“We need to rethink adaptation” ~ IPCC 2022
Last week, the much awaited 4000 page report on Impacts, Adaptation, and Vulnerability by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) arrived to deliver the news – we’re now at the crucial moment when action must either be taken as soon as possible or our options narrow with each delay. What struck me, was that […]
Coronavirus side-effect: Transformation of China’s business models, logistics, and service delivery
Just the way the SARs epidemic kicked off China’s e-commerce revolution back in 2003, the ongoing COVID-19 containment strategies maybe triggering an even larger transformation of the Chinese economic ecosystem. I went looking today for the earliest signals of what might be underway. Rural China is facing the biggest challenge right now as the spring […]
Mobile Money and the Informal Economy: A Paradigm Change
One of the most powerful pieces of data analysis I have come across recently has been the Banque de France’s working paper on the role of financial innovation in the informal economy. In my opinion, the importance of their conclusions are no less than the famous “price of fish” paper of a decade ago – […]
A Unique Path to Development Seen for the Informal Economy
Just recently I stumbled over this slim book < 60 pages that analyzed existing data sources in order to frame an answer to the research question they posed: How did the informal economy―markets and the private sector―develop in the absence of legal and administrative frameworks to support it? Some of the most intriguing insights extracted […]
Dignity drives purchasing decisions for South African low income consumers
There is so much I was going to say when I came across this snippet in the news about South African consumer habits among the lower income folk for yesterday’s post. I am not convinced by the framing of the interpretation of the qualitative data but that’s an embedded SA problem with qualitative research in […]
“No Ordinary Disruption” – Africa’s Transformation
McKinsey consultants have released a new book – No Ordinary Disruption – looking at global mega trends and market forces that are forcing a rethink of the foundations of their intuitive knowledge. Assumptions are to be challenged and questioned, they say, as these changes impact a deeper transition in the way the world works. Even […]
