Sustainability in the Developing World: hosted Skoll Foundation – Edwin Ou
· Instilling first world values into the developing world where the focus is on making a living
· Opportunity to learn from the developing world -> leapfrogging technologies of the developing / emerging world
· How do we harvest the innovative solutions that the developing world has developed to compensate for resource scarcity
o Developing world innovations are often not necessarily technologies
o E.g. Grameen Bank’s innovation was group lending not a technology
· Key levers to make change
o Local drivers – bottom up
o Developed world interaction – top down
o Efforts to share technology:
§ Apropedia.org – sharing of technologies for developing world
§ Green Exchange - focused on developed world best practice
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· Ashoka Fellows
o Bringing together technology experts (eBay, Google etc.) to focus on developing world issues
o This is a business strategy focus for these companies – what is the opportunity for 2 way flow
o Overcoming corporate tendency towards protecting intellectual property and trade secrets. Aim is to create an economic model
· Suggested Reading:
o How
o Capitalism at the Crossroads
o Fortune at the Bottom of the Pyramid
o Emerging Markets, Emerging Models – Monitor Group
· Key Questions / take aways:
o How can we engage Silicon Valley more to support sustainability in the developing world?
o What are the levers?
o How do we tap into the local, on the ground knowledge to identify opportunities and provide solutions?