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Uganda Shakes up Electricity Access Amid Global Infrastructure Reset
About 1 billion people worldwide still lack access to electricity, according to the latest data, with efforts moving too slowly to meet a U.N. goal of providing clean, affordable power to everyone on the planet by 2030.
- Categories
- Energy
- Region
- Sub-Saharan Africa
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Viewpoint: Reforming Microfinance to Alleviate Poverty, Foster National Development
About 90 per cent of Nigeria’s businesses are considered microenterprises. Despite this huge number, easy access to funds has remained a challenge for most Small and Medium Enterprises, in spite of several government funding initiatives.
- Categories
- Finance
- Region
- Sub-Saharan Africa
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Taking the ‘Green Leap’: How Linking BoP Business and Clean Tech Can Build an Inclusive Economy
In this era of environmental degradation and climate change, aiming to eradicate poverty before addressing the environment will simply not work. The challenge of our time, say Stuart Hart and Fernando Casado Cañeque, is to figure out how to commercialize new clean technologies, while extending the economic benefits to vulnerable communities – what they term a global “green leap.” They discuss this challenge in their new book, and share some key takeaways here. (NextBillion will be giving away a free chapter of the book in our e-newsletter, NextBillion Notes, all month.)
- Categories
- Energy, Environment
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Financial Inclusion in Africa To Be Boosted Following Launch Of This New Fund
In a bid to continue supporting financial inclusion in Africa, Dubai-based Investment banking advisory firm Nimai has unveiled a USD 150 Mn fund in a partnership with Kenya’s Victoria Commercial Bank .
- Categories
- Finance
- Region
- Sub-Saharan Africa
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Antimicrobial Resistance Is Being Called A Sustainable Development Issue
As the report notes, “Clean water in hospitals has a huge impact on reducing infections and the spread of antibiotic resistance.” Yet one-third of hospitals in developing countries lack running water. Thus there’s a clear case for investing in the basics.
- Categories
- Health Care
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Why Foreign Aid Is Getting Better at Saving Lives
Billionaire do-gooders get a lot of flak. In his new book, Raj Kumar argues that they’ve helped change global health work for the better.
- Categories
- Health Care
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Building an Ecosystem to Save an Ecosystem: How Facilitating Climate Finance for MSMEs Can Fight Global Climate Change
Climate finance has become a buzzword for micro, small and medium enterprises (MSMEs) working on climate solutions. But with the unique challenges these enterprises face, it has become increasingly clear that the global development community will need to reimagine the entire ecosystem in order to get them the funding they need. Santosh Kumar Singh and Ankit Gupta at Intellecap discuss the obstacles to climate finance for MSMEs, and how best to overcome them.
- Categories
- Environment, Investing
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Viewpoint: We’re All Actors in the New Silk Road Play
It’s easy to forget that the Belt and Road Initiative – a massive connectivity project, both geo-strategic and geo-economic, now in effect all across the Eurasian landmass, as well as straddling the South China Sea, plus the Indian Ocean all the way to East Africa – is less than six years old, and projected to last until 2049.
- Region
- Asia Pacific
