accessing markets

share

Value Chains

International Day for Abolishing Slavery: The Facts

Sixty-five years after the United Nations officially condemned human trafficking, slavery quietly flourishes in every corner of the globe, from Hong Kong to Bangladesh to Russia to, yes, the United States.

share

Financial Inclusion

World Bank President faces staff mutiny amid reform

World Bank President Jim Yong Kim is catching heat for his efforts to reform the organization.

share

Mobile Technology

Monopoly No More: New Players Threaten M-Pesa's Mobile Money Dominance

M-Pesa’s mobile money-transfer service has been a sweeping success story in Kenya. But advances in the banking sector are catching up and new rivals are joining the race with their own mobile platforms.

share

Social Enterprise

Companies target billion-dollar potential by marketing to the poor

Creating and marketing products to sell to the poor is a tricky business, a game of trial and error. There appears to be no formula for success, only a few guiding principles. And the products that sell are not always what we would expect.

share

Value Chains

What do markets have to do with emergency response?

South Sudan is facing the most severe food crisis in the world. After eight months of humanitarian response, however, only one-third of civilians in need of assistance have received it. So what can we be doing differently?

share

Value Chains

Open sesame: Ugandan sesame seed farmers double their income

Global demand for sesame is strong and stable, but farmers’ income is anything but.

share

Financial Inclusion

Lessons learned: How Japan's small businesses are rebuilding after the 2011 tsunami

After the earthquake and tsunami hit Japan in 2011, thousands of small businesses were literally wiped out. As they began to rebuild, many found they didn't qualify for loans. Here's what they did:

share

Social Enterprise

Three big reasons why business is the best route to ending poverty

There’s nothing mysterious here. Poor people tell us they’re poor because they don’t have enough money—and who knows more about making money than businesspeople?

share

Financial Inclusion

The MasterCard Foundation Wants to Change the Financial Game for World’s Poor

Shiva Kumar is the face of India’s hard-working poor in a new video from CGAP.

share

Global Ideas News Brief: NGOs vs. big business

A weekly roundup of mainstream news about the context in which Mercy Corps works, focused on economic development and innovations.

share

GLOBAL IDEAS NEWS BRIEF: AFRICA SUMMIT + CLIMATE

A weekly roundup of mainstream news about the context in which Mercy Corps works, focused on economic development and innovations.

share

GLOBAL IDEAS NEWS BRIEF: UNLIKELY PARTNERSHIPS + CONFLICT

A weekly roundup of mainstream news about the context in which Mercy Corps works, focused on economic development and innovations.

share

Value Chains

Why understanding globalization’s roots lets us use it for good

How do we harness globalization so it benefits more people? First, we have to understand it. The University of Texas at Austin's online course gives a solid foundation--the free class starts August 27.

share

Value Chains

What the pivoting IMF mandate means for the poor

The International Monetary Fund is known for its multi-billion dollar bailouts of struggling countries, but the watchdog for global economic stability now says narrowing the income gap between the very poor and the very rich is a key tenet of its mission.