Bridging the Worlds of Impact Investing and Inclusive Business
Attending this month’s SOCAP/Europe conference (see my blog about the event), I have been struck by the huge potential for connecting the world’s of impact investing and inclusive business. Both are effectively about using private capital to bring about positive social and environmental change. Very often both are focused on supporting small and medium enterprises […]
Moving Minds, Moving Money: SOCAP/Europe in Amsterdam
On Monday, I attended the launch of SOCAP Europe in Amsterdam. Founded in 2008, as a “multi-platform organization dedicated to the flow of capital towards social good”, SOCAP has already established itself as one of the leading events on the impact investment calendar in the US, but this is the first time the event has […]
The GIM Initiative Releases 60 New Case Studies of Inclusive Business Models
The “Growing Inclusive Markets” (GIM) Initiative, a UNDP-led global multi-stakeholder research and advocacy initiative on inclusive business models (i.e. financially sustainable models that include the poor on the demand side as clients and customers, and on the supply side as employees, producers and business owners along the value chain), has recently released 60 new case […]
Why the latest Coca-Cola/SABMiller report helps us all move forward
Tracking what happens up and down a company’s value chain, where and how poor people engage, can be massively revealing. So I welcome the new report, ‘Exploring the Links between International Business and Poverty Redu…; The Coca-Cola/SAB Miller value chain impacts in Zambia and El Salvador.’ It’s not earth shattering, but that is precisely why […]
Joe Phelan: Rolling up Sleeves for Development
In the world’s top corporate boardrooms, its lecture theatres and in the planning sessions of think tanks and development agencies such as my own, much is made of uncovering new business solutions for development challenges. Inclusive innovation is the current buzz. This is important work. Today, in rural Maharastra, India, I was reminded of another […]
Acumen Fund and AECF: Innovative Approaches to Financing Pro-Poor Business
An increasing number of businesses find that investing in pro-poor business approaches yields not only bottom line rewards, but also poverty alleviation. However, employing these inclusive business models to produce such results can be challenging when short-term time horizons exist for capital investments and barriers to financial access persist for small and medium-sized enterprises. During […]
Great Expectations from New Entity UN Women
Earlier this week, I attended the UK launch of UN Women. Its Executive Director and Under-Secretary-General Michelle Bachelet addressed a packed audience in London to make the case for gender equality and women’s empowerment. She spoke evocatively about her hopes for UN Women and the World Bank’s upcoming report that positions gender equality as ‘smart […]
Stephen Farrant: Responsible Business Goes Mainstream
As responsible tourism goes mainstream, the issues of environmental and social responsibility have been placed firmly on the agendas of global company boards. But the myth remains that it is only small specialist companies that have adopted a responsible tourism strategy. This is however, not the case and major global travel and tourism companies have […]
Graham Baxter: Voluntary Coalitions – in Crisis or Just Growing Up?
Voluntary coalitions set up by business, government and civil society groups to address ethical challenges risk losing their potency when they become detached from the leadership agenda. Once leadership of the agenda for tackling specific corporate responsibility challenges moves from the CEO’s office to the operational areas, there is a natural shift to focusing more […]
Reflections on the journey of corporate responsibility
Besides the regular festivities, food and frolicking, December is a time for reflection. Commentators love to look back on The Year That Was – debating everything from the most gripping news stories to the highest grossing movies. But it’s not often that you get to hear someone like the head of the UN Global Compact, […]
A Fair Hearing for Fairtrade
Passions are running high among the defenders and detractors of Fairtrade. Sparked by a recent report by the right-wing economic think tank, the Institute of Economic Affairs (IEA), a long-running debate has be reignited (see the article by Simon Bowers on this site). A couple of years ago, the same thing happened when another right-wing […]
VC4Africa launches first African Venture Capital platform – Crunch your business idea!
Today VC4Africa starts the first African online venture capital matchmaking platform. Many investors are looking for businesses to get involved with but have difficulties in finding promise. At the same time many businesses seek knowledge, capital and practical support. Without matchmaking their promise is never realized, hindering economic growth. The VC4Africa community currently consists of […]
Aureos committed to ensuring its investments contribute to the Millennium Development Goals
PRESS RELEASE, AUREOS Private sector institutions investing in areas suffering from high poverty and poor healthcare must step up their efforts to advance the United Nations’ Millennium Development Goals, says Aureos Capital Ltd, the private equity fund management company specialising in investing in small and medium-sized businesses in emerging markets. The UN launched the Millennium […]
Blog Action Day 2010: Could a floating brewery provide a business solution to water scarcity?
Without water there can be no beer. It might seem like an obvious statement, but the ability to get enough good quality water to make high quality beers over the coming decades is an issue that SABMiller is putting a lot of effort into. This week we unveiled some research that our technical team has […]
Stakeholder Governance: An Analysis of BITC Corporate Responsibility Index Data on Stakeholder Engagement and Governance
Some critics of Corporate Responsibility falsely claim that it represents surrendering the running of business to Greenpeace and other NGOs. That is nonsense. Engaging stakeholders is not an abdication of management responsibility. It is how effective and successful modern management thrives. Good management involves reconciling customers, employees’, suppliers’, owners’ and society’s wants and needs with […]
Blog Action Day 2010: Water
Water is the focus of this year’s Blog Action Day – an annual event that unites the world’s bloggers in posting about the same issue on a single day – October 15. Last year, more than 13,000 bloggers participated from 152 countries. The aim is to raise awareness and trigger a global discussion about an […]
Podcast: Water – A Business Imperative
Podcast: Water – A Business Imperative from Business Fights Poverty on Vimeo. A podcast from Diageo for the Water: A Business Imperative programme. This content was produced by the International Business Leaders Forum (IBLF) and is reproduced with permission.
Andy Wales: Big Business, Big Responsibilities: from ‘villains’ to ‘visionaries’
Big Business, Big Responsibilities: from ‘villains’ to ‘visionaries’ charts the journey that many major companies have been on over the last twenty years, where issues that were previously defined as corporate social responsibility (CSR), philanthropy or environmental compliance are now becoming core to future growth strategies. We welcome your comments and thoughts in the debate […]
Enough Responsibility To Go Around: Lessons in Corporate Responsibilities From Corporate Crises
Corporate crises are not new. What is relatively new is the increased public awareness and interest in such crises as a result of globalisation, the availability of 24-hour news and the use of the internet and social media to disseminate news. This means that reactions to and scrutiny of events, such as the 2010 global […]
DFID's MDG Conference: Scratching The Surface Of Business Engagement
Speaking at DFID’s MDG Conference this week, Helen Clark, head of the United Nations Development Programme and former Prime Minister of New Zealand, highlighted the importance of business in meeting the MDGs. However, she said we were still only “scratching the surface” of what is possible. She highlighted the need to promote inclusive business models […]