Keeping Our Promise to Every Woman, Every Child
Each of us has felt the sting of a broken promise, most likely in our early childhood. The lesson leaves a lasting impression, teaching us that when we make a promise, we must honor it. The launch of Every Woman, Every Child by the United Nations three years ago sparked a series of promises to […]
Critical Skills for Employability in Africa
Two days before our international participants were due to travel to Nairobi, Kenya for the ISESE Africa Skills Development Conference, I woke up to the headlines: “Flights suspended after fire destroys Jomo Kenyatta International Airport terminal.” Our team had planned for all sorts of logistical hurdles from visa hiccups to yellow fever vaccines, but we […]
Doing Well By Doing Good In Colombia
The EPM Group is a Colombian utility company that provides water, domestic gas and electricity in Colombia and other countries like Guatemala, El Salvador, Panama, Mexico and Chile. Many of our clients belong to the low-income segment of the population. Instead of discouraging us, this reality has become a challenge in which innovation and, above […]
Helping Women Overcome Cultural Norms to Become Innovative Entrepreneurs
With a focus in economic development in Africa, I decided to spend my summer interning with a nonprofit organization in Ghana. The organization addressed development issues from the aspect of women empowerment, by creating a global market for the goods produced by women entrepreneurs. They were seamstresses, bead makers, and batik makers; batik is an […]
Ten Education Lessons from Tunisia
g.Maarifa aims to develop human capital in emerging markets where it is usually hardest to do so. We develop customizable and interactive platforms that increase access to educational and training content via mobile phones. Our platforms: deliver content, evaluate through testing, track performance, and manage data on a range of mobile phones. I went to […]
Transforming India's Urban Waste Management System
When India changes its urban waste management system, it matters. Ashoka Fellow Ravi Agarwal has spent the past two decades moving mountains… of rubbish. He is counting on the youth to give the final push. With global waste measured in millions of tonnes, it is easy to question whether recycling your water bottle or daily […]
Transforming India’s Urban Waste Management System
When India changes its urban waste management system, it matters. Ashoka Fellow Ravi Agarwal has spent the past two decades moving mountains… of rubbish. He is counting on the youth to give the final push. With global waste measured in millions of tonnes, it is easy to question whether recycling your water bottle or daily […]
The Power of Insurance and Haiti’s Future
The Haitian people face repeated natural and man-made disasters every year – just last week a tropical depression hit the island bringing heavy rains. Haiti is not the only Caribbean country exposed to extreme weather events, but we are the most vulnerable and terribly ill-prepared. What would pass as a shower in the Bahamas leads […]
Enterprise-Driven Innovation in South Africa
Encouraging and fostering entrepreneurship is increasingly viewed as the best way to empower communities and bring about social change. Large corporations are joining in cross-sector collaborations with public bodies to support impact investment projects that accelerate social and environmental improvements. SABMiller has long placed Enterprise Development at the core of its long-term Sustainable Development strategy. […]
How Brazil’s Tenda Atacado Serves the Base of the Pyramid
Executive Director, VoxCred S/A The Tenda Atacado Group has 19 cash & carry stores in São Paulo, Brazil. By the end of 2013, we’re projecting revenues for U$900 million. Every month, we serve 1.3 million clients in our stores, 25 per cent of whom are entrepreneurs representing 50 per cent of our sales. We understood […]
Celebrating Successful Impact Investment in South Africa
Enterprise Development is at the core of SABMiller’s long-term Sustainable Development strategy, helping create jobs and develop entrepreneurial skills in poor communities around the world. Encouraging Enterprise Development is a key SABMiller sustainable development priority – and well integrated into day-to-day business – for it is enterprise-driven innovation that can act as a change-maker for […]
Health Franchising: Strengthening India’s Village-Level Private Providers
India is often portrayed as a rising “economic tiger,” yet many of India’s one billion+ inhabitants still live on the margin; approximately 30% live below the poverty line[i], and 70% live in rural areas[ii]. Communities in these remote, rural areas lack access to basic health care, and despite the existence of pro-poor government-mandated schemes the […]
Building Infrastructure for Under-Served Markets
Finalist for Youth Business International’s Young Entrepreneur of the Year 2013 Award In just three years, Sharad Tandale has created a successful infrastructure engineering company employing 175 people and providing a range of services to meet the huge demand in the neglected and underserved small towns and rural areas of India. Sharad’s business, Innovation Engineers […]
Achieving Scale
Scale is the single biggest unmet challenge in development and impact investment today. IDE, the development organization I founded, has helped some 20 million people living on a $1/day move out of poverty, but this is a drop in the bucket compared to the 2.7 billion people still living on less than $2/day. About the […]
Building Schools & Delivering Quality Education in China
Interview with Huaping Yang, Finalist for Youth Business International’s Young Entrepreneur of the Year 2013 Award Spirited entrepreneur Huaping Yang has overcome failure to launch an education business which today enables hundreds of students to work towards achieving their goals. Chinese company Chengdu Aosite Education (AST) is a three-pronged after-school tutoring chain for students of […]
Building Schools & Delivering Quality Education in China
Interview with Huaping Yang, Finalist for Youth Business International’s Young Entrepreneur of the Year 2013 Award Spirited entrepreneur Huaping Yang has overcome failure to launch an education business which today enables hundreds of students to work towards achieving their goals. Chinese company Chengdu Aosite Education (AST) is a three-pronged after-school tutoring chain for students of […]
Forging a Sustainable Future in Sri Lanka
In Sri Lanka’s Northern Jaffna District, a region ravaged by 30 years of war and unrest, Prinson Thuraiaiya’s unique brass foundry business (producing castings from waste metal) encompasses entrepreneurial spirit, sustainability and a positive social mission. This is Prinson’s story…. I was born into a poor family. I keenly engaged in school education hoping to […]
Project Inspire: MasterCard & UN Women Support Youth Involvement in Women Empowerment Projects
This year marks the third year since we launched Project Inspire: 5 Minutes to Change the World – a digital initiative dedicated to inspiring young people to build sustainable projects that will benefit disadvantaged women and girls in Asia/Pacific, the Middle East or Africa – together with the Singapore Committee for UN Women. Aimed at […]
Project Inspire: MasterCard & UN Women Support Youth Involvement in Women Empowerment Projects
This year marks the third year since we launched Project Inspire: 5 Minutes to Change the World – a digital initiative dedicated to inspiring young people to build sustainable projects that will benefit disadvantaged women and girls in Asia/Pacific, the Middle East or Africa – together with the Singapore Committee for UN Women. Aimed at […]
Building an Affordable Learning Market
By Katelyn Donnelly, Executive Director, PALF and Ravi Patel, Analyst, Affordable Learning Fund As we approach 2015, it is clear that the international community will not meet its commitment to universal primary education (MDG goals). As of 2011, UNESCO estimated 57 million children of primary school age were still not enrolled in school. Additionally, 69 […]