David South Consulting

Tag: Issue 5

  • Indian Solar Power Pack Powers Villages

    Indian Solar Power Pack Powers Villages

    By David South, Development Challenges, South-South Solutions

    SOUTH-SOUTH CASE STUDY

    Developments in India are showing the way forward for low-cost solar power for the poor. The Duron Solar Home Power System (http://www.duronenergy.com/product_info/) is now enabling the rural poor to generate and store solar electricity. It is powerful enough to charge gadgets and appliances and run LED lights. It allows people to do their household chores into the dark hours and to study or earn extra income.

    As the company says, it “allows ample light for cooking, for children to study at night, and for shop owners to stay open later to earn more money.”

    The system removes the need for polluting and dangerous kerosene lamps, which are used by an estimated one million families for lighting in India.

    Kerosene lamps are a major contributor to indoor air pollution, which itself claims the lives of 1.5 million people each year. Kerosene lamps have also caused countless deaths by suffocation, burns and fatal fires.

    The United Nations Environment Program says kerosene fumes are responsible for around 64 percent of deaths for children under the age of five in developing countries.

    More than 1.7 billion people around the world have no domestic electricity supply, of whom more than 500 million live in sub-Saharan Africa (World Bank). Some 400 million people in India do not have access to electricity, according to the World Bank, and 600,000 villages lack an electrical supply. Prime Minister Manmohan Singh has pledged “power for all” by 2012. Without electricity, many development goals remain dreams that will never be achieved.

    Being able to see at night unleashes a vast range of possibilities, but for the very poor lighting is often the most expensive household expense, soaking up 10 to 15 percent of income.

    According to Greenpeace (http://www.greenpeace.org/international/), India could generate 10 percent of its electricity from solar power by 2030.

    The Duron package comes with a five watt solar panel, a cell phone charger connection, three LED (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LED_lamp) lights, and an AC grid charger. After a day of charging, the Duron can power three hours of bright lighting or 10 hours of dim lighting.

    The Duron system sells for about 5,999 rupees, or around US $130, and the typical user to date has been small businesses and schools.

    Duron is selling several thousand units a month and the company is currently scaling up its sales efforts.

    Duron’s approach is to provide a market solution to the huge problem of providing electricity to India’s rural poor.

    The company was launched in 2008 with the goal of providing electricity to those without around the world. It was developed out of the Idea Lab (http://www.idealab.com/), a Pasadena, Californian incubator of technology companies.

    Extensive field research was conducted across India to determine what was the best solution and what were the needs of rural dwellers. Duron moved its headquarters to Bangalore, India in 2009 to be closer to its customers and expand sales. The company operates in the Indian states of Uttar Pradesh and Karnataka.

    By August 2009, more than 2,100 people had light because of the Duron system. The company calculates this translated into 172,500 hours of light.

    One customer, Anil Singh, lives with his family in the unelectrified village of Narainpur. His family used kerosene lamps and was paying US $4 a day for unreliable lighting. But after seeing his neighbour, Santosh Singh, with bright, powerful lights at his home, he was curious as to why. When he found out about Duron’s system, he installed a system to light his front porch and two rooms in his house. His family now enjoys two-and-half hours of reliable light in the evening to do things.

    “The Duron has made my life so much easier,” said Anil. “It’s a much cheaper (lighting) option compared to kerosene lamps, and I now have a reliable source of power on a daily basis,” he told the company’s website.

    Another innovative start-up with offices in India and Africa, is the d.light company, which also has a new, highly-efficient solar-powered product available. The Kiran LED lamp (http://www.dlightdesign.com/products_kiran_global.php) stays lit for eight hours on a full battery and is four times brighter than a kerosene lamp. It illuminates 360 degrees and produces an even, bright white light.

