FINCA Microfinance Bank Ltd. has set its priority to expand its network and business in commercial sector particularly in the agriculture sector having major contribution to Pakistan’s economy. This was stated by Muddasar Aqil in an interview with The News Tribe. Informal lenders have existed for centuries in all societies, particularly in rural areas which tend to be geographically isolated from banking and commercial centres. We believe that rural and agricultural workers will benefit from the high quality, formal financial services that microfinance delivers, as has been the experience with such clienteles in other microfinance markets. The potential for the growth of the microfinance sector in Pakistan is su...
December 20, 2013 at 1:45 am | News Desk
New Delhi: An Indian owner of a billboard dedicated to Nelson Mandela was left embarrassed on Thursday after the discovery that a photo of actor Morgan Freeman was used instead of one of the anti-apartheid hero. The billboard was erected on the side of a road in the southern city of Coimbatore as part of memorials across India and the world to Mandela, who died on December 5. But Freeman’s face loomed large in the billboard over small images of human rights icons including Martin Luther King, Mother Teresa and Mahatma Gandhi. “We should be proud that we were part of an era when they lived,” read the Tamil-language condolence message on the board. Cloth merchant Chandrashekhar, who paid for the board in a private capacity ...
December 20, 2013 at 1:03 am | News Desk
Quetta: One person has been killed, 20 others injured including 7 children in a blast near Meetha Chowk of Pushtunabad in Quetta. The blast occurred near ice cream parlour which caused damage to nearby shops. The police and rescue teams have reached at the blast side and started moving the blast victims to hospital for treatment. The bomb disposal squad has also arrived on the scene and launched search for samples of the explosives used in the blast. The News Tribe – UK-based bilingual news website covering politics, technology, sports, health and lifestyle from US, Pakistan, Middle East and around the world Click here for more information The News Tribe
December 20, 2013 at 1:03 am | News Desk
Lahore: Provincial Sports Minister Punjab Rana Mashood has announced to celebrate ‘Youth Festival’ from December 23 in Changa Manga. In a statement issued by the ministry, the minister said that Chief Minister Punjab Shahbaz Sharif already issued 2 billion in sports endowment funds. Mashood said that one week basant festival will be celebrated in Changa Manga and for this purpose special trains would be started from Lahore. The News Tribe – UK-based bilingual news website covering politics, technology, sports, health and lifestyle from US, Pakistan, Middle East and around the world Click here for more information The News Tribe
December 20, 2013 at 1:03 am | News Desk
Tamera Swofford My editor sent along a link and request for a report on the U.S. economy. The link offered a trumpeting headline, "What shutdown? Job growth strong in October”. CNN functioned as one of many heralds for the latest release of the job growth statistics. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the U.S. economy added 204,000 jobs in October. This is well above expectations of economists. The numbers were there for all to visualize, conveniently displayed with a bar graph. Dashing off a reply, I noted that the job statistics were most likely related to seasonal work in retail and the hospitality industries. So the chase was on.... My life is that of a mathematical dwarf. That being said, I am diligent enough...
December 19, 2013 at 12:11 pm | News Desk
Saleem Shaikh For Jamal Mujtaba, the news that the Pakistani government has prepared a plan to make Islamabad a model disaster-resilient city comes as a relief. Resident of Pathan colony, a slum in Pakistan’s capital, Mujtaba has suffered losses to his home and livelihood. With that he faced a displacement caused by heavy rains that swell the streams emerging from foothills of scenic Margalla Hills to the north-west, triggering floods in the city. “For me any plan to make the city disaster-resilient is the need of the hour,” says Mujtaba. On October 10, Pakistan’s Climate Change Division (CCD) unveiled a Climate Change Vulnerability Adaptation Assessment (CCVAA) for the Islamabad Capital Territory to reduce the city...
December 19, 2013 at 11:43 am | News Desk
Dr Fawad Kaiser The extraordinary popularity of interpersonal media, such as social network sites (SNSs), raises set of questions, in reference to the terrorist threats. The decision to suspend instant messaging and voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) applications such as Skype, Whatsapp, Tango and Viber in Moharram adds to the overall impact of the threat. Unlike mass media content, SNS content is both produced by the media users and also features them as protagonists. I do not intend to write about the threat incumbent from the terrorists by their use of SNS. There are people who are doing a much better job at that. What we have to do is to analyze how exposure to social media content that centres around the users themselves and thei...
December 19, 2013 at 11:08 am | News Desk
Washington: Amazon have start shipping the Unlocked Motorola Moto G’s 8GB and 16GB models. When Motorola officially launched the Moto X, the company only made the handset available to customers in the U.S. This decision left customers in other countries wondering when they would be able to get their hands on the customizable smartphone. Motorola later confirmed that the Moto X would remain a U.S. exclusive, but the company had a plan up its sleeve to offer a smartphone that had a similar design and also allowed users to customize it through the use of removable color back plates. Motorola officially announced the unlocked and affordable Moto G in November and confirmed that the smartphone would be released worldwide and it would be p...
December 19, 2013 at 1:48 am | News Desk
Seoul: Samsung is now eyeing to introduce its flagship device Samsung Galaxy S5 with metal chase, and now report claims that company wants to introduce a diamond-like material into its future smartphones. According to Korean site ET News, Samsung is in the process of testing out a “diamond metal surface treatment technology” by blasting carbon with high temperatures in the same way that diamonds are formed. However coating a diamond-like material on top of the metal case would make the phone more resistant to scratches and damage. If Samsung is planning to go ahead with its fancy diamond material, there’s the problem of timing. Right now we’re expecting the Galaxy S5 to arrive as early as February so we may not get ...
December 19, 2013 at 1:42 am | News Desk
Germany is celebrating 100th birthday of Willy Brandt, the Federal Republic’s first Social Democratic chancellor. Born Herbert Frahm in 1913, Brandt is widely considered one of the greatest European statesmen of the 20th Century. A staunch opponent of the Nazis, Brandt left Germany in 1933 after Hitler took power. In exile, Frahm began living under the pseudonym Willy Brandt, a name he later officially adopted. After World War II, Brandt helped rebuild West Germany’s Social Democrats (SPD). He served as mayor of divided Berlin from 1957 to 1966, helping lead the city through the crisis sparked by the Berlin Wall. In 1969 he was elected Germany’s first Social Democratic chancellor since 1930. Brandt resigned as chancellor ...
December 19, 2013 at 1:39 am | News Desk
Pakistan Rupee Exchange Rate