Win a trip to the M4D Conference in New Delhi, India!

Share your idea for a Future application for Development and win a trip to the 3rd International Conference on Mobile Communication on Development in New Delhi 28-29 February 2012!

The future Apps4D challenge focus on the development of mobile phone applications that in one way or another address the immense challenges our globe is facing concerning climate change, democracy, health, poverty reduction and increased livelihood in emerging growth economies.

The rise of mobile communication has been remarkable. By November 2010, over 5.3 billion had access to mobile telephony reaching up to 90 per cent of the world population. The proliferation of mobile telephony in the emerging growth economies open up a range of possibilities and new avenues for using the mobile telephone as a communication platform for change.

Read more http://www.yipekenya.org/M4D.html

Women and Mobile Phone global study reveals that phone ownership can lead to increased income and opportunity

The GSM Association and the Cherie Blair Foundation for Women, a charity that supports women entrepreneurs has published a report ‘Women and Mobile: A Global Opportunity’. 

This is the first detailed global study of its kind that attempts to understand the nature of women mobile subscribers in low and middle-income countries such as Kenya and India. 

Among the key findings, the report showed that:

• There are 300 million fewer female subscribers than male subscribers worldwide
• A woman in Africa is 23% less likely to own a phone than a man.
• Going forward, two thirds of potential new subscribers for mobile network operators will be women.
• Women in rural areas and lower income brackets stand to benefit the most from closing the gender gap.
• 93% of  women report feeling safer because of their mobile phone.
• 85% of women report feeling more independent because of their mobile phone
• 41% of women report having increased income and professional opportunities once they own a phone  
  

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When an enabling business environment means more than easier and cheaper credit

Even though credit is critical for commerce, it’s not just in Kenya where entrepreneurs are not jumping with joy over announcements of easier and cheaper credit. In India, according to Ragini Verma writing in an article titled “Easy loan access fails to enthuse SMEs”: the Indian micro, small and medium enterprises sector has given an average rating to the easy and cheaper credit announcement by the public sector banks, saying it was not enough to boost growth.

Today’s business owner is more concerned with macro factors, in light of the financial slowdown. Even though the media keeps bombarding us with ads on the youth and women’s funds, a prudent startup owner not only wants to ascertain how they will pay back the loan, but also ensure that the business environment allows their enterprise to thrive.

In this severe economic climate, it is now more imperative than ever that the macro environment allows these small businesses to trade their way out of the downturn. This means addressing barriers to trade, of which probably the level of taxation is high priority.

Just like Dehli entrepreneurs are saying, these extra credit facilities would have more impact on the economy if they came matched with fiscal concessions. VAT at 16% for instance already outprices goods and services, making local goods less competitive compared with imports.

Another way of making these funds more attractive would be to allow flexibility regarding the loan amount and duration. The ability to reinvest the principal into the enterprise and accrue more profit would probably act as a further incentive for entrepreneurs to seek the funds.