    Published: February 2010

    Resources

    1) Lighting Africa: this website run by the World Bank is a virtual business community and has forums, market intelligence, access to grants, network and partnership opportunities. Website: http://lightingafrica.org/index.cfm?Page=Home

    2) D.light Design is dedicated to bringing modern lighting and power to more than 1.6 billion people globally currently living without electricity. They aim to be the number one player in off-grid lighting and power solutions worldwide. Website: http://www.dlightdesign.com/

    3) Solar Power Answers is a one-stop-shop for everything to do with solar power. It has a design manual and guides to the complex world of solar power equipment. Website: http://www.solar-power-answers.co.uk/index.php

    4) Sun King solar lantern: The lantern provides 16 hours of light for a day’s charge. Website: http://www.greenlightplanet.com/ourusers.html

    Development Challenges, South-South Solutions was launched as an e-newsletter in 2006 by UNDP’s South-South Cooperation Unit (now the United Nations Office for South-South Cooperation) based in New York, USA. It led on profiling the rise of the global South as an economic powerhouse and was one of the first regular publications to champion the global South’s innovators, entrepreneurs, and pioneers. It tracked the key trends that are now so profoundly reshaping how development is seen and done. This includes the rapid take-up of mobile phones and information technology in the global South (as profiled in the first issue of magazine Southern Innovator), the move to becoming a majority urban world, a growing global innovator culture, and the plethora of solutions being developed in the global South to tackle its problems and improve living conditions and boost human development. The success of the e-newsletter led to the launch of the magazine Southern Innovator.  

    Creative Commons License

    This work is licensed under a
    Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 License.

    ORCID iD: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-5311-1052.

    © David South Consulting 2022

  • Asian Factories Starting to go Green

    Asian Factories Starting to go Green

    By David South, Development Challenges, South-South Solutions

    SOUTH-SOUTH CASE STUDY

    Media headlines have recently highlighted the growing air pollution crisis in Asia’s expanding cities. This is caused by a mix of factors – the growing number of vehicles, coal-powered factories, people burning dirty fuels to heat their homes, and poor enforcement of standards – and has severe consequences for human health. If it’s not tackled, more and more countries will see large rises in respiratory problems, cancers and early deaths from pollution-caused illnesses (http://www.nrdc.org/air/).

    The World Health Organization (WHO) says air pollution is the world’s largest environmental health risk, killing 7 million people every year. Asia has the largest number of air pollution deaths in the world, with 3.3 million deaths linked to indoor air pollution and 2.6 million deaths related to outdoor air pollution (Clean Air Asia).

    While most of the Asian countries where this is a problem are also aggressively growing their economies in order to get richer and raise living standards, there is a rising awareness of the need to balance a modern, industrial economy with human health and the environment.

    One solution is to adopt green and sustainable building standards when constructing new factories. This is more than just a public relations exercise: the energy savings possible from building smart pay off in the long run. And green factories not only pollute less, they save lives and the environment.

    Asia plays a critical role in producing the world’s consumer products, from the small and simple to the highly complex components used in 21st-century computing technologies.

    Intel (intel.com), the manufacturer of electronic devices and the computer chips that go inside them, is trying to lead the way. It has built a US $1 billion manufacturing plant 16 kilometers outside Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam, and it is designed to exceed Vietnamese environmental and sustainability guidelines and laws.

    Opened in 2010, it boasts the country’s largest solar power system. It is also currently working on a water reclamation system to reduce water consumption at the plant by 68 per cent, according to The New York Times. It is hoping to receive certification from the US Green Building Council (usgbc.org).

    It is all part of a wider trend that is starting to reverse the damaging, short-termist approach of the past. More and more Western multinationals and their Asian suppliers are building environmentally sound factories in the developing world.

    According to the US Green Building Council, around 300 manufacturing facilities in Asia are either certified or are awaiting Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) certification. The LEED certification recognizes the building has met certain standards in becoming a ‘green’ building.

    Going green is more and more part of corporate policy for companies that want to avoid the bad publicity of disasters such as the garment factory collapse that killed 1,135 people in Bangladesh in April 2013.

    But it is not just driven by a desire to avoid bad publicity: large corporations that build factories in the global South are also realizing there are big financial savings to be made.

    Intel has been able to reduce its global energy costs by US $111 million since 2008. It did this by investing US $59 million in 1,500 projects to boost sustainability across its facilities worldwide. The projects have reduced carbon dioxide emissions equivalent to the amount produced by 126,000 American households per year.

    Intel’s solar array in Vietnam, which cost US $1.1 million, offsets the equivalent of 500 pollution-belching motorbikes every day.

    How effective are LEED-certified buildings? The New York Times reported that a 2011 survey compared a typical shoe factory with a LEED factory run by the American sport shoe maker Nike. It found the LEED factory used 18 per cent less electricity and fuel and 53 per cent less water.

    And this trend is creating a new economy unto itself. As an example, a new marketplace for industrial efficiency upgrading is developing in India. Power outages are frequent in India, so finding a way to save electricity and alternatives to dependence on the national power grid is attractive to any economic enterprise.

