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Digital Access Matters: The Benefits of Bringing High-Speed Internet To Low-Income Communities During COVID-19
The COVID-19 pandemic has led people around the world to work and shop from home – but as Dirk-Jan Koeman and Kara Ing at Poa Internet point out, this is easier for some than others. For instance, in densely-populated urban areas in Kenya, the lack of high-speed internet makes working from home almost impossible. They discuss how Poa is bringing these households online, and share research on how these newly connected customers are using the internet.
- Categories
- Coronavirus, Social Enterprise, Technology, Telecommunications, Transportation
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Leveraging the COVID-19 Crisis for Local Development: How the Pandemic Can Strengthen Public-Private Collaboration in Africa
The COVID-19 pandemic is a massive humanitarian crisis. But as Malado Kaba, the first female Economy and Finance Minister of the Republic of Guinea argues, it could also be an opportunity for the African continent. She explores how public-private partnerships and improved collaboration across industries and sectors could create sustainable change—if governments take the lead in mobilizing private sector and development partners to support locally driven solutions.
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- Agriculture, Coronavirus, Investing
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ShopUp Raises $22.5 Million To Digitize Millions of Mom-and-Pop Shops in Bangladesh
A startup that is aiming to digitize millions of neighborhood stores in Bangladesh just raised the country’s largest Series A financing round.
- Categories
- Investing, Technology
- Region
- Asia Pacific
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‘Our Only Competition Is Poverty’: How Avanti Finance Aims To Create a ‘Population-Scale’ Digital Microfinance Platform in India
India has long been a hotbed of digital financial innovation. Avanti Finance is an emerging innovator in the sector, with a digital lending platform that aims to bring affordable microfinance to even the poorest customers. NextBillion spoke with CEO Rahul Gupta to discuss Avanti’s unique model, and the challenges of serving low-income customers both efficiently and responsibly.
- Categories
- Finance, Technology
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Press Release: Solar-Powered Technology To Level the Playing Field for Women and Girls in World’s Poorest Countries
The Efficiency for Access Research and Development Fund has awarded 20 organisations a total of £2.9 million in funding for innovative, solar-powered appliance technology projects that will help to level the playing field whilst addressing the climate emergency.
- Categories
- Energy, Environment, Technology
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COVID-19 and Higher Education: How Universities Are Leading the Recovery in Emerging Economies
Universities in emerging economies have shown they have a key role to play in the response to the coronavirus crisis, through both cutting-edge research and development (R&D) and pioneering approaches to teaching and studying.
- Categories
- Coronavirus, Education, Health Care
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Gender: The Blind Spot of the COVID-19 Response in Low- and Middle-Income Countries
The COVID-19 pandemic is imposing a disproportionately higher socio-economic cost on women. As Melinda Gates put it, “COVID-19 is gender-blind, but not gender-neutral.” Analysts at MSC discuss four potential types of fallout from COVID-19 that will have lasting socio-economic impacts on women in India and other low- and middle-income countries, based on multiple studies that MSC conducted between March and July of this year.
- Categories
- Coronavirus, Finance, Technology
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Kenya Bankers Association (KBA), Huawei Ink Partnership Agreement To Promote Tech-Driven Financial Inclusion, Fintech Capacity Building
The Kenya Bankers Association (KBA) has signed a collaboration agreement with tech-firm Huawei-Kenya that seeks to deepen financial inclusion in the banking sector through further deployment of technology and building fintech capacity.
- Categories
- Finance, Investing, Technology
- Region
- Sub-Saharan Africa