Innovation can spring from the margins as well as the centre. Take the example of a bamboo windmill which was developed by two Muslim farmers in north-east India. It cost around $100 and was originally used to pump water from a small padi field. Now it's been adopted by Gujarati salt workers, who are some of the poorest people in the state, to pump brine water. This is a task which they used to accomplish with counterfeit diesel engines burning huge amounts of fuel, at a cost of around $1,000 each year. But now they've adapted the windmill to make it more powerful and suitable for the work, and it has transformed their lives. It costs around $1,200, and does the job much better.
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