    Prashant Kapoor, principal industry specialist for green buildings at the International Finance Corporation (IFC), believes demand for upgrades is strong enough that various companies can specialize in this field and profit from it.

    And things are also happening in the notoriously smog-choked cities of China. By the end of 2012, China had certified eight factories and 742 buildings as LEED, according to the China buildings programme at the Energy Foundation (ef.org) in San Francisco.

    Damien Duhamel of Solidiance (solidiance.com), a firm that advises businesses on how to grow in Asia, believes avoiding risk caused by environmental accidents or scandals is heightened by the growing presence of social media, which amplifies negative publicity.

    “The next battle will be here” for higher corporate environmental standards, Duhamel believes. “This is why some smart companies – Intel, for example – took the steps of being proactive.”

    Published: April 2014

    Resources

    1) Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED): LEED, or Leadership in Energy & Environmental Design, is a green building certification program that recognizes best-in-class building strategies and practices. Website: http://www.usgbc.org/leed

    2) US Green Building Council (USGBC): Its mission is to transform the way buildings and communities are designed, built and operated, enabling an environmentally and socially responsible, healthy, and prosperous environment that improves the quality of life. Website: http://www.usgbc.org/

    3) Dwell: Dwell magazine is focused on demonstrating that modern design can be both functional and comfortable. Website: dwell.com

    4) Inhabitat: Design for a Better World: Inhabitat.com is a weblog devoted to the future of design, tracking the innovations in technology, practices and materials that are pushing architecture and home design towards a smarter and more sustainable future. Website: inhabitat.com

    5) Solidiance: Singapore-based consulting firm specializing in Asia’s green-building sector. Website: solidiance.com

    6) Clean Air Asia: Clean Air Asia was established in 2001 as the premier air quality network for Asia by the Asian Development Bank, World Bank, and USAID. Its mission is to promote better air quality and livable cities by translating knowledge to policies and actions that reduce air pollution and greenhouse gas emissions from transport, energy and other sectors. Website: cleanairinitiative.org

    7) Southern Innovator Issue 4: Cities and Urbanization: This issue is packed with ideas on to how make cities and urban environments greener and reduce air pollution. Website: http://www.scribd.com/doc/133622315/Southern-Innovator-Magazine-Issue-4-Cities-and-Urbanization and here: http://tinyurl.com/oc2mqgm

    8) Better Air Quality Conference 2014 and 8th Regional Environmentally Sustainable Transport Forum in Asia:  From 19 to 21 November 2014 in Colombo, Sri Lanka, BAQ is the leading event on air quality in Asia, covering the key sectors of transport, energy, industry and climate change, with a particular emphasis on government policies and measures. Website: http://cleanairinitiative.org/portal/node/12274

    9) Tianjin Eco-city: The Sino-Singapore Tianjin Eco-city’s vision is to be a thriving city which is socially harmonious, environmentally-friendly and resource-efficient. Website: tianjinecocity.gov.sg

    10) Songdo: Songdo International Business District (IBD) officially opened on August 7, 2009 as a designated Free Economic Zone and the first new sustainable city in the world designed to be an international business district. Website: songdo.com

    https://davidsouthconsulting.org/2022/09/27/caribbean-island-st-kitts-goes-green-for-tourism/

    https://davidsouthconsulting.org/2021/01/25/creating-green-fashion-in-china/

    https://davidsouthconsulting.org/2021/02/01/ethiopia-and-djibouti-join-push-to-tap-geothermal-sources-for-green-energy/

    https://davidsouthconsulting.org/2023/02/03/environmental-public-awareness-handbook-case-studies-and-lessons-learned-in-mongolia/

    https://davidsouthconsulting.org/2021/08/29/indian-business-model-makes-green-energy-affordable/

    https://davidsouthconsulting.org/2022/11/11/innovation-cairos-green-technology-pioneers/

    https://davidsouthconsulting.org/2021/10/22/innovations-in-green-economy-top-three-agenda/

    https://davidsouthconsulting.org/2021/08/07/mongolian-green-book/

    https://davidsouthconsulting.org/2022/04/14/prisons-with-green-solutions/

    https://davidsouthconsulting.org/2021/02/04/us-450-million-pledged-for-green-economy-investments-at-kenyan-gssd-expo/

