Sustainable BusinessRecent posts
How to Create Jobs in the Caribbean: From Payment Delays to Payroll Growth
Discover a pathway that speeds up payments, unlocks cash flow, and empowers Caribbean entrepreneurs to take more orders and hire.
Facing the Storm: How IDB Invest Supports Caribbean Private Sector Resilience
IDB Invest is partnering with the Green Climate Fund to help Caribbean businesses better withstand future climate shocks through blended finance and technical assistance.
Digital Innovation Expands Financing for Women-Led SMEs in Latin America and the Caribbean
Loans and disbursements approved in less than 24 hours, enabled by artificial intelligence, and early invoice payments powered by fintech solutions are transforming access to credit for MSMEs, especially those led by women.
Four ways technology and data facilitate SME finance in Latin America & the Caribbean
* By Greg Da Re Technology, particularly the Internet, allows SMEs to share experiences, connect to different networks and operate in a world without the limitation of geographical barriers. Social networks are increasingly important for companies to position their brands. Social media in Latin America will near 300 million users by 2017. Technology can allow SMEs to increase their competitiveness and facilitate new ways to access financing.
Impact Investing: Defining 2014’s #1 Development Buzzword
* By the IDB's Partnership Office Is impact investing just another development buzzword? A passing fad? We believe it is not, and that it is an innovative approach to development financing that is here to stay.
World looks to BRICS for sustainable business solutions
Multilaterals can provide sustainable business solutions – the recent BRICS summit highlighted how. Two weeks ago, the leaders of the five BRICS emerging nations –– Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa–– met in Fortaleza, Brazil for the 6th BRICS Summit. A $100 million development bank and a currency reserve pool were launched among the nations, a long-waited initiative since talks first began five years ago. This is no small feat. The five nations together account for half of the global population and 20 percent of the world’s GDP. Moreover, in the last ten years the economic outputs of these emerging nations have quadrupled . Although economic growth often translates into better living standards and opportunities for citizens, it is often coupled with key economic, social and environmental challenges –– especially in rapidly growing emerging economies.
Two cents from an entrepreneur: how development institutions can help scale up base of the pyramid models
* By Andre Averbug Most discussions about scaling up base of the pyramid (BOP) models focus on financing the companies themselves, yet there are other ways development finance institutions (DFIs )could support BOP ventures.
Abandoned houses prove golden opportunity: An interview with Antonio Díaz, Founder and CEO of Provive
Miriam, 43, lives in Cañadas del Florido, a low-income neighborhood in Tijuana, Baja California, the northernmost state of Mexico. Three years ago, on any given day, Miriam and her three children would watch criminals, drug addicts, and vagrants frequent the empty house next-door. Their streets were littered with garbage and dead animals. This is not an uncommon situation in the Mexican neighborhoods, or fraccionamientos, where more than seven million houses were built by developers with mortgages from the government in the last decade. Thanks to Provive, Miriam’s life has since changed.
Soccer and women: not just something men talk about
Well done Germany! The German national football team is the winner of the FIFA 2014 World Cup that ended Sunday at the Maracanã stadium in Rio de Janeiro. The next time a men’s soccer team holds the FIFA World Cup trophy will be four years from now in Russia. As Die Nationalmannschaft were congratulated by two female heads of state; Brazil’s Dilma Rousseff and Germany’s Angela Merkel, another important event came to mind: the FIFA 2015 Women’s World Cup in Canada
