Category: Partnerships

Partnerships

NGO Partnerships Give Businesses the Teeth to Be Social Activists

Let’s start with the obvious: your average ice cream company doesn’t have much to say about the refugee crisis in Europe. Equally obvious: Ben & Jerry’s is not your average ice cream company. We mix activism and a social mission in with our famous chunks and swirls. And we know that to drive real change, […]

SDGs: What Part Do Forests Play?

Deemed as the ‘lungs of the planet’ and covering 30% of the earth’s surface, forests are essential to supporting all life on Earth. Not only do forests provide a wide array of ecosystem services, such as absorbing greenhouse gases and regulating water quality, there are also over a billion people who depend on forests for […]

Access to Energy Through Mobile Is Changing Lives

Over the last decade, the rapid growth of the mobile industry in developing countries has surprised observers. Access to mobile has increasingly outpaced access to basic services such as energy, water and sanitation. In fact, due to the slow expansion of the traditional energy grid, 1.2 billion people around the world still live without access […]

Delivering on the Promise of Inclusive Business

Back in November 2008, on a hot, dusty day in Dar es Salaam, I vividly remember the moment I met Lillian Kessy. I was immediately struck by her confidence, dignity and determination. Only a year earlier, Lillian was in a desperate financial situation. By the time I met her, she was busy building a small […]

Effective Partnering: In Praise of Internal Politicians

The term ‘intrapreneur’ has emerged to describe people who stimulate innovation within their companies. A similar role describes the people who are able to navigate the various parts of their own organisations to enable them to engage in a partnership. Taking a cue from this recent HBR article, we can suggest the term ‘internal politician’ […]

Inviting Start-ups (and Up-starts) to Solve Global Problems

The saying goes that two heads are better than one. We believe it gets even better when you bring a lot of different talent together to collaborate and solve urgent global challenges. HelloScience, supported by Novozymes, is an online open innovation network for entrepreneurs, researchers, NGOs, associations and companies. It aims to foster collaboration across […]

Boldline Accelerator: Bringing Partnerships to Life and Scale

Did you ever have a good idea but felt it was too large to undertake yourself? Not sure how to bring it to life? Or have you had a successful pilot program that you knew had the potential to expand and even more meaningfully advance foreign policy imperatives? Welcome to the Boldline Accelerator for Public-Private […]

2 Billion People Can’t See Clearly. This Business Sees the Answer.

What if I told you we had a breakthrough solution that could access untapped potential in 2.5 billion people? That it could keep people safer and help children learn better? You might envision a fancy new technology, but this magic bullet is surprisingly simple: a pair of eyeglasses. Just this month, Williams-Sonoma Inc. and Target […]

How Financial Inclusion Can Move People Out of Poverty

By Nina Nieuwoudt, Global Product Development, New Consumers Around the world this week, governments, multilaterals, and companies are coming together to celebrate Financial Inclusion Week. It’s an opportunity to reflect on the progress that we’ve made in extending financial access to un-banked and underbanked communities, and also a time to take honest stock of how […]

Creating a Partnership Ecosystem – 6 Rules to Live By

Despite its increasing occurrence in the global community, and its elevation through the Sustainable Development Goals, the act of partnering remains a challenge across all sectors. Doers need to share about what works — and what doesn’t – if we are to create a partnering model that enables sustainability and scale capable of achieving the […]

How Some Health NGOs Can Be Bolder in Their Engagement with Business

I was recently invited to present TPI’s partnering toolkit on NCDs – developed last year in collaboration with Bupa and UICC – at EPHA’s annual conference. The memorable phrase ‘evil puppeteers’ was used in one presentation, in reference to the nefarious and shady activities of corporate lobbyists. While significant progress has undoubtedly been made in […]

Credible Standards Benefit from Multi-stakeholder Standard-setting

By Karin Kreider, Executive Director, ISEAL In an age of multiplicity of approaches to sustainability, the question arises time and again of which of these embody credibility and deliver impact, and what engenders such outcomes. Karin Kreider, Executive Director at ISEAL, considers some of the key elements of credible sustainability standards in a series of […]

Want to Change the World? Allow the Private Sector to Do What it Does Best

For the past week, the world has watched as heads of state and global business leaders convened in New York City for the 72nd United Nations General Assembly. The agenda was far from light. Topics ranged from food security to climate change to the refugee crisis to healthcare. The task at hand – achieving the […]

Business Fights Poverty NYC 2017: Watch the Event Videos

Last week, 150 people came together in New York, at an event timed to coincide with the UN General Assembly, to explore the theme, “Rethinking Collaboration for the SDGs”. The event was co-hosted with Barclays and the Harvard Kennedy School Corporate Responsibility Initiative, and with the support of CDC Group, the UK’s Development Finance Institution. […]

From Digital Divide to Inclusion: How to Make Digital Finance Work for India’s Women

Often heralded as a panacea for financial inclusion, digital financial services could exacerbate the gender divide, unless there is a concerted effort to develop women-friendly products and channels. Despite recent successes in India’s financial inclusion journey, Indian women still cannot access bank accounts, loans, and other financial services as easily as men. In 2015, only […]

Partnering to Get Every Child Learning

The world is witnessing the highest levels of human displacement on record since World War II. Of the unprecedented 65.3 million people forced from their homes, almost one-third are refugees, seeking protection from violence or persecution. The majority of refugee children have lost not only their home, but also their education – so often the […]

Bold Partnerships Can Help Achieve the Global Goals

While trust in business and institutions is consistently questioned, I believe partnerships are providing solutions. The Global Goals are clear that business has a vital role to play in achieving sustainable development. The private sector can bring the scale, expertise, and resources needed to find new solutions. But to have impact we must work in […]

The Money is There to Fight Climate Change

  Policy debates on climate change and sustainable development routinely cite the massive numbers needed to achieve the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs): an additional $1 trillion annually in clean energy investments to limit global warming to below 2 degrees and between $5-7 trillion a year to achieve the SDGs. These numbers are overwhelming […]

New Report: Unlocking Investment to Deliver the SDGs in Challenging Places

  This report, launched today, is the main output of Business Fights Poverty’s Investing for Impact Challenge. We are hosting a roundtable event with contributors, partners and other interested stakeholders at BFP’s event in New York to mark the occasion and discuss the central themes of the report. The report asks the question: “How can […]