    Development Challenges, South-South Solutions was launched as an e-newsletter in 2006 by UNDP’s South-South Cooperation Unit (now the United Nations Office for South-South Cooperation) based in New York, USA. It led on profiling the rise of the global South as an economic powerhouse and was one of the first regular publications to champion the global South’s innovators, entrepreneurs, and pioneers. It tracked the key trends that are now so profoundly reshaping how development is seen and done. This includes the rapid take-up of mobile phones and information technology in the global South (as profiled in the first issue of magazine Southern Innovator), the move to becoming a majority urban world, a growing global innovator culture, and the plethora of solutions being developed in the global South to tackle its problems and improve living conditions and boost human development. The success of the e-newsletter led to the launch of the magazine Southern Innovator.  

    Creative Commons License

    This work is licensed under a
    Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 License. 

    ORCID iD: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-5311-1052.

    © David South Consulting 2022

  • Banning of Plastic Bags and Containers Brings New Opportunities

    Banning of Plastic Bags and Containers Brings New Opportunities

    By David South, Development Challenges, South-South Solutions

    SOUTH-SOUTH CASE STUDY

    This month, Uganda bans plastic bags, outlawing their import, manufacture and use and joining a growing list of African countries seeking to sweep cities of this menace. Uganda’s ban follows similar moves in Kenya and in Tanzania, where even plastic drinks containers will soon be banished. Rwanda, also a member of the East African Community, has gone further – in 2005 the country banned any products made of very thin plastic below 100 microns. The thinner plastic found in plastic bags (under 30 microns) is particularly troublesome because it is easily blown around by the wind. The proliferation of plastic bags and plastic containers across the developing world has not only become an eyesore, it is also an environmental catastrophe that is poisoning the land.

    In Uganda’s capital, Kampala, discarded plastic has combined with toxic waste management practices to make the problem worse. While Kampala has 30 companies dealing in solid waste management, the process is mired in corruption. Poor areas of the city receive no service because it is more profitable for the companies to target wealthy areas for the user fees they collect to remove rubbish.

    Scavengers in the municipal dump of Kampala earn 50 Ugandan pence a day collecting plastic bags. Most plastic bags do not make it to the dump, ending up blown around the city by the wind, washed into drains and water courses. Worse, the rich soil around Uganda’s towns and villages is now covered in plastic bags. A new layer of polythene and contaminated soil has formed in many areas, with an impenetrable crust that stops rain from soaking through. It leaves water stagnating in pools gurgling with methane gas bubbles.

    For entrepreneurs, tackling the mountains of plastic waste is an opportunity – as is providing a replacement once they are banned. A boon time is emerging for the market in recycled and reusable materials and biodegradable alternatives.

    The So Afr-Eco Community Upliftment Project for Rural Women in South Africa is a common example. A project that proves money can be made from recycling discarded plastic bags into useful items. Based in the Obanjeni district in Kwazulunatal, it was founded by Jenny Kirkland, who was disgusted with the proliferation of plastic bags littering South Africa’s countryside. She decided to do something that would also hire rural women and give them an income. The plastic bags are cut into strips of twine and then woven together to make hats, bags, doormats and waistcoats. Run as a for-profit business, it now employs 132 families and exports products to 19 countries, including Australia, the USA, the UK, Canada, Sweden and Poland. South African schools are now provided with sun hats and companies order hats for use at conferences. The profits made from sales are significant by local standards. For example, the sale of one beach bag can feed a small family for two weeks, a hat feeds a family for a week, and a doormat for a month.

    Anita Ahuja, president of the NGO Conserve, has set up a business making fashionable handbags, wallets and shopping bags from recycled plastic bags in New Delhi, India. Begun in 2003, the project collects plastic bags on the streets and keeps 60 women employed. The recycling process does not require additional dyes or inks and is non-toxic. The bags are sold in London, UK and will soon be sold in Italy by the Benetton clothing chain.

    “We braided them and tried weaving them, but the plastic would come loose. Then we hit upon the idea of pressing them to make sheets,” Ahuja said.

    But this issue can be more complex than it first seems. After South Africa banned plastic bags of less than 30 microns in 2003, many poor entrepreneurs have complained that it hit hard their making of hats, handbags, purses and scrubbing brushes from them – something that had become a good livelihood.

