47,747 research outputs found

    Thinking Beyond Credit

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    Credit is often seen as an indispensable vehicle for the poor to get out of poverty, or as the tool that allows farmers to get access to new technologies, to increase productivity and their incomes. But many existing credit programmes often undermine farmers’ independence, tie them into dependency relationships, and oblige them to take all the risk. There are better ways to help farmers build their own resource base and independenc

    Big Ideas for Small Business Report

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    Big Ideas for Small Business is a national peer network led by the National League of Cities (NLC) that aims to accelerate efforts by local governments to support small businesses and encourage entrepreneurship.  This direct peer-to-peer engagement expands the capacity of city staff to explore common challenges, share proven strategies, and collaborate on new approaches for creating a more business-friendly city.  The Big Ideas for Small Business toolkit discusses important strategies for how local leaders can be better advocates for small businesses. Our report provides guidance on creating ecosystems that support small business growth; reorganizing city resources to better meet the needs of small businesses; and providing business owners with access to new sources of capital. Specific strategies highlighted in this report explain how to:Connect Small Businesses to Information and ResourcesEstablish a Small Business Resource Center Advocate for Small Businesses via Community-Led Councils or CommitteesProactively Engage the Local Business CommunityProvide Platforms for NetworkingCreate Incubator SpacesCelebrate Successful BusinessesDevelop One-Stop-Shops and Express Lanes at City Hall Streamline City Regulations and the Inspection ProcessHelp Small Businesses Build a Web PresenceSupport Microlending and CrowdfundingEncourage Local Small Businesses to Bid for City Contracts

    Ending open defecation in rural Tanzania: which factors facilitate latrine adoption?

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    Diarrheal diseases account for 7% of deaths in children under five years of age in Tanzania. Improving sanitation is an essential step towards reducing these deaths. This secondary analysis examined rural Tanzanian households sanitation behaviors and attitudes in order to identify barriers and drivers to latrine adoption. The analysis was conducted using results from a cross-sectional study of 1000 households in five rural districts of Tanzania. Motivating factors, perceptions, and constraints surrounding open defecation and latrine adoption were assessed using behavioral change theory. Results showed a significant association between use of improved sanitation and satisfaction with current sanitation facility (OR: 5.91; CI: 2.95-11.85; p = 0.008). Livestock-keeping was strongly associated with practicing open defecation (OR: 0.22; CI 0.063-0.75; p < 0.001). Of the 93 total households that practiced open defecation, 79 (85%) were dissatisfied with the practice, 62 (67%) had plans to build a latrine and 17 (18%) had started saving for a latrine. Among households that planned to build a latrine, health was the primary reason stated (60%). The inability to pay for upgrading sanitation infrastructure was commonly reported among the households. Future efforts should consider methods to reduce costs and ease payments for households to upgrade sanitation infrastructure. Messages to increase demand for latrine adoption in rural Tanzania should integrate themes of privacy, safety, prestige and health. Findings indicate a need for lower cost sanitation options and financing strategies to increase household ability to adopt sanitation facilities

    Good Health at Low Cost 25 years on: lessons for the future of health systems strengthening.

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    In 1985, the Rockefeller Foundation published Good health at low cost to discuss why some countries or regions achieve better health and social outcomes than do others at a similar level of income and to show the role of political will and socially progressive policies. 25 years on, the Good Health at Low Cost project revisited these places but looked anew at Bangladesh, Ethiopia, Kyrgyzstan, Thailand, and the Indian state of Tamil Nadu, which have all either achieved substantial improvements in health or access to services or implemented innovative health policies relative to their neighbours. A series of comparative case studies (2009-11) looked at how and why each region accomplished these changes. Attributes of success included good governance and political commitment, effective bureaucracies that preserve institutional memory and can learn from experience, and the ability to innovate and adapt to resource limitations. Furthermore, the capacity to respond to population needs and build resilience into health systems in the face of political unrest, economic crises, and natural disasters was important. Transport infrastructure, female empowerment, and education also played a part. Health systems are complex and no simple recipe exists for success. Yet in the countries and regions studied, progress has been assisted by institutional stability, with continuity of reforms despite political and economic turmoil, learning lessons from experience, seizing windows of opportunity, and ensuring sensitivity to context. These experiences show that improvements in health can still be achieved in countries with relatively few resources, though strategic investment is necessary to address new challenges such as complex chronic diseases and growing population expectations

