Digital Archive....

Is Agribusiness the Key to Africa's Growth? Global Development: Views from the Center By Vijaya Ramachandran - This post is joint with Casey Friedman. Today, the World Bank launched a new report, "Growing Africa: Unlocking the Potential of Agribusiness."  The report argues that agriculture and agribusiness should be at the top of the development and business agenda in Sub-Saharan Africa. The Bank is right to emphasize this issue–of the $25 billion of food [...]

Over $1 Trillion to 1 Percent of Charities: How Do We Measure the Results? Ken's Commentary This post, originally published in  The Huffington Post , was co-written by  Ken Berger  and  Dr. Robert Penna . The U.S. has the largest nonprofit sector in the history of the world. It is estimated to contain over  1.1 million public charities , which account for somewhere around  $1.5 trillion per year in revenues ; and the nonprofit sector as a whole employs over  one out of every 10 workers in this country . Therefore, with massive government budget deficits, tax increases on top earners, along with payroll taxes hitting millions of workers, America is at a critical juncture and needs to know that charitable revenues are being used as effectively as possible. Even more amazing is a fact most of the general public does not realize -- roughly 1 percent of the charities in the USA (perhaps 15,000 organizations) garner over 85 percent of...

Measuring Impact: Keep It Clear and Simple SSIR Opinion & Analysis By Larry Probus It's a truism that what gets measured gets done. But in the case of international NGOs seeking to measure the effectiveness of their programs, the doing is often in the hands of local communities, and the funding that fuels the doing comes from donors on another continent. Keeping measures simple and highly meaningful to both donors and those in the local community can make all the difference in motivating stakeholders toward a shared vision of healthy lives and livelihoods. Take for example World Vision's experience in scaling up access to clean water in Africa. Three years ago, we changed our approach to ensuring that communities had access to clean water, sanitation, and hygiene (WASH), and set an aggressive goal to reach five million in need over five years. The effort would require a rapid expansion of the program, including building enough wells to help ...

MOOC-sourcing for Social Good SSIR Opinion & Analysis By Nabeel Gillani Everyone's talking about massively open online courses (MOOCs) these days. Just before the New York Times named 2012 the year of the MOOC , Time magazine dedicated its October Issue, titled "Reinventing College," to an analysis of the role that MOOCs could play in repairing our higher education system—a system that is becoming more expensive while failing to prepare a growing pool of students to succeed in the workforce. To me, the most compelling part of the issue's feature article was the story of an 11-year-old girl from Pakistan named Khadijah Niazi. She started a challenging college-level physics course on Udacity in late 2012 when the Pakistani government decided to block access to YouTube. However, her peers—other students from around the world—were determined to help her succeed. They banded together to ensure that Khadijah could access course lectu...

Four Arguments against the Elimination of Child Labor David Roodman's Microfinance Open Book Blog By David Roodman - Don't get me wrong: sarcastic headline aside, I'm not in favor of the exploitation of children. However, I feel moved to speak against a recent push, I guess led by Hugh Sinclair , to insert a ban on child labor into the lending policies of microfinance institutions (MFIs), microfinance investors, and such accrediting programs as the Smart Campaign and the Seal of Excellence . The concern behind this movement is serious: that microcredit is financing, thus increasing, the exploitation of children. So the cause it leads to is understandable: a push for policies to break any such link. My challenges to this proposal are four: Legality. Hugh argues that child labor is wrong because it is illegal in many countries with microfinance. Excellent point! In fact, most microfinance clients are engaged in illegality one way or another: s...

http://elibrary.worldbank.org/content/workingpaper/10.1596/1813-9450-6325

Aid received per person updated Gapminder We updated the aid received per person. The data source is the World Bank and values are displayed in current US$. See the bubbles in the Gapminder World. Sent with Reeder

Has Venture Philanthropy Passed Its Peak? SSIR Opinion & Analysis By Joanna Jacobson As someone with roots in product marketing, I can't but help to see the similarities between the fashion curve of popular products and the adoption curve of venture philanthropy. And we have, in my opinion, passed the summit of that curve for venture philanthropy. When we founded Strategic Grant Partners in 2002, partnering with outstanding leaders who have powerful ideas to improve the lives of struggling individuals and families in Massachusetts, the term venture philanthropy was new. You had to explain to people that it referred to taking techniques from venture capital and applying them to achieving philanthropic goals Today, terms like social investing, social entrepreneurs, and social impact are common. Grants that require measurement and outcomes are ubiquitous. Finding the "new" new thing is the primary occupation of several well-intentio...

"Some Of These Institutions Have Become Too Large" The Baseline Scenario By Simon Johnson In a recent interview with PBS's Frontline , Lanny Breuer – head of the criminal division at the Department of Justice – appeared to admit that some financial institutions were too big to prosecute.  In the "too big to fail is too big to jail" controversy that ensued, lobbyists and other supporters of big Wall Street firms tried all kinds of complicated ways to spin Mr. Breuer's words. Their job got a lot harder yesterday when Eric Holder, the attorney general, stated clearly to the Senate Judiciary Committee, "I am concerned that the size of some of these institutions becomes so large that it does become difficult for us to prosecute them when we are hit with indications that if you do prosecute, if you do bring a criminal charge, it will have a negative impact on the national economy, perhaps even the world economy," ( Watch the...