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Mobile Banking to Transform Nigeria’s Economy, says GT Bank Boss
The Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer of Guaranty Trust Bank Plc (GTBank), Mr. Segun Agbaje said Wednesday that the introduction of the mobile money- a mobile payment and remittance services, into the country would bring about positive transformation of payment system in the economy. Agbaje said this at the official launch of the bank’s mobile money product, in partnership with MTN. He explained that the innovation was as a prompt step towards financial...
- Region
- Sub-Saharan Africa
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Ending Africa’s Hungry Season: How Family Farms Are Driving Development
In rural sub-Saharan Africa, most people are farmers, and for part of the year, they go hungry. It’s called the hungry season. I encountered it when I lived in a farming community in Malawi for two years as a Peace Corps volunteer. Families in my village subsisted off of the maize and beans that they harvested, but there was only one growing season, and making stocks last an entire year was difficult. Imagine growing all of your family’s food for an entire year using just a hoe,...
- Region
- Sub-Saharan Africa
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How to Make It in Africa? Unilever Listens to the Consumer
"There is a growing realisation that the future of Africa is based around a consumer rather than mining. This is a consumer that has been under-served and over-charged," said Frank Braeken, Unilever executive vice-president for Africa at the High Growth Markets Summit at the end of September 2011. But Braeken pointed out that consumers in Ghana spend just one fifth ...
- Region
- Sub-Saharan Africa
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Africa Beckons as the Next Pot of Gold for the Cellphone Telecoms Industry
Africa’s lag in land-based telecoms infrastructure has propelled the continent directly into the mobile age, opening up unparalleled short-term growth prospects. Sector players have seen growth especially in mobile Internet and banking services, as people use cellphone technology for lack of landlines or cable Internet. "Africa is the last market to emerge. China’s emerged, India’s emerged. So where else outside Africa needs emerging? The growth opportunity is right he...
- Region
- Sub-Saharan Africa
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Chutes, Ladders, and Safety Nets: How Microinsurance Helps African Development
James Abuh-Prah had owned a used electronics shop in a small market in Accra for 17 years before a flood took everything. It was late one night in October, and the torrential rains hadn’t stopped for hours. "By 5 a.m. the water was up to my chest," he says. He had taken out a $2,400 loan from his bank, Opportunity International, to use as capital to buy used televisions, stereos, and other electronics. Now, everything was destroyed. It’s like a game of Chutes and Ladders,"...
- Region
- Sub-Saharan Africa
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Africa Rising
THE shops are stacked six feet high with goods, the streets outside are jammed with customers and salespeople are sweating profusely under the onslaught. But this is not a high street during the Christmas-shopping season in the rich world. It is the Onitsha market in southern Nigeria, every day of the year. Many call it the world’s biggest. Up to 3m people go there daily to buy rice and soap, computers and construction equipment. It is a hub for traders from the Gulf of Guinea, a region b...
- Region
- Sub-Saharan Africa
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Frequent Flier Miles at the Base of the Pyramid
OK, so you are a cell-phone user in rural Nigeria or Zimbabwe, and your provider is Econet Wireless. You’ve been a customer for a while, so you’ve accumulated loyalty rewards, just like airline frequent flier points. You live in a small hut in a village with no electricity, so you can’t use your phone as much as you would like, because you can only charge it on market day at the district headquarters. But now you can get a big discount on a solar lantern, or if you hav...
- Region
- Sub-Saharan Africa
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Africa Can Make Significant Progress Towards the MDGs
Most African countries may not achieve all the MDG targets by 2015. What matters more is that they all make significant progress in all areas of the MDGs and sustain, or even accelerate, this progress in accordance with their national conditions. Arguably, the political and economic conditions in Africa in 2011 are a lot better than they were...
- Region
- Sub-Saharan Africa
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