This report prepared for an international publication ‘Global Mobile’ builds a compelling social and business case for leveraging mobile communication to shape financial access and opportunities for people who may not have traditional banking entitlement. It identifies mobile phone–based financial transactions involving government and public-sector agencies and discusses innovations in foreign remittances, micro-credit, and micro-insurance. Roles and partnerships of stakeholders such as banks, operators, and other third parties are identified and illustrated with numerous case studies from Asia, Africa, and Latin America. Recommendations are made for regulators and service providers to increase the reach and utility of mobile financial services. The book is due to come out March, 2013.
Mobile Phones and Financial Inclusion..
ICT and Environment Sustainability: Bangladesh Baseline Study
Bytesforall Initiative has undertaken an extensive research to map all environment and climate change related policies in Bangladesh and to identify where ICT and access to information can play an important role in order to address the environment sustainability issues. The research indicates that ICT and environment sustainability issues are still not at the policy radar of the Government of Bangladesh is now available through the APC website at:
http://www.apc.org/en/pubs/environment/icts-and-environmental-sustainability-bangladesh-b
ICT and Health Network
Bytesforall Initiative has set up an ICT and health network (http://ictforhealth.ning.com) to build community and to undertake research in understanding whether ICTs can play any transformational role in the development, delivery or management of health care services for the poorer of the society. Please join the network and share your thoughts, case studies
Study on Internet Usage in Dhaka City
Bytesforall Initiative has undertaken a research project to study and analyze the Internet usage pattern, browsing habit and service requirements of Internet users in Dhaka city as per age, income and gender. The research project is expected to fill up an important gap of understanding the Internet users from a social perspective. We expect the outsomes of this research is going to serve advocacy, activism, market or policy interest of different stakeholders in the
country.
Global Information Society Watch (GISWatch) Report
GISWatch aims to be a leading platform for civil society perspectives on the state of the information society. The focus of this year’s report is: “access to online information and knowledge – advancing human rights and democracy”. Bytesforall Initiative participated the report preparation work since 2007 and contributed the chapters on Bangladesh (http://www.giswatch.org/gisw2009/country/pdf/Bangladesh.pdf)
and South Asia (http://www.giswatch.org/gisw2009/regional/pdf/SouthAsia.pdf).
This Year’s report is available at: http://www.giswatch.org/gisw2009/GISW2009.html