whythawk ratings: measuring effective development

1.
(Comments)

.... By this I mean that they are ruled over by \\\"landlords\\\" who dictate the nature of much of their working environment and ultimately levy significant \\\"taxes\\\". This results in the majority o...

2.
(Comments)

... but actions. Solving real problems, creating real jobs is just too hard, so they all default to: An enabling environment must be created to allow our teeming youths .... (you get the picture....

3. The tragedy of Burma, should we help, how to help
(Analysis/Analysis)

.... Famines don't happen in free-market, liberal economies. Flooding is less likely in nations with strong environmental protection laws. Earthquakes cause less damage where builders can be jaile...

4. The Remarkable Power of Remarkable People
(Analysis/Analysis)

... the balance wrong and you introduce asymmetries. For instance, when the US Forest Service manages an area of environmental value purely for recreational purposes, they have to send that money direct...

5. No way out; ducking the Eskom bullet
(Analysis/Analysis)

...ost. Eskom would like to raise the price of electricity to cover their expansion. Normally, in a competitive environment, one company cannot raise prices significantly without handing a decisive com...

6. The hazard of market dominance
(Analysis/Analysis)

...the Competition Tribunal investigations into collusion, it is just as essential that they pay attention to the environmental factors that have encouraged this behaviour. If price makers continue to h...

7. Electricity Redux - Electricity Quotas Will Work About As Well As Race Quotas
(Analysis/Analysis)

... of electricity, as well as creative innovation, is to make it expensive. As a side-effect it'll help the environment as well. If the state continues to put the emotive needs of the poor first a...

8. Of Chiefs and Presidents
(Analysis/Analysis)

...won with 51.9 percent of the vote. He has won the preceding elections, amid accusations of an uneven political environment by the opposition. In 2003, restrictions to the limit of presidential terms w...

9. Of Capitalism, Socialist Greed, Poverty and Remaining Silent
(Analysis/Analysis)

...upport business effectiveness. Businesses rely on educated, healthy employees; and need to be based in a safe environment that respects property rights. One of the worst excesses of South African st...

10. Perlemoen and the Tragedy of the Commons
(Analysis/Analysis)

...least attention. Soon, and it will be this century, commercial fishing of wild fish-stocks will be a memory. Environmental Affairs minister Marthinus van Schalkwyk bravely put his neck out and decla...

11. This festive season: the accumulating effects of individual activity
(Analysis/Analysis)

...become a mass of hum-drum sameness. Declaring that "hand-made" is more efficient and better for the environment is not one of them. Yet this is precisely what the HandMade Project declares...

12. Trevor Manuel and the "Plunder of Skills"
(Analysis/Analysis)

...its people; not the other way round. If South Africa wants investment then it must act to create a favourable environment for those investors. Whether they are foreigners whom you wish to attract to...

13. Killing the Golden Goose, a lesson in Economic Freedom
(Analysis/Analysis)

...t in Africa. That's Mauritius, which has made dramatic efforts to liberalise and improve their investment environment. They are the 22nd most economically liberal economy in the world. South Af...

14. China, Toys And The Tragedy of Xenophobia
(Analysis/Analysis)

...astonishing 350 million people out of poverty. The fact that Chinese manufacturing is still very rudimentary, environmentally hazardous, and with poor safety and health controls belies how far they h...

15. Ending poverty means abandoning charity and accepting reality
(Analysis/Analysis)

... going to bother trying to register in the first place. A state should realise that - as with any competitive environment - business owners and investors have the choice not to participate if they so...

16. Dow Jones, The Wall Street Journal, and Rupert Murdoch
(Analysis/Analysis)

Business is cyclical. Innovation changes environments and, unintentionally, destroys profitable status quos. When that happens stronger and more innovative firms pounce to buy up the assets of weake

17. Zimbabwe: the Hollow State
(Analysis/Analysis)

...he legal status of these agreements is in doubt but further degrades the investment climate. Any future legal environment must look to the rapid attraction of productive capacity back into Zimbabwe i...

18. People, Planet and Profits: the complexities of corporate governance
(Analysis/Analysis)

...ommission developed a methodology for what is known as the Triple Bottom Line, or – in the US – as Environment, Social and Governance (ESG) issues. This was picked up and formalised inter...

19. The tragedy of innovation: how brilliant ideas are criminalised
(Analysis/Analysis)

... vulnerable plants and loss of water from the soil. We have seen how pesticides and herbicides have harmed our environment and made us sick."African civil society organisations at the World Socia...

20. Suburbanise! How aid and trade obliterate unique cultures
(Analysis/Analysis)

...side in Business owners, by and large, are extremely conservative. They look for proven markets and familiar environments in which to do business. If the market is dramatically and culturally diffe...

21. The efficiency of markets and how protectionism leaves the poor behind
(Analysis/Analysis)

... they can work the same and earn more (the US choice). In both cases, though, the quality of life and working environment improve to a degree never before experienced, except for the super-rich. The...

22. Islam, Shari'ah Law, and Cultural Capitalism
(Analysis/Analysis)

...ting about equity markets: capitalism is a bicycle.  Whether you're Muslim, Socialist or a born-again environmentalist, the capitalist system will work the same for you.  Like a bicycle,...

23. Sarkozy's French Election: when elephants fight only the grass gets trampled
(Analysis/Analysis)

...y.  Some is the fault of outside meddling, some is self-inflicted, and some arises from the nature of the environment of Africa itself (big weather, big diseases, lots of space). Then comes 11 Se...

24. Melamine, China, and the peril for emerging markets
(Analysis/Analysis)

... products from entering their market; citing evidence that Costa Rica used harmful pesticides and degraded the environment through their agricultural practices.  That Costa Rica was improving its...

25. Lawrence Lessig, take note: Digital freedom still needs digital responsibility
(Analysis/Analysis)

...ple become, then the more dogmatic they become.  And the more dogmatic they become the more you create an environment where terrorism seems like a reasonable response. While moving forward we mus...

26. What market is worth R 100 billion a year and is growing at 10.9%?
(Analysis/Analysis)

... ignore the informal sector, what new innovations may come out of that market to radically alter your business environment?  What happens when your competitors reduce their prices – not by ...

27. Hedging and bundling; improving the efficiency of microlending
(Analysis/Analysis)

...tion effectiveness to ensure that overlaps, and concomitant underlaps, are kept to the minimum. A poor credit environment drives up banking costs and, by extension, a poor aid environment drives up d...

28. Demonstration Health HIV / AIDS Orphanage B
(Ratings Demonstration/Demonstration)

...mation Systems: C Policies & Procedures - Child Orientation Process: BBB Financial Environment - Revenue distribution: CCC Financial Environment - Financial effe...

29. Demonstration Health HIV / AIDS Orphanage A
(Ratings Demonstration/Demonstration)

...e - Information Systems: AA Policies & Procedures - Child Orientation Process: AAA Financial Environment - Revenue distribution: BBB Financial Environment - Financial effectiv...

30. What happens when they hate you? The impact of charity.
(Analysis/Analysis)

...olivar. The truth of successful social development is not in helping other people directly but in creating an environment in which they are encouraged to help themselves. It is no good destroying ag...

31. The redistribution of poverty
(Analysis/Analysis)

...le of figuring out how to do something to earn a living.  The only time that people stay poor is when the environment they’re in offers them no incentive to do anything.  For instance,...

32. We're from Mars and we want to help: four lessons in development
(Analysis/Analysis)

...tative culture and pursuit for interstellar novelty is awful.  Hyperspace drives are ruining the galactic environment.  Intergalactic warming is pushing the planets out of alignment.  B...

33. Bringing Capital to Small Enterprise
(Analysis/Ideas and Challenges)

The predicament lies in balancing the risk and reward in an environment where the perceived risk of lending demands a premium the borrower cannot afford. Solutions therefore must see risk reduced to a

34. Enterprise - Ratings and Scorecard overview
(FAQs/Rating FAQs)

... participants in the business services sector progress from intervention to actually investing in the business environment. Beyond that, the scorecard measures the continued success of the investors a...

35. No matter how hard you try bad environments lead to bad results
(Analysis/Analysis)

...8 Iraqis have been ruled by a series of tyrants culminating in the barbaric rule of ((Saddam Hussein)). The ((environment)) is one of savage authority.  The physical shape of the cities was insp...

36. Millennium Development Goals and the Measurement of Change
(Analysis/Analysis)

...lnesses by halting the spread of HIV and reversing the incidence of malaria and other illnesses Goal 7: ensure environmental sustainability by halving the number of people without access to clean drin...

37. X Challenge: Develop the cheapest most effective school
(Analysis/Analysis)

...per child isn’t going to change this. In essence the requirements are good teachers, a pleasant study environment conducive to learning (no guns, no gangs, and kids with enough food in their ...

38. A revitalised UN may improve development in Africa
(Analysis/Analysis)

...his technology.  Please can you donate funds to help us?”  Sounding less like a savvy business environment and more like a basket-case.  This statement would be echoed, one way or...

39. Investor Orientation for Development Ratings
(Events/Events)

...ver on the needs identified within their target sector. Openness to new ideas in an ever-changing development environment is critical to providing better service.  In developing these – as...

40. What do Richard Branson and Che Guevara have in common?
(Analysis/Analysis)

...m the very capitalist governments they hate. Any wild accusation can be levelled at businesses: they harm the environment; they exploit poor people; the steal from the masses.  Business owners l...

41. Lessons in sustainable development
(Analysis/Analysis)

Easter Island, in the Pacific Ocean, has long been a pet trophy for both environmentalists and anti-capitalists. This remote island is denuded of vegetation and features artefacts pointing to a rich c

42. Interpreting the Emerging Market Risk Curve
(Static Content)

...is a relatively large, socially- and economically mobile middle class that relies on a stable private business environment. In reality there are two nations present in this country. The first is tha...

43. Research Reports, eBooks and Ideas
(Static Content)

...ison of the aggregated findings and results of small business consultants acting in the two principle business environments in South Africa: 2006/7 sample series Keynote Presentations U...

44. Unlock the Value in Emerging Markets
(Static Content)

...nomy, as well as rating the risk in the trust relationships that are necessary to work in such an unstructured environment. Improve your operational and investment efficiency speed up your decisio...

45. Get Rated
(Static Content)

In formal commercial economic environments investors rely on information provided by independent rating organisations to assess the risk and potential of the vast number and range of companies competi

46. Why Use Whythawk
(Static Content)

... of the Pyramid" business strategy, and rating the local partners necessary to work in such unstructured environments. Whythawk also investigates regional development needs and assists in the on...

47. Interpreting the Emerging Market Risk Curve
(Static Content)

...is a relatively large, socially- and economically mobile middle class that relies on a stable private business environment. In reality there are two nations present in this country. The first is tha...

48. Research Reports, eBooks and Ideas
(Static Content)

...ison of the aggregated findings and results of small business consultants acting in the two principle business environments in South Africa: 2006/7 sample series Keynote Presentations U...

49. Unlock the Value in Emerging Markets
(Static Content)

...nomy, as well as rating the risk in the trust relationships that are necessary to work in such an unstructured environment. Improve your operational and investment efficiency speed up your decisio...

50. Get Rated
(Static Content)

In formal commercial economic environments investors rely on information provided by independent rating organisations to assess the risk and potential of the vast number and range of companies competi