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DEAUVILLE, France - When is something smoke and mirrors and when should a promise be believed? This was a frequent question during the G8 summit in Deauville last week as world leaders dedicated billions to help "Arab Spring" countries Egypt and Tunisia and promised full transparency in the delivery of previously announced development assistance which never came through.

I arrived in Chad last week to meet with our country team, and to assess our programs and the ongoing humanitarian needs in our program areas. Chad is one of the world’s seven least developed countries: it ranks at 163 out of 169 countries on the 20

10 United Nations Human Development Index. The goal of our programs here is to target the poorest communities in the poorest parts of Chad—and I was curious to see how successfully we were doing that.

When Michael Joseph started Safaricom in 2007 he invested three million dollars in a venture that no other investor had interest in. Four years later, that venture known as Safaricom, a leading mobile network subscriber, has evolved as the central player in mobile banking in Kenya and financial inclusion around the world with 12 million subscribers. Panelists at a recent  Brooking event on on mobile technology described the need for the private sector to invest in technological infrastructure and for donors to take risks in investments.