    Government support to private infrastructure projects in emerging markets

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    Driven by fiscal austerity and disenchantment with the performance of state-provided infrastructure services, many governments have turned to the private sector to build, operate, finance, or own infrastructure in power, gas, water, transport, and telecommunications sectors. Private capital flows to developing countries are increasing rapidly; 15 percent of infrastructure investment is now funded by private capital in emerging markets. But relative to needs, such private investment is progressing slowly. Governments are reluctant to raise consumer prices to cost-covering levels, while investors, mindful of experience, fear that governments may renege on promises to maintain adequate prices over the long haul. So investors ask for government support in the form of grants, preferential tax treatment, debt or equity contributions, or guarantees. These subsidies differ in how they allocate risk between private investors and government. Efficiency gains are greatest when private parties assume the risks that they can manage better than the public sector. When governments establish good policies--especially cost-covering prices and credible commitments to stick to them--investors are willing to invest without special government support. Privatizing assets without government guarantees or other financial support is possible, even where governments are politically unable to raise prices, because investors can achieve the returns they demand by discounting the value of the assets they are purchasing. But this is not possible for new investments (greenfield projects). If prices have been set too low and the government is not willing to raise them, it must give the investor financial support, such as guarantees and other forms of subsidy, to facilitate worthwhile projects that would not otherwise proceed. But guarantees shift costs from consumers to taxpayers, who subsidize users of infrastructure services. Much of that subsidy is hidden, since the government does not record the guarantee in its fiscal accounts. And taxpayers provide unremunerated credit insurance, as the government borrows based on its ability to tax citizens if the project fails, not on the strength of the project itself.Payment Systems&Infrastructure,International Terrorism&Counterterrorism,Public Sector Economics&Finance,Banks&Banking Reform,Municipal Financial Management,Banks&Banking Reform,Public Sector Economics&Finance,Municipal Financial Management,Environmental Economics&Policies,Financial Crisis Management&Restructuring

    Rethinking business models for innovation

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    One of the major challenges confronted by those in charge of technological innovation involves anticipating the value creation model sufficiently early on,in a highly uncertain context both as far as the technology itself is concerned and the potential market. Today, in many industrial sectors, the innovation boundaries have moved towards projects that are more and more exploratory and fuzzy. The simple optimisation of linear processes of the "stage-gate" type is no longer sufficient to build sustainable competitive advantages. The notion of Business Models, when applied to innovation, enables us to describe how a company creates value through innovation, generally within a business ecosystem, and how the value will be distributed between the actors involved. The authors of this book believe that the notions of Business Modelling and value creation are key to all the dimensions of successful innovation, whether technology, marketing, organisational or economically based. Rethinking Business Models for Innovation: this title describes the relationship between thinking, modelling, and also field-testing. The book is based on a series of nine recent cases of innovation involving company managers, often assisted by researchers (the co-authors of each chapter), and how they built and formalised their Business Models and then tested their strategies. After having discovered the variety of the cases, the reader will understand that every innovation situation generates specific questions about Business Models. However, we feel that we can identify three key issues that arise, more or less, in each of these projects. The chapters in this book build on these issues: the identification of sources of value and revenue models (the notion of value creation), the position of the company in the value-network or ecosystem (the sharing of value) and finally the evolution of Business MoDdels over time (the sustainability and the competitiveness of the company). The last chapter goes over all the contributions, exploring the notion of value in the Business Model approach.business model ; innovation ; value ; entrepreneurial project

    Winners and Losers in Housing Markets

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    This paper is a quantitatively-oriented theoretical study into the interaction between housing prices, aggregate production, and household behaviour over a lifetime. We develop a life-cycle model of a production economy in which land and capital are used to build residential and commercial structures. We find that, in an economy where the share of land in the value of structures is large, housing prices react more to an exogenous change in expected productivity or the world interest rate, causing large redistribution effects between net buyers and net sellers of houses. Changing the financing constraint, however, has limited effects on housing prices.Real estates, Land, Housing Prices, Life cycle, Collateral constraints.

    Growing a Green Economy for All: From Green Jobs to Green Ownership

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    This Democracy Collaborative report provides the first comprehensive survey of community wealth building institutions in the green economy. Featuring ten cases, the report identifies how policy and philanthropy can build on these examples to create "green jobs you can own.

    Expanding Asset-Building: Opportunities Through Shared Ownership

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    Based on a literature review and interviews, proposes expanding low-income working families' asset-building options beyond individual ownership to shared ownership such as cooperative housing. Outlines various strategies and explores policy options
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