    After the bags are banned, environmentalists say the best option is to use reusable bags made of materials that don’t harm the environment during production and don’t need to be discarded after use.

    Alternatives to plastic bags include traditional African baskets or kiondos as they are known in Kenya. Made from sisal and sometimes with leather or wooden handles, the handmade bags support many local women (http://www.propoortourism-kenya.org/african_bags.htm).

    In Kenya, entrepreneurs have also stepped in to offer alternatives to plastic and kiondos. Supermarkets and shops in the country distributed 11 million plastic shopping bags a year, so Joseph Ayuka of Greensphere Enterprises has begun to market cotton bags for their easy portability. “People don’t want to carry bulky bags to the supermarket”, he said.

    Resources

    Creative Commons License

    This work is licensed under a
    Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 License.

    ORCID iD: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-5311-1052.

    © David South Consulting 2022

  • Recycling Waste to Boost Incomes and Opportunities

    Recycling Waste to Boost Incomes and Opportunities

    By David South, Development Challenges, South-South Solutions

    SOUTH-SOUTH CASE STUDY

    We all know that green is good, but often the best way to encourage recycling and other environment-improving activities is to put in place economic incentives. It is one thing to admonish people and tell them something is the right thing to do; it is another to make keeping a clean environment pay.

    Many initiatives across the global South have proven it is possible to develop an economy of recycling and garbage collection in poor neighbourhoods. These economies take many forms and models.

    At the most basic end of the scale are the desperate, survival-driven examples of recycling. In countries likeIndia, recycling can be purely a question of survival – people are so poor they can’t allow anything that might have income potential go to waste. Other countries are very familiar with large numbers of desperately poor people picking through garbage dumps and waste to eke out a living. Or, for example in Brazil, as in many other countries, it’s common to see poor and homeless people picking through garbage on the streets.

    These are examples of degrading ‘green’ economies. But there other ways to encourage waste recycling that offer real income benefits and life improvements.

    Brazil, a world leader in waste recycling and green technologies, has pioneered the recycling of plastic bottles, aluminum, steel cans, solid plastic waste and glass. And now energy companies inBrazilhave created credit schemes that encourage waste recycling while giving people real economic benefits in return for doing the right thing for the environment. The first scheme went so well, it quickly inspired others to replicate its programme in other poor communities.

    Coelce (http://www.coelce.com.br/default.aspx) is a power company in the Ceará State in northeastern Brazil. The company is primarily engaged in the distribution of electrical power for industrial, rural, commercial and residential consumption. In 2007 it set up Ecoelce (http://www.coelce.com.br/coelcesociedade/programas-e-projetos/ecoelce.aspx), a programme allowing people to recycle waste in return for credits towards their electricity bills. The success of the programme led to an award from the United Nations.

    The programme works like this: people bring the waste to a central collection place, a blue and red building with clear and bright branding to make it easy to find. In turn they receive credits on a blue electronic card – looking like a credit card – carrying a picture of a child and arrows in the familiar international recycling circle.

    These credits are then used to calculate the amount of discount they should receive on their energy bill. The scheme is flexible, and people can also use the credits for food or to pay rent. In 2008, after its first year, the scheme had expanded to 59 communities collecting 4,522 tons of recyclable waste and earning 622,000 reais (US $349,438) in credits for 102,000 people. People were receiving an average of 5 to 6 reais (US $2.80 to US $3.37) every month towards their energy bills.  A clear success leading to an expansion of the scheme.

    Now in Ceará’s state capital, Fortaleza (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fortaleza), – population 3.5 million – there are more than 300,000 people recycling a wide range of materials, from paper, glass, plastics, and metals to cooking oil to get electricity discounts, according to the Financial Times.

    In Brazil’s second largest city, Rio de Janeiro, a favela clean-up programme is being run by electricity firm Light S.A. (http://www.light.com.br/web/tehome.asp), which took its inspiration from the success of the Ecoelce experience.

    The number of favelas, or informal slum neighbourhoods (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Favela), in Rio is debated: according to the federal government, there are 1,020 favelas, while Rio’s housing department lists 582. The government has been trying to tackle the law and order problems in these neighbourhoods – many are plagued with violent drug gangs – and endemic poverty. It calls this programme “pacification” (http://brazilportal.wordpress.com/2011/10/20/rios-top-cop-talks-public-safety-policy-favela-pacification-program/) as it tries to bring law and order and boost economic development and social gains.

