"The question is not whether business has a role to play in alleviating poverty. We know that. The question is how." With that statement, Harvard Business School Professor Kash Rangan opened a gathering of academics, business leaders from around the world, and development officials to discuss more than 30 research papers on the role of business in serving low-income communities. The companies presenting or whose efforts were being analyzed include Shell, Nestle, Ogilvy and Mather India, Cemex, Intel, Kodak, ITC, Hindustan Lever, Manila Water Company, and Shorebank. Social entrepreneurs and development agencies and their roles figure into the discussions too -- nobody thinks companies can do this alone.

The discussions have been rich and sometimes passionate. We will post executive summaries of the papers in coming days, along with other insights. The conference agenda is available here.

Having worked for Nextbillion and scoured news sources every day for two months, I've been surprised at how seldom any Middle-Eastern, BOP-activity makes the news, compared to, say, Bangladesh or Uganda. (Perhaps I am looking in the wrong places? If you know good SME/BOP-related news sites for the Middle East, please let me know!)

Intrigued by this dearth of news, I started digging for MFIs in the Middle East and suddenly remembered that usury is prohibited in Islam. No wonder one hears little about micro-credit in those regions (except for one MFI in Yemen)! And yet...Grameen Bank, which states nothing about conforming to Islamic lending practice, was founded in Bangladesh, a country that is 83% Muslim. Are Islamic usury laws now simply ignored or obsolete?