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Scaling up Access to Electric Cooking Solutions for Households in Zambia
"The electric cookers offer families economic as well as health benefits by reducing household fuel costs and indoor air pollution associated with traditional cooking methods."
- Categories
- Energy, Environment, Health Care, Social Enterprise
- Region
- Sub-Saharan Africa
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NextBillion at 20: Reflecting on Growth, Change and Global Impact
NextBillion is celebrating its 20th anniversary this year, at a time of immense global change and uncertainty. But a few things haven’t changed: Entrepreneurship continues to be a key factor in solving the world’s most urgent challenges. Investments in emerging markets continue to catalyze innovation. And access to accurate sources of information remains essential to unlocking business growth and impact. In the coming weeks, NextBillion will be spotlighting guest articles that captured some of the key conversations and challenges that have shaped impact-focused business in emerging markets over the past two decades — and that continue to shape these sectors today. We're starting with agriculture: Check out these insights below.
- Categories
- Social Enterprise
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Public Good vs. Profitable Exits: Why Public Innovation Agencies Must Stop Copying Venture Capital
A new class of venture capitalist is emerging, but they aren’t Wall Street financiers or Silicon Valley tech bros. As Emre Eren Korkmaz at the University of Oxford argues, they are public innovation agencies that are shifting their funding approach: Instead of supporting high-risk research and innovations aimed at delivering societal benefit, they have begun to adopt the logic of venture capital, favoring commercially viable projects that are more likely to secure follow-on private funding. He explores the downsides to this shift, arguing that the world needs these institutions to do what private capital cannot or will not: supporting innovation for the public good, not just for profitable exits.
- Categories
- Investing, Social Enterprise, Technology
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Press Release: Grameen Foundation and Yunus Social Business Unite to Build the Future of Locally Led Development
Together, Grameen Foundation and Yunus Social Business will harness blended finance, agribusiness investments, and innovative agricultural solutions to deliver transformative, locally led programs across multiple regions.
- Categories
- Agriculture, Social Enterprise
- Region
- Global
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Time is a Social Innovator’s Most Precious Resource: Why Are So Many Funders Wasting It?
For social entrepreneurs and civil society innovators, time is a perpetually scarce resource. But according to Tanner Methvin at Impact Amplifier, in his decades of engagement with these innovators and their funders, he has often been shocked by how wasteful some of the funding world is with the ecosystem’s time. He argues that many funders don't fully understand the time demands imposed by their cumbersome systems for applying for grants or investments, or responding to requests for proposals. He explores these inefficiencies, and proposes a better way for funders to support the social innovation community.
- Categories
- Investing, Social Enterprise
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IRC and GiveWell Partner to Deliver Safe Water to 1.7 Million People in Chad, Nigeria, and Somalia With Cost-Effective Approach
This 18-month pilot will introduce a cost-effective approach to water treatment across refugee camps, displacement settlements, and vulnerable host communities.
- Categories
- Social Enterprise, WASH
- Region
- Sub-Saharan Africa
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Are Impact Investors Really Listening?: Why Capturing Stakeholder Insights is Key to Impactful Investment Strategies
Collecting data is easy for impact investors; acting on it is harder. As Taanya Khare at Acumen explains, most impact investment firms turn data-driven insights into action through intentional spaces like investment committees or portfolio review sessions. But she argues that listening is about more than surveys or feedback loops — it requires investors to sit down with company teams to make sense of customer insights, identify blind spots and co-create better solutions and impact strategies. She shares what Acumen has learned from embedding listening and impact management into every stage of its investment process.
- Categories
- Investing, Social Enterprise
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Global Partnerships Announces Maturity of 6th Impact Investment Fund
The 10-year Social Investment Fund 6.0 demonstrated the power of impact-first investing strategies for