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Twice as many African presidents made it to China’s Africa summit than to the UN general assembly
A Quartz analysis of the African principals who spoke at the general debate using the country list published by the UN shows fewer African presidents attended the general assembly in New York than were at the third summit of the Forum on China–Africa Cooperation that took place in Beijing two weeks earlier in September.
- Region
- Sub-Saharan Africa
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Introducing the Mobile Money Regulatory Index
The Mobile Money Regulatory Index is intended to support dialogue between regulators and mobile money providers on reforms that can promote market growth. For the development community, the Index will help identify subject areas and markets where technical assistance to governments and regulators can have the biggest impact.
- Categories
- Finance
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Benin is the latest African nation taxing the internet
The new law has been denounced, with citizens and advocates using the hashtag #Taxepamesmo (“Don’t tax my megabytes”) to call on officials to cancel the levy. The increased fees will not only burden the poorest consumers and widen the digital divide, but they will also be “disastrous” for the nation’s nascent digital economy, says ISF’s executive director Julie Owono.
- Categories
- Technology
- Region
- Sub-Saharan Africa
- Tags
- public policy
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Viewpoint: India’s Cash Ban Failed Even to Create a Bank Savings Culture
What’s going on? Some have argued that lower interest rates are the problem. That’s not an easy sell: Over the past year, India was one of the few countries with strongly positive real rates — and savings in bank deposits were a higher fraction of disposable income back in 2012-14, when Indians were dealing with negative real interest rates.
Perhaps, instead, a change in behavior is responsible.- Categories
- Finance
- Region
- South Asia
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Mexico’s new government wants fintech, banks to help financial inclusion
Arturo Herrera, one of two future deputy finance ministers, said in an interview that the lack of financial inclusion was one of the biggest obstacles in the new government’s fight against poverty, inequality and slow economic growth.
- Categories
- Finance
- Region
- Latin America
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India Aims For The World’s Biggest Health Care Overhaul
In his annual Independence Day speech on Wednesday, Narendra Modi is expected to unveil the biggest government health care program in the world. The plan is to roll it out by the end of the year – ahead of elections expected early in 2019.
- Categories
- Health Care
- Tags
- public policy
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Colombia’s New President Ivan Duque And Financial Inclusion
With 54 percent of the vote's worth of support under his belt against Gustavo Petro, Duque promised to transform the country's economic model and tackle inequality, as reported in Reuters.
- Region
- Latin America
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Google could give Baidu a serious run for its money in China
Speculation on the US internet giant’s return has centred on its reported development of mobile search and news aggregation apps designed to meet China’s strict censorship laws.
- Categories
- Technology
- Region
- Asia Pacific
- Tags
- public policy