India

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Sustainable Energy

Sun queens: Barefoot College women turn on the lights in off-grid villages

SELCO Technician installing solar panels. Credit: SELCO

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Sustainable Energy

SELCO: A shining star in market-driven social enterprise

This article was republished by The Christian Science Monitor

In India, one iconoclastic solar company employs deep knowledge of the ways communities use energy to overthrow the traditional means of bringing power to the people.

Chit funds have traditionally been utilized by groups of women in Southern India <a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/worldbank/2183521230/in/set-72157603947778876/"> World Bank (flickr)</a>

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Chit funds: You save your money, you take your chances

Amid the setbacks affecting India’s microfinance market an old time tradition has emerged with potential to provide an alternative for economic mobility.

Mobile phones are one of the ways ADB says will increase microfinance availability among the poor. Photo: <a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/cimmyt/8048414699/">CIMMYT (flickr)</a>.

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Financial Inclusion

MFIs should offer more than just microfinance, study finds

Despite the surging popularity of microfinance in the last several decades, access among the poor in Asia and the Pacific remains low. A new report says technology and livelihood programs will put it in the hands of more people.

Mera Gao Power: Men installing solar panels

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Sustainable Energy

To feed its growth, India weighs coal subsidies against solar ones

Could decentralized, solar energy be the solution to India’s power poverty?

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Mobile, solar schools literally bring power to the powerless

Beep beep! For some students, hopping on the school bus is hopping into the classroom. Four communities are using solar-powered mobile classrooms to overcome inaccessibility to the power grid.

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From Chitradurga, India: A magical, solar-powered school

A dearth of energy resources and skilled teachers in rural India means students lack access to modern computer technology. A traveling, e-learning school bus powered by the sun might roll its way to a better rural education solution.

Deep in the foothills of Darjeeling. Photo: Mercy Corps

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Teatime chat with Tazo and Starbucks

In India, the more important debate over Walmart may not be about whether it sells to the poor but whether it buys from them. Photo: <a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/37936363@N00/2206316223/">Bobinson K B (Flickr)</a>

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Value Chains

Poor Indians won't shop at Walmart - but will Walmart shop from them?

India's leaders say farmers will win big from last week's opening of the nation's retail market to multinationals.

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A closer look at India's new health microinsurance scheme

As mentioned in last week's post, India set out four years ago to achieve universal health coverage for poor families using a massive system of state-subsidized private microinsurance.

India is subsidizing more than 100 million small-value insurance policies in an effort to help people treat health problems without falling into poverty. Photo: <a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/nadya/4789818776/in/photostream/">Nadya Peek(flickr)</a>

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Financial Inclusion

India: Knocking the poor back on their feet with microinsurance

Hospitalization can save a life--at the cost, sometimes, of throwing it permanently off track. Two very different countries, India and the United States, recently chose a similar solution: subsidized insurance.

Hong Kong and other Chinese cities are driving an economic explosion that's blessing the world as a whole - but threatening many Westerners. Photo: <a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/95572727@N00/953669278/">Trey Ratcliff (Flickr)</a>

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Does the economic growth of poor countries terrify Westerners?

A Vancouver Sun story published Sunday offers a fascinating way of thinking about the scale of China's economic explosion:

As the world gets richer, competition for resources like water and livestock will likely increase. Photo: Erin Gray for MercyCorps

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Extreme poverty could end by 2030, but the planet might pay for it

The world’s soaring wealth will nearly wipe out poverty worldwide by 2030, according to the National Intelligence Council.

Savvy Kashmir youth start businesses to stem the tide of unemployment in the region. Photo: Tara Noronha/Mercy Corps

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With business training, lenders stitch Kashmir's private sector back together

A need in a community and an enthusiastic entrepreneur make a perfect match, but for many the financial hurdles of starting a business dissolves this relationship.

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Mobile phones: A jaw-dropping decade of success (INFOGRAPHIC)

The mobile revolution has taken over the world: 75 percent of the population now has access to phones. The applications are seemingly endless, from health care to agriculture. Check out the World Bank’s new infographic to see mobile phones' progress—click on either image to enlarge.