From an app that is reuniting families and the water wheel easing the burden on women, to healing honey and affordable reading glasses. We've been highlighting some of the innovations that caught our eye in 2013. Catch up on the 12 products we've discussed on our series page, and vote for your favourite.
Elsewhere on the site
African Union missing in action in conflicts from Mali to South Sudan
Obesity soars to 'alarming' levels in developing countries
South Sudan: fears grow for 75,000 people fleeing violence
Susan George on the secret capitalist cabal behind European austerity
On the blog
Steve Wiggins: A weighty problem: how to halt obesity in the developing world
Kevin Gallagher and Enrique Dussel Peters: How China crashed the Nafta party
Ruth Evans: Bangladesh shipbuilder sets benchmark in health and safety standards
Multimedia
• Podcast: Big philanthropy: are the critics right to be suspicious?
• In pictures: Global development events and issues of 2013
Coming up
Marking the fourth anniversary of the Haiti earthquake in 2010, we'll look at whether local business has benefited from reconstruction efforts.
Claire Provost reports on Ethiopia's army of community health workers.
And we highlight some of the development books we're keen to read this year.
What you said: this week's top reader comment
Commenting on our innovation piece on the whisky byproduct being used to clean water, Shahreen Reza writes:
Biofuels are definitely one option, but of course one of our greatest concerns are the various separation techniques for removing arsenic before spent media is prepared as biofuel. We are in the process of developing some proprietary handling techniques and separation processes, and we are working in collaboration with arsenic specialist research teams at cutting edge university labs on the key issue of ensuring proper waste management.
Highlight from the blogosphere
Rob van den Berg: Is there enough public money to address climate change? Of course there is.
And finally …
Poverty matters will return in two weeks with another roundup of the latest news and comment. In the meantime, keep up to date on the Global development website. Follow @gdndevelopment and the team – @MaeveShearlaw, @ClaireProvost, @LizFordGuardian and @MarkTran – on Twitter, and join Guardian Global development on Facebook.
