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Sustainable Solutions for the World’s Failing Food Systems: Acceso’s CEO Discusses its Innovative Approach
The war in Ukraine has weakened global food systems that were already reeling from the ongoing impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic – not to mention the escalating climate crisis. In this interview, Acceso CEO James Jenkin discusses how his organization is responding to that urgent need by taking an innovative, market-driven, farmer-focused approach to what’s becoming one of the most critical challenges of our time.
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- Agriculture, Social Enterprise
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Expanding Financial Opportunity to All: Kiva CEO Chris Tsakalakis Discusses the Pioneering Lending Platform’s Evolving Focus
In April of last year, Chris Tsakalakis was named CEO of the San Francisco-based microlending nonprofit Kiva, after successful leadership stints at Vivino, the world’s largest online wine marketplace, and StubHub, the world’s largest online ticket marketplace. We caught up with Tsakalakis roughly one year into his tenure at Kiva, to discuss his vision and priorities for the organization, the lessons he’s learned in his time at the helm, and his thoughts on the challenges and opportunities facing Kiva and the broader microfinance sector in the coming years.
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Innovations in E-Mobility: An Electric Vehicle Startup Seeks to Gain Traction in Mexico
Mexico City is the fifth most populated city in the world – and the most congested city in North America. Over the years, traffic and pollution levels have spurred government efforts to improve mobility in the city. But momentum is also building in the private sector, as illustrated by the startup Zacua, Mexico's first electric vehicle brand. Diana Páez at the William Davidson Institute spoke with Nazareth Black, Zacua’s CEO and a prominent e-Mobility advocate, to learn more about the company’s efforts to accelerate the adoption of e-Mobility solutions in the country.
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- Energy, Technology
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Embedding Gender Equity Into Companies’ DNA: An Investor Consortium Builds the Evidence Base for Gender Lens Investing
As gender lens investing moves into the mainstream, investors and enterprises need support in getting buy-in for this approach – and in implementing it effectively. To that end, the Gender-Smart Enterprise Assistance Research Coalition is working to build the evidence base for investing with a gender lens, with support from the Performance Measurement and Improvement team at the William Davidson Institute. NextBillion spoke with Lisa Willems at AlphaMundi and Rebecca Fries at Value for Women about the momentum that’s driving gender lens investing, the challenges it faces and the work the new consortium is doing.
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- Investing, NextBillion Originals
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Surveying the Landscape for Social Investments in Africa: A Major New Study Assesses the Current State of Play on the Continent
The social investment sector in Africa is dynamic and growing – but it’s struggling to close the enormous Sustainable Development Goals financing gap. The African Venture Philanthropy Alliance (AVPA) explored the opportunities and obstacles facing social investors on the continent in an ambitious new study, “The Landscape for Social Investments in Africa.” NextBillion interviewed AVPA’s CEO, Frank Aswani, to discuss the study’s findings, and what they say about the current state of social investment in Africa.
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- Investing, Social Enterprise
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Doing Good by Doing Business: How B1G1’s Innovative Giving Model Is Mobilizing Small and Medium-Sized Enterprises to Make a Social Impact
B1G1 (Buy1Give1) is a global business giving initiative that makes it easy for enterprises – particularly small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) – to support charitable causes around the world. NextBillion spoke with founder and CEO Masami Sato to discuss how B1G1 developed its innovative model, how its approach differs from the model popularized by companies like TOMS Shoes, and why it’s important to mobilize the power of SMEs to build upon the impact of traditional charitable giving.
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- NextBillion Originals, Social Enterprise
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Data in Real Time: How Digitalisation is Transforming Financial Policies in Africa
For the past year, Cenfri and Finmark Trust have been partnering with NextBillion to share insights from their Insight2Impact (i2i) initiative, a five-year program that has sought to improve financial inclusion and related public policies through the smarter use of data. As the Openi2i Series concludes, i2i lead Hennie Bester takes a look back at the program and the learnings it has generated. In this interview, he explores how digitalisation and data are transforming the policy landscape in Africa and beyond.
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- Finance, Technology
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Startups and Venture Capital vs. COVID-19: How an INR 1 Billion Grant Program Is Boosting India’s Pandemic Response
India is home to many innovative startups that are leveraging technology to fight the COVID-19 pandemic. To support them, a group of prominent venture capital funds and founders recently launched ACT Grants, an INR 1 billion effort to fund scale-ready solutions to COVID-related challenges. NextBillion spoke with Mekin Maheshwari, founder of Udhyam Learning Foundation – a key partner in the initiative – about how it is helping India’s startups ramp up their battle against the virus.
- Categories
- Coronavirus, Health Care, Investing, Technology
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