Author Archives:
Consultative workshop on universities and intermediaries for inclusive development
IDRC is starting a new initiative on inclusive innovation for development. As part of that effort a workshop on universities and intermediaries for inclusive development with participants from across several countries in South Asia plus South east Asia, and IDRC representatives from Canada and elsewhere, is being held in Negombo, 2-3 February 2012. Sujata Gamage, [...]
Positive externalities of telecom: Enabling innovation
I’ve written about this earlier, but a more fleshed out argument is in my LBO column. The story was about an award. But what I noticed was the role of telephones in the story. The award winning innovation is not just one new thing; it is a collection of process improvements. Critical elements involve phones [...]
Ideas to save the postal service
For those who believe in bringing the dead back to life: Even better, imagine if you could email a letter to the post office, pay for the stamp online, and never set foot outside of your door? You could send mail digitally, with minimal fuss. People still like receiving letters, if it wasn’t such a [...]
Bill Gates on inclusive innovation
In a recent in-house piece I did on LIRNEasia’s work on inclusive innovation with emphasis on agriculture, I concluded that inclusive development occurs when “the necessary condition of high, sustained growth above 7 percent year-on-year and the sufficient condition of a majority of the country’s work force being engaged in high-growth sectors are satisfied.” Innovations [...]
Perception is reality in investment decisions
Bangladesh is on the cusp of transformative change. No certainty. It could miss the bus. Because of years of work on family planning, child health and womens’ education, its fertility rates are declining and the country is just entering the golden period in terms of demography: declining child dependency; increases in elderly dependency not yet [...]
Trade liberalization: Doha is recognized as dead
Though not part of LIRNEasia’s funded research, we have kept an eye on, and engaged with, issues related to services trade liberalization, partly because ICTs form a critical element of international services trade and the success of telecom reform exemplifies what can be achieved by liberalization of Mode 3 trade in services. In debates around [...]
When losing a billion Euro is still good news
Strong sales for Nokia’s Lumia smartphone line based on Windows OS has changed perceptions: Analysts are expecting Nokia to rapidly reassert its relevance in the smartphone market, which it had largely to itself before the 2007 introduction of Apple’s first iPhone. Over the next 12 months, Nokia will expand its smartphone market share more than [...]
Proto teleporting: Printing 3D objects
The NYT piece is focused on the intellectual property issues. But what I sense is the coming of age of 3D printing. As I wrote in a column in November, people will soon be able to download files of physical objects and print them out at home. Although being able to print out a new [...]
Complementary role played by mobiles in Bangladesh in improving immunization rate
We have always emphasized that telecom is a complementary input: Does not solve problems by itself, but makes solutions possible; Multiplies the effects of interventions. Here, in Bill Gates’ thoughtful year-end message, is a great illustration. He is talking about the first winner of a Gates Foundation innovation award, a doctor from Bangladesh: In 2009, [...]
Nationalizations are back: Libyans in Zambia now, but who is next?
Sounds so 1960s, but . . . This should change investment risk calculations, in Africa for now. But how broad will the ripples run? The Zambian government has confirmed expectations and will renationalise the local mobile network, Zamtel, which is 75% owned by Lybia’s Lap Green Networks. The government has also dissolved the board of [...]
Governments should decide: Is mobile telephony a bad or a good?
Gregory Mankiw is a gutsy economist. He defended outsourcing while still serving in the Bush administration. He is a also a good economist. He could make a living on textbooks alone. He is now advising Mitt Romney as he campaigns for the presidency. In an interesting op ed, he lays out some simple principles for [...]
Sri Lanka and India: The substance of agreement
It has been an unfortunate fact that Sri Lanka and India have signed many agreements that have not been implemented. This caused me to write a column some years back entitled “An MOU to implement MOUs.”. The one difference that I see in the short LBO report on cooperation between India and Sri Lanka on [...]
Open science and open scholarly publishing
For what LIRNEasia does, scholarly publishing with slow-paced peer review and print-on-paper publishing has not been the best fit. Our 2006 work got published in a 2008 book and our 2008 survey data got published in a special issue of a journal in 2011. But the question of assessing and ensuring quality is ever present [...]
Obama does the right thing or why checks & balances are needed in Constitutions
This was not a fight we were involved in, but were following with peripheral vision. For those who were in the thick of it, it must be a good day. For us too, because an open Internet benefits everyone. “Let us be clear,” the White House statement said, “online piracy is a real problem that [...]
An exemplar of sustainability: IDRC’s funding of the National Poisons Information Center of Sri Lanka
Conventional evaluation privileges short-term outcomes (if it gets to outcomes at all). This is unavoidable. As a teacher I used to think that the true results of my efforts would be seen five-ten-fifteen years down the road. But my university needed to know how good a teacher I was every quarter or every year, so [...]
Recent Comments