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Tiny Loans, Tremendous Returns: Tales from the Microlending Frontier
Sometimes, small gestures can make huge differences in people's lives and livelihoods. That's the premise -- and the power -- of microlending.
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- Entrepreneurship
- Region
- Latin America
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Big Idea: Why Hands-On Regulation of Mobile Money Could Be Dangerous
There’s a very simple imperative driving the tariff structure and every other decision that determines access to mobile money: cost recovery. This is more than a cold-hearted calculation by mobile network operators’ accountants. If rural mobile money agents, who generally operate as independent contractors, cannot profit from this role, there will be no rural agents and no mobile money service.
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- Technology
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Cash Transfers Do Not Address the Underlying Causes of Women’s Poverty
Women need more than just small amounts of cash to escape poverty – the limited 'empowerment' of income support should be coupled with training and employment
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- Impact Assessment
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Bridging the ‘Financial Capability Gap’ to Financial Inclusion
Between 500 million and 800 million of the world’s poor have gained access to finance in recent years. But 25 percent or less of these individuals have received any form of financial training to help them make informed decisions about entire financial future. This represents the ‘financial capability gap." It’s the reason why today we are releasing Bridging the Gap: The Business Case for Financial Capability.
- Categories
- Education
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Learning From the Past, Looking Ahead: Highlights From Day 2 of the Harvard Social Enterprise Conference
“We really are at a crossroads,” The Economist’s Matt Bishop observed at the opening of the second day of Harvard’s Social Enterprise Conference. Bishop struck a theme for the day’s speakers: We’ve reached a point in time to rethink how markets work, and how more people can share in the benefits of the global economy.
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- Entrepreneurship
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The Big Idea: (UPDATED) Simple Truths About Mobile Money
Wow, the role of mobile money has been hotly discussed across the mainstream media in recent weeks - even in Slate. There is much that I agree with in that article, and in a related critique of technology-centered development by Kentaro Toyama in CNN. So let’s unpack some of the conclusions presented in these two articles. (UPDATED: The Slate authors respond to this post).
- Categories
- Technology
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The State and Future of Impact Investing
In a recent interview with Antony Bugg-Levine, CEO of Nonprofit Finance Fund, we discussed his new book about the impact investing sector, emerging trends and ideas in this space, challenges and opportunities moving forward, what the world would look like if the potential of impact investing were to be realized, and advice to traditional investors interested in becoming an impact investor.
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- Entrepreneurship
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E+Co Announces Plans to Scale Up Clean Energy Investments
E+Co, the non-profit leader in clean energy investing in small and medium enterprises in emerging markets, announced today that it will phase out its innovations unit to solely focus on and scale up clean energy investments in developing markets.
- Categories
- Energy, Entrepreneurship
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