NextBillion - An Initiative of the William Davidson Institute at the University of Michigan

Wednesday, May 1, 2013

Twenty social enterprises were awarded grants totaling $2 million by the India Development Marketplace (DM) funded by the World Bank Group (WBG).

The grantees received $100,000 each to extend and scale up their innovative business models in the states of Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, and Jharkhand. A number of financial institutions, social entrepreneurs, investors, and government officials participated at the India DM event organized to showcase these development solutions to the problems of the most vulnerable people.

Through its India Development Marketplace initiative, the World Bank Group (World Bank and the International Finance Corporation) has identified scalable, replicable, and financially sustainable projects for support. The call for proposals was launched in January and received nearly 200 proposals from organizations already operating in these three states, as well as from across the country. These organizations have developed business models to expand access to basic services such as livelihood and employment, education, women and child welfare, agriculture, energy, health care and financial services.