Blog

This month, Marketlinks is highlighting the best of 2021, including the standout learning and knowledge-sharing content that has resonated the most with our community.

This post is the second in a two-part Market Corner series looking at health systems and why health professionals are turning to systems thinking and market systems development (MSD) approaches in their work. Read part one here.

This month, The Market Corner looks at health systems and why health professionals are turning to systems thinking and market systems development (MSD) approaches in their work. Systems thinking evolved with contributions from a diversity of disciplines.

The private sector is a powerful force in driving economic growth, creating jobs, and boosting opportunities that improve the lives of people and communities worldwide. USAID has partnered with companies and investors to solve some of the world’s toughest challenges since its founding in 1960. 

Across engagement efforts in the field, we’ve seen firsthand how some private sector actors can mitigate drivers of instability and conflict by creating jobs, providing essential goods, increasing financial inclusion, developing infrastructure, advocating for peace and economic stability, and promoting other forms of inclusive economic development.

This post is the second installment in Marketlinks' new blog series, The Market Corner, which explores market systems development (MSD) implementation in fragile and conflict-affected situations (FCAS) during the month of October.

A new blog series explores the opportunities and challenges market systems development practitioners face working side-by-side with humanitarian actors in fragile and conflict-affected situations.

This post was written by Dan Hudner, Market System Resilience Measurement Lead at Mercy Corps.

As part of its work in Uganda, the USAID/Uganda Feed the Future Market System Monitoring (MSM) Activity applied a systems approach to understanding the Karamoja region, the focus of humanitarian and resilience programming in Uganda.

By Kati Suominen, Founder and CEO, Nextrade Group and Techical Director, eTrade Alliance Ecommerce – the sale and purchase of goods and services online – is booming in developing countries and their export markets, opening new opportunities for developing country micro, small, and medium-sized enterprises (MSMEs) to grow their sales, export, diversify their markets, and create new jobs.

USAID is launching a new, self-paced version of its Mobilizing Finance for Development (MF4D) course on Marketlinks.

By Desmond Dodd, INVEST Communications When Tanzania’s government recently began reducing funding, medical supplies, and staff available to faith-based hospitals, Peter Maduki quickly understood the stakes involved for his members. “Some of our hospitals will be at a high risk of closing,” said Maduki, the Executive Director of the Christian Social Services Commission (CSSC), a national ecumenical organization that facilitates health services through member churches.

By Angela Hogg, Regional Environment Office Director, USAID/RDMA

By Emily Langhorne, INVEST Communications Specialist

By Emily Langhorne, INVEST Communications Specialist In today’s technology-driven world, having access to the internet is an essential for building educated societies, pathways out of poverty, and competitive economies.

By Kati Suominen, Erica Vambell, Mariah Furtek, Nextrade Group

The first in a series of five blogs about the drivers of sustainability in USAID partnerships with the private sector based on the Enduring Results Study 3.0

FROM SILICON VALLEY STARTUP TO LANDMARK ACQUISITION Access to technology is an essential component to development, especially in Africa. Africans use cheap mobile phones to pay their bills, conduct small business, and make calls anywhere and everywhere. However, even a small mobile phone is not useful if power is not available to charge it. Eighty percent of African households lack electric power, which limits opportunities to access information and mobile money, as well as business and educational opportunities. 

This post was originally published on DAI website and was written by Thaniya Theungsang

By Benjamin Butcher, INVEST Activity Associate

Disasters adversely affect local economies, making it hard for microenterprises to remain open and damaging critical assets and infrastructure.  USAID’s humanitarian economic recovery assistance seeks to help people recover their livelihoods and be able to provide for their own needs. The market systems these people work in, though, are often deeply inequitable.

The article originally appeared on Washington Business Dynamics website.

In the Sahel region of West Africa, small and growing businesses account for nearly 50 percent of new job creation. When these businesses are women-led, the potential to drive growth is even higher: a USAID study found that, globally, these businesses grow revenues 1.5 times faster and jobs twice as fast compared to male-owned businesses.

Over the past few decades, we’ve all heard variations of the same refrain: the future is digital. However, digital’s promise is hard to realize in many contexts given the technology infrastructure required for success. This goes beyond broadband internet availability and access to include cultural norms and other factors that affect individual access and use, particularly for vulnerable populations.

This is one of two posts reflecting on private-sector engagement in a complex, thin market system (read the companion post). It relates to a previous four-part series you can read on Marketlinks.