-
From All-Inclusive to Socially Inclusive: Travel and Tourism’s Big Shift is Under Way
Tourism is one of the world's largest industries – but how can it best be leveraged to move nations from poverty to prosperity? That was a key question at the recent "Global Conference on Jobs & Inclusive Growth: Partnerships for Sustainable Tourism," organized in Jamaica by the UN's World Tourism Organization. NextBillion was a media partner at the conference, and we share some major themes (and a few controversial remarks) ranging from the impact of the sharing economy and Airbnb, to the problems with building "five-star hotels in three-star communities."
- Categories
- Social Enterprise, Technology
- Tags
- employment, research, tourism
-
‘Stealthy’ Saving: Building on Payroll Credit to Automate Savings
Basic savings accounts are essential to helping people build assets, and to establishing their relationship with financial institutions. But customers often fail to open or use these accounts – even when they have the money and the intention of saving it. Acreimex, a savings & credit cooperative in Oaxaca, Mexico, worked with BFA to find an innovative, "stealthy" way to introduce savings to its existing payroll loan customers. The results of their pilot program were intriguing.
- Categories
- Finance, Technology
-
Six Ways MarketBookshelf.com Can Improve How We Share Global Health Market Research
Preventing research duplication in the global health arena is critically important – but it's also beyond challenging, given the large number of organizations working at country, regional and global levels. It's with these challenges in mind that organizers have launched MarketBookshelf.com, a new, one-stop platform for sharing global health market literature. The site aims to consolidate market literature across donors, sectors and health areas to improve – and ultimately change – how the global health market community disseminates its research.
- Categories
- Health Care, Technology
-
Three Reasons for the African Research Gap – And How to Close It
Sub-Saharan Africa’s population share will more than double in the next 50 years—from 13 percent to 25 percent of the world's population. Despite this growth, its research outputs lag far behind other regions, with just 2 percent of peer-reviewed publications coming from authors there. Center for Effective Global Action (CEGA) program manager Maya Ranganath explores reasons for the gap, and ways CEGA is working to increase the volume of high-quality academic research produced by scholars in the region.
- Categories
- Agriculture, Education, Health Care
-
When Failure is Hard to Recognize: Facing Hard Truths about Microfinance
After decades of faith in the ability of tiny loans to transform people’s lives, quantitative research has revealed that microfinance rarely lives up to the hype. But in spite of their lackluster impact, microfinance projects have persisted – the question is, why? After seven years of observing various actors throughout the microfinance value chain, Erin Beck, an assistant professor at the University of Oregon, has an answer. She discusses how policymakers, MFI leaders, employees and even customers contribute to microfinance’s persistence.
- Categories
- Impact Assessment
-
Press release: Apparel Impact Institute Launches to Accelerate Environmental Impacts in Apparel and Footwear Industry
Despite widespread awareness of the environmental hazards within the apparel and footwear industry, few of the pilot projects designed to reduce impacts are operating at the scale needed to meet the critical environmental and social outcomes brands and consumers are seeking. The AII will identify promising projects that are working in limited geography, for example, or are targeting a narrow problem yet show potential for broader application. By applying the appropriate resources, the AII will help bring them to scale more quickly.
- Categories
- Environment, Impact Assessment
- Tags
- research
-
We Went Looking for Impact Investors – Here’s Who and What We Found
The "friction" of getting an impactful investment fully raised and closed is holding back the flow of capital that wants to be deployed, writes Michael "Luni" Libes. In early 2017, he helped launch investorflow.org, a free service that recently released a report on its first 205 members. Libes explains how the service is attempting to turn anecdotes into analysis.
- Categories
- Impact Assessment, Investing, Social Enterprise
- Tags
- data, impact investing, research
-
Stanford launches research center focused on global poverty and development
The center’s mission is threefold: to support path-breaking research on global poverty and development within Stanford and beyond; to inspire students through hands-on research opportunities, fellowships and events; and to inform policies and practices through strategic partnerships with global policymakers and thought leaders as well as on-campus events that foster new ideas and university-wide collaborations.
- Categories
- Education
- Region
- North America
Subscribe to Our 'Business in Global Development' Newsletter!
Our new weekly LinkedIn newsletter features NextBillion's latest original articles, along with curated news, jobs, bizdev opportunities and events from our recent coverage of impact-focused business in emerging markets.
We respect your privacy. Your information is safe and will never be shared.
Don't miss out. Subscribe today.