involving some of the poorest households across 138 villages in rural Uganda.
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- Entrepreneurship, Investing
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With the 2030 SDGs Looming, the Public and Private Sectors Team Up for Global Health
Global health funding is no longer the sole purview of local governments and international donors. Despite large contributions (nearly $8 trillion in 2013) from traditional donors, there is still a critical funding gap of $2.5 trillion annually – in developing countries alone – to achieve the U.N.'s 2030 Sustainable Development Goals. Fortunately, public and private actors are teaming up to close that gap. Rachel Fowler of USAID discusses some intriguing examples, including a first-of-its-kind development impact bond aiming to reduce maternal and newborn deaths in Rajasthan, India.
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- Health Care, Investing
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Prince Charles launches education impact bond for India
Britain's Prince Charles has launched a new 10-million-dollar Development Impact Bond (DIB) to help improve education for over 200,000 children in India. The DIB, the largest bond of its type in South Asia, is the latest fundraising initiative by the British Asian Trust (BAT), set up by the royal 10 years ago to fight poverty in South Asia.
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- Education
- Region
- South Asia
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Announcing the Most Influential NextBillion Posts of 2017
As we welcome 2018, we'd like to pay a final tribute to the top posts of 2017. In their own way, each of these insightful pieces introduced a novel concept, approach or argument that captured our readers' attention – and in some cases, provoked their ire. Here are the winners of 2017's Most Influential Post Contest.
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- Agriculture, Energy, Inclusive Fintech, Investing, NextBillion Originals
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What was the Most Influential NextBillion Post of 2017? Vote for Your Favorite
“Fast away the old year passes.” That lyric from “Deck the Halls” always hits home this time of year – and in 2017, it resonates particularly strongly. Across the social sectors, the year often felt like a race against time (or against competing societal forces) and many of our most popular posts reflect that sense of urgency. Here are the most influential posts from the last twelve months, one from each month, in our sixth annual holiday contest. Vote early, vote often.
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- Agriculture, Education, Energy, Entrepreneurship, Environment, Health Care, Impact Assessment, Inclusive Fintech, Investing, NextBillion Originals, Technology
- Tags
- agriculture, business development, development impact bonds, digital finance, digital payments, financial inclusion, fintech, impact investing, microcredit, microfinance, mobile banking, mobile finance, mobile money, NextBillion.net, research, smallholder farmers, social business, social enterprise, social impact, solar, solar energy
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Most Influential Post Nominee: A Milestone in Innovative Finance: Exploring the First-Ever Outcome-Based DIB for Poverty Alleviation in Africa
The graduation approach to poverty alleviation has been effective in helping raise incomes and savings over the long term. But traditional funding models don't provide enough flexibility or performance incentives to boost this impact, since funding is typically tied to activities rather than outcomes. To address this challenge, Village Enterprise and Instiglio have partnered with USAID and DFID to launch the first-ever outcome-based development impact bond for poverty alleviation in Africa.
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- Entrepreneurship, Investing
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Investment where profit means better schools
The British Asian Trust is planning to raise $10m (£7.5m) for an "education development impact bond" in which investments are linked to specific targets in improving education for disadvantaged communities in India.
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- South Asia
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