    Recycling programmes are helping to bring improvements to life in the favelas by simultaneously cleaning up neighbourhoods and boosting household wealth.

    Light S.A. is a Brazilian energy company working in the generation, transmission, distribution and marketing of electricity. It distributes to 31 municipalities inRio de Janeiroand has around 3.8 million customers.

    According to the Financial Times, the Light project pays residents 0.10 reais per kilogram of paper and plastic (US .5 cents). It also pays 2.50 reais per kilogram of aluminum and lead (US $ 1.40).

    Importantly for community relations, the scheme is open not just to favela residents but to nearby middle class neighbourhoods.

    “The idea is to unite the community and the people living around it,” Fernanda Mayrink, Light’s community outreach officer, told the Financial Times.

    The project has helped improve theSanta Martafavela ofRio, where police have been working since 2008 to take back the neighbourhood from the control of violent drug gangs. Community police officers can now do their job of taking care of safety for the 6,000 residents.

    “You don’t see drugs and guns any more but you do see lots of rubbish,” Mayrink said.

    “This project encourages recycling within the company’s concession area and at the same time contributes to sustainable development and the consumer’s pocket. Light wins, the customer wins (and) the environment wins.”

    In Vietnam, the NGO Anh Duong (http://www.anhduonghg.org/en/) or “Sun Ray” shows schoolchildren how to collect plastic waste to sell for recycling. In return, their schools receive improvements and the students can win scholarships. It is estimated ruralVietnam is littered with 100 million tons of waste every year. Much of it is not picked up.

    The project is operating in 17 communities in Long My and Phung Hiep districts in southernVietnam, mobilising children from primary and secondary schools. School children wearing their uniforms fan out in groups and collect the plastic waste. The money made from selling the plastic waste is being used to improve school facilities and fund scholarships for poor children.

    In 2010, the project reported that 10,484 kilograms of plastic waste was collected by 26,015 pupils. This provided for 16 scholarships for school children.

    The Anh Duong NGO was set up by a group of social workers with the goal of community development. They target the poorest, bringing together the entire community and seek out “low cost and sustainable actions”. The NGO has a mix of specialties, from agriculture to aquaculture, health, microfinance and social work.

    “Close, but no cigar” some might say, but we were genuinely flattered to be shortlisted in 2014 for inclusion in the book Visual Storytelling: Infographic Design in News published by Images Publishing in Shanghai, China. It is a lovely book to look at and the quality of infographics chosen for the book is high so it must have been a tough call. It was further proof Southern Innovator was getting known around the world and gaining respect for its content and design. The excellent work done by our graphic designer and illustrator Solveig Rolfsdottir speaks for itself.
    Graphic Designer and Illustrator: Sólveig Rolfsdóttir.

    Published: November 2011

    Resources

    1) A travelling exhibit, In The Bag: The Art and Politics of the Reusable Bag Movement, showcases bags and art produced by communities throughout the world and by individual artists. Website:http://www.unrisd.org/80256B3C005BE6B5/%28httpNews%29/D1AB353A91EC2466C125793600519C7B?OpenDocument

    2) EPAP guide: Based on extensive research throughout Mongolia by UNDP, this guide includes the application of the Blue Bag project to Mongolia’s sprawling slum districts surrounding the capital Ulaanbaatar. Website:http://tinyurl.com/yfkn2dp

    The Environmental Public Awareness Handbook: Case Studies and Lessons Learned in Mongolia was funded by the European Union and published by the UNDP Mongolia Communications Office in 1999.

    Development Challenges, South-South Solutions was launched as an e-newsletter in 2006 by UNDP’s South-South Cooperation Unit (now the United Nations Office for South-South Cooperation) based in New York, USA. It led on profiling the rise of the global South as an economic powerhouse and was one of the first regular publications to champion the global South’s innovators, entrepreneurs, and pioneers. It tracked the key trends that are now so profoundly reshaping how development is seen and done. This includes the rapid take-up of mobile phones and information technology in the global South (as profiled in the first issue of magazine Southern Innovator), the move to becoming a majority urban world, a growing global innovator culture, and the plethora of solutions being developed in the global South to tackle its problems and improve living conditions and boost human development. The success of the e-newsletter led to the launch of the magazine Southern Innovator.  

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    Creative Commons License

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    Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 License.

    ORCID iD: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-5311-1052.

    © David South Consulting 2023