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A New Test for Old Technology: How COVID-19 is Sparking Innovation in PayGo Financing for Biodigesters
Biodigesters transform animal manure into high-quality fertilizer and biogas, replacing the need for wood-burning cooking stoves – and PayGo financing enables smallholders to afford them. But as Laura Harwig at Feed the Future explains, COVID-19 has made it harder for farmers to make their payments. She explores how the biodigester company ATEC* has adapted its PayGo model to help farmers weather these challenges.
- Categories
- Agriculture, Coronavirus, Technology
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Viewpoint: 4 Ways Digitisation Can Unlock Africa’s Recovery
The full human cost of COVID-19 in Africa is not yet known, but it is likely to be significant. Importantly, for many Africans, the longer-term socio-economic consequences of the pandemic is likely to be just as material as the health impact of the virus itself.
- Categories
- Coronavirus, Technology
- Region
- Sub-Saharan Africa
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Viewpoint: How Socially-Led Innovation Can Bring Positive Change in Unchartered Times
There's an old and somewhat overused saying attributed to Winston Churchill that is nevertheless appropriate in these uncertain times: never let a good crisis go to waste. A global pandemic certainly qualifies as a crisis, but what good can we generate from this exceptional challenge?
- Categories
- Coronavirus
- Tags
- innovation
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Missed Calls = Missed Opportunities: How Starlogik is Converting a Mobile Billing Loophole into an Inclusive Innovation
The mobile telephony industry has done a remarkable job reaching poorer people in developing countries. But as Ignacio Mas at the Digital Frontiers Institute points out, this success has been shaped by customer ingenuity too – for instance, through the common practice of reallocating call charges by requesting call-backs via missed calls. He explores how Starlogik has formalized this billing loophole to create a mutually beneficial new feature.
- Categories
- Technology
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Digital Lending Post COVID: How Micro-Credit Holds the Key for Small Merchants, Customers to Bounce Back
Credit and Finance for MSMEs: Digital lending platforms with the principles of financial inclusivity will emerge as the heroes of the financial crisis.
- Categories
- Coronavirus, Finance
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Amazon India to Include 10,000 E-Vehicles in Its Delivery Fleet by 2025
With the introduction of electric vehicles, Amazon India aims to reduce carbon emissions and environmental impact of delivery operations
- Categories
- Technology
- Region
- South Asia
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How ‘Market-Creating Innovations’ Can Lift Nations Out of Poverty: A Q&A with Efosa Ojomo
Efosa Ojomo is a senior research fellow at the Clayton Christensen Institute and a rising star in the world of impact-focused business. He has spoken and written extensively about the potential of innovation to lift developing countries out of poverty – including in his recent book “The Prosperity Paradox," co-written with Christensen. In this Q&A, Ojomo discusses the concept of market-creating innovations, and their unique value as a global development tool.
- Categories
- Uncategorized
- Tags
- employment, innovation, interviews
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Bringing the Private Sector to Public Health: How Business Innovation Can Improve Health Care Access
Engaging the private sector is an increasingly critical theme in global health, because there is no clear way to achieve universal health coverage without it. Perhaps that's why four of the five winners of the first-ever USAID Inclusive Health Access Prize are for-profit companies. Marian W. Wentworth, President and CEO of Management Sciences for Health, discusses the prize, and the movement toward private solutions to provide scalable innovation in global health.
- Categories
- Health Care
- Tags
- innovation, public health