Calling Tech-Focused Ideas to Help Address COVID-19 Learning Emergency
The disruption will be felt long after the immediate crisis has passed and schools reopen and will be particularly serious in low-income countries across Africa, Asia and the Middle East. The evidence shows that disruptions to schooling due to things such as pandemics can cause: continued negative impacts on student enrolment and retention in school […]
COVID-19 Could Drive Millions of Women into Poverty, When They are Agents of Recovery
Women working in garment factories have already lost their jobs, often their households’ only income, while the pandemic is exacerbating other families’ food insecurity. For those living in areas of conflict, COVID-19 is exacerbating an already terrible situation. Like an earthquake exposing a fault line, as the pandemic plays out it is exposing deep structural inequalities. […]
The Informal Economy is Complicating Government Responses to COVID-19: Will the Crisis Push Millions Toward Formality?
As COVID-19 spreads in countries around the world, governments have already started to address the economic and livelihood challenges posed by the constraints the pandemic has put on behavior and employment. Wealthier OECD countries are designing economic support measures to target the backbone of most economies – the tens of thousands to millions of small businesses. […]
Saving Main Street in the Wake of COVID-19
Why saving small businesses matters Small businesses are the backbone of the U.S. economy. Under the most expansive definition, small businesses account for nearly half of the nation’s employees and almost 65 percent of new jobs created. Owning a small business is also associated with faster wealth-building. Since 1990, families in which the head of the household was […]
Three Promises Lidl Has Made to Protect its Food Workers
But there is another group of frontline food workers doing the same, hidden from view, those who produce the products we are all trying to buy, such as tea, coffee, prawns, fruit and vegetables. Even before Coronavirus, Oxfam research highlighted workers’ vulnerability, earning low wages on insecure contracts, often with poor sick pay and hygiene arrangements. In 2018, we launched the Behind the […]
UNIDO Helps Tajik Textile Enterprises Diversify into PPE Production
To further help avoid a health crisis, some national textile enterprises are diversifying production to include medical masks and gowns. The move will provide much-needed supplies of protective equipment to prevent the spread of the coronavirus in Tajikistan. Two enterprises making this move, Guldaston and Suman, have received assistance from the United Nations Industrial Development […]
COVID-19: Delivering Critical Information and Behaviour Change at Scale
Endcornavirus.africa and endcornavirus.co.ke are interactive one-stop-shops for COVID-19 prevention and management information in English for users across Africa using WHO guidelines, with the first language localised site in kiswahili for Kenya. Abi Gleek, Our Director of Digital Strategy, will be presenting the sites at the online ICT4D Conference in a session called ICT for COVID-19 Response: […]
The Urgency of a New Social Contract
In the United States, the crisis we are experiencing has laid bare the failure of the current social contract in many ways: the lack of access to healthcare owing to the tying of health insurance to paid employment; the extreme vulnerability of gig-economy workers to a sudden downturn of business; and for many workers, the absence of paid sick leave, inadequate childcare, and insufficient unemployment […]
Armenian Apparel Manufacturer Starts Producing Masks to Help Fight Coronavirus
The masks are made from anti-bacterial melt-blown polypropylene, a specialized medical-grade textile that allows air to pass through while filtering out dangerous particles. TOSP is currently manufacturing around 2,000 masks a day. Armenia instituted a one-month state of emergency on March 16, following a sharp increase in cases of Covid-19. All educational institutions have been shut […]
How to Profitably Serve the Last Mile
High cost of maintaining a single brand distribution network While some of the most profitable companies in the world are working on solutions for the last mile, the costs of maintaining these distribution networks remains a challenge, given the low profit margins. Even when product costs are low, maintaining a network of sales reps to […]
Fintech Opens New Opportunities for Private Sector to Support Cash Transfer Aid in Developing Countries
A new global network of blockchain-based community currencies, announced very recently, demonstrates how fintech is creating new ways for public and private sector partners to work together to help the most vulnerable. The two-year project will test, develop and distribute eVouchers, or Community Inclusion Currencies, held in mobile wallets on feature phones in some of […]
What Will Last Mile Distribution Look Like in 2025? Six Predictions for an Emerging Sector
Beneficial household products such as solar lights, improved cookstoves, water purifiers, nutritional supplements and agricultural inputs can play a significant role in achieving the Sustainable Development Goals. But these products can’t make an impact if they don’t reach the last mile customers who could benefit from them. And since they often live in rural communities […]
It’s Time We Understand All of a Business’ Impacts on People and the Planet
Many of us are entering the new decade with a sense of urgency as well as possibility. Whilst we know more and more about the global threats to society and the environment, we are increasingly made aware of the opportunities to actively contribute to positive change. This awareness is reflected in the way that we […]
Appropriate Technology for Serving the ‘Last Mile’ – The Need for Simple, Flexible and Scalable Solutions
Technology Challenges With the widespread proliferation of mobile phones, most of the leading FMCG players have attempted various initiatives to use technology to reach and gain visibility of mass-market businesses. However, while mobile phones are a true game-changer, common misconceptions have plagued many of these initiatives: Assumption 1: Mobile Phone = Mobile Data The majority […]
Nestlé’s System to Tackle Child Labor Works – Now We’re Scaling It Up
Our system was successful in tackling child labor in just over half of cases in the 2019 reporting period. Strong progress, but now we’re going further. What underlies the successes we’ve had, and how can we improve? Well, the system’s strength stems from the fact that we’ve built it from the ground upwards. Our 1,640 […]
Better Coffee, Better Prices: Improving Farmer Livelihoods through Quality Improvements
The hillsides surrounding Besheshe village in western Ethiopia are covered in coffee gardens and wild coffee trees growing under the forest canopy. Generations of farmers there have depended on this coffee to eke out a living. The varietals near Besheshe are unique, with the potential to produce the kind of flavors that discerning coffee drinkers […]
Reaching the Elusive Last Mile – Challenges of Digitizing Indirect FMCG Distribution Channels in Emerging Markets
With over 400 million business not connected to the digital economy and an annual “offline” trade of $5 trillion (Based on World Bank Statistics), today’s global consumer facing companies realize that reaching the ‘elusive last mile’ is key to their bottom line and ongoing growth. However, despite many efforts, ranging from partnerships with NGOs and […]
Social Innovation: The Answer to Progress
Innovation is not just about new ideas and methods, it’s about the new ways of thinking that lead to them. It’s also about new data models and being open to change that can improve products and services. In fact, at Salesforce.org, our most trailblazing products came from ideation and co-creation with customers, volunteers, interns and […]
Understanding the Pitfalls and Shooting for Alignment: How ViiV Healthcare is Tackling HIV Globally
What you should know about GSK, ViiV Healthcare and DTG GSK is a science-led global healthcare company with a purpose: to help people do more, feel better, and live longer. This includes a commitment to improve global health impact through research and development (R&D) for infectious diseases affecting children and adolescents in the developing world, […]
How a Sustainable Coconut Oil Project Improved Livelihoods for Smallholder Farmers in the Philippines and Indonesia
In Indonesia and the Philippines – world leaders in coconut production and exportation – most farmers are smallholders that struggle with lack of financing and training. Poor agricultural practices led to aging plantations and declining yields and incomes. Beginning in 2011, Cargill identified an opportunity to use its unique position to deliver solutions that would […]