CK Prahalad's "Bottom of the Pyramid"
I haven't yet read this so I found the summary of the ideas in that book here:
http://www.ckprahalad.com/2006/01/29/selling-to-the-poor-by-allen-l-hammond-ck-prahalad/
a good read.
I think its a really fantastic idea to be able to spend some time and ingenuinity in coming up with a useful service for the poor. Some of the examples in the article are really stimlating. However I feel you can't fundamentally change the situation without heavy government investment in rural development, education and healthcare and so on.
To tie this up with another line of thought: the communists and socialists make a similar argument about 'government investment in rural development ..." -- Yes, yes, all this is very important but the real thing is land reform. I find it the right argument in some cases, but the world is moving away from the times when ownership of land was such a key determiner of your status. The government may better invest its efforts in enabling poor people to take part in the modern industrial and service and knowledge economy than in worrying about land issues.
http://www.ckprahalad.com/2006/01/29/selling-to-the-poor-by-allen-l-hammond-ck-prahalad/
a good read.
I think its a really fantastic idea to be able to spend some time and ingenuinity in coming up with a useful service for the poor. Some of the examples in the article are really stimlating. However I feel you can't fundamentally change the situation without heavy government investment in rural development, education and healthcare and so on.
To tie this up with another line of thought: the communists and socialists make a similar argument about 'government investment in rural development ..." -- Yes, yes, all this is very important but the real thing is land reform. I find it the right argument in some cases, but the world is moving away from the times when ownership of land was such a key determiner of your status. The government may better invest its efforts in enabling poor people to take part in the modern industrial and service and knowledge economy than in worrying about land issues.
posted by VK at 7:32 AM
1 Comments:
hey, this is cool. I was discussing the same concept with a friend a few months back. How there are small number of rich consumers and a comparable market potential for large number of small consumers : rural India+China.
land reform may be the best bet to unleash the market potential for small consumers.
:) glad to come across this on your pages.
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