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The Power of Texting: How a Simple Text Message Can Make the Difference Between Success and Failure for Social Initiatives
Mobile phones are increasingly prevalent throughout the world, and researchers have found that sending text message reminders can help people follow through with their intentions, significantly increasing the success of development interventions. Roxanne Bauer explores the impact of text reminders on malaria treatment and savings initiatives, and discusses the science behind the approach.
- Categories
- Health Care, Impact Assessment, Technology, Telecommunications
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Bill to Promote Social-Impact Bonds in U.S. Has Support in High Places
Republican Sen. Orrin Hatch of Utah and Democratic Sen. Michael Bennet of Colorado are trying again to advance legislation that would appropriate $300 million for state and local social-impact bonds over 10 years.
- Categories
- Finance, Impact Assessment
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‘By making it available to people, you are almost by definition doing good’: Grameen Foundation CEO Alex Counts, on microfinance’s past and future
Microfinance has careened from hero to villain status over the years, before settling into its current persona as a useful but not transformative anti-poverty tool. Alex Counts has had a front-row seat in the sector’s turbulent development, as founder and long-time president/CEO of Grameen Foundation. He shares his frank perspectives on microfinance’s past and future in this video Q&A.
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- Impact Assessment
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MFTransparency is Dead … What Does That Mean for Pricing Transparency?: The CEO of the influential watchdog initiative discusses the future of pricing transparency in microfinance
MicroFinance Transparency recently announced that it has stopped collecting pricing data for the global microfinance industry. But as CEO Chuck Waterfield explains, that doesn’t mean the movement for transparent pricing is dead. He explains the decision and discusses how the industry can still make fair pricing a reality.
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- Impact Assessment
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Weekly Roundup – Taking Issue with the Meaning (and Quantity) of Global Health Verbiage
The Weekly Roundup examines the precise nature of health care language, the imprecise Sustainable Development Goals, plus some possbily "magic" powder.
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- Health Care, Impact Assessment
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Reaching ‘an Emerging Market Within an Emerging Market’: JPMorgan Chase and Omidyar back new impact fund aimed at Brazil’s middle class
Entrepreneurs who can deliver high-quality basic services on the cheap are rushing to meet the pent-up demands of Brazil’s 112 million lower- and middle-class consumers. Those entrepreneurs can tap a new source of capital: impact investors - including one backed by JPMorgan Chase and the Omidyar Network - focused on the huge population of Brazilians who make under $10,000 a year.
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- Impact Assessment, Social Enterprise
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Where Ethics and the Enterprise Intersect: 1,001 questions at the 2015 Latin American Impact Investment Forum (FLII)
What is an ethical business? During last month’s Latin America Impact Investing Forum (FLII) Avina’s Bernardo Toro, said it clearly: “It is a business that doesn’t prey on people; one that creates real value; one that pays attention to what’s important, not what’s showy.” Simple and to the point, so why do we struggle with it?
- Categories
- Education, Impact Assessment
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Striving for Consistency: A new guide aims to standardize impact assessments of the growing microinsurance market
Estimates suggest there are close to 270 million microinsurance clients in the developing world, with a potential market estimated at 3 to 4 billion policies. But while assessing the social impact of this growing sector is vital to improving product design, there is a dearth of consistency amongst the impact assessments being conducted. Microinsurance Network created “A Practical Guide to Impact Assessments” to address this challenge.
- Categories
- Education, Health Care, Impact Assessment
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