TC-I Tidbits

Your daily dose of headlines:

Science & Tech: The Indian government has successfully launched 10 satellites simultaneously to significantly expand its presence in space.
Women’s Rights: PM Singh asked local officials to fight the killing of female children by parents, and also turned to the health ministry to develop a grassroots effort to combat this trend.
Education & [...]

India’s Manpower Paradox

An article by Meera Shenoy (Executive Director of Employment Generation and Marketing Mission, Government of Andhra Pradesh) focuses on a paradox faced by India - a booming population of youth, but a shortage of skilled manpower.  Shenoy discusses the downfalls of the approaches of a variety of stakeholders - government, companies, and the rural poor, and emphasizes [...]

Midday Newsfeed

BoP Energy and beyond: BP has built a new stove for the BoP market that produces much fewer emissions than the typical wood burning stoves. Scaling up, the government predicts that by 2017, 10% of total transport fuel will come from biofuels. In order to improve public transportation in Hyderbad and the surrounding area, the [...]

InternetSpeech - The New Digital Genie?

In a recent interview with Fortune Magazine, Muhammad Yunus beautifully articulated his dream of a “Digital Aladdin’s Lamp”, which would provide poor women around the world with access to global markets and trends for local benefit:
“A genie comes out of it and asks, ‘What can I do for you, ma’am?’ And she says ‘I make [...]

Quarter billion internet capable phones by 2010

Previously we wrote about how India is positioned to have the 2nd most mobile phone users behind China. Well now, ThinkChange India has discovered some better statistics underpinning this trend. According to WATBlog.com, 250 million Indians will have internet capable cell phones by 2010. The article continues to breakdown the user base even further. The [...]

World Bank Executive Development Program - Inclusive and Sustainable Business: Creating Markets with the Poor

What are the “linkages between corporate strategy and development”?  How can public and corporate sector leaders implement strategies that provide opportunities for the world’s 4 billion people to lift themselves out of poverty?  The World Bank Institute has recently launched an “Executive Development Program” to help company managers and public sector leaders develop sustainable, yet [...]

Over the weight limit …

Anyone who has flown recently can relate to the frantic attempt to remove clothing, shoes and other packed items from your suitcase in order to meet the weight requirement that is draconiously enforced upon unsuspecting passengers. In a similar fashion, here are some additional articles that may be of interest that I could not fit [...]

Fair & Lovely, and may be a little bit of Dignity

Derek Newberry, a blogger at Nextbillion has a very interesting post on Ethics in the BOP Market. He uses the case of Fair & Lovely, the skin whitening cream marketed in India by Hindustan Lever, the Indian subsidiary of Unilever. The company has constantly used a advertising strategy that depicts women of darker complexion as [...]

If you build it (a map), they will come (and build solar panels)

There are few things hotter than BoP. One of them may be renewable energy, particularly solar (no pun intended) and wind. Well one would imagine that anything that combines these two fields of unusually high interest that there would be a flourish of activity on the ground. Not so fast argues Kenneth Westrick, CEO of [...]

Reliance Capital Starts Microfinance Fund

Looks like the biggest of the big see profits in reaching out to the smallest of the small. Anil Ambani’s Reliance Capital announced the formation of a microfinance fund that will target the rural poor. Microcapital.org writes that
Reliance Capital is joining hands with two Gujarat-based microfinance institutions - MAS Financial Services and Vardan Trust - [...]

FT and IFC Sustainable Banking Awards for Microfinance Deadline Extended

From Microcapital.org:

The 2008 Financial Times Sustainable Banking Awards has extended their submission deadline to March 10. The awards will be presented in London on June 3, 2008 following the 2008 FT/IFC Sustainable Banking Conference.
Previously, the FT and IFC Sustainable Banking Awards had focused solely on banking institutions. This year, in hopes of recognizing non-bank [...]

Just Call Me on My Cell …

At the risk of overstating the role that mobile phones will play in reaching the BoP, a great post on NextBillion.net talks about how cell phones have reached the level that Malcolm Gladwell would label a “social epidemic.”
It is notable that Eric Schmidt, chairman of the board and enlightened CEO of Google has said that [...]

Eat it up … the less discussed aspect of sustainability

One ongoing topic on this blog appears to be the need to be forever conscious of the consumption dilemma that arises due to expanding markets to untapped communities, specifically BoP and the rural populous. Providing the fringes with first rate technologies and products to better their lives is an integral part of the development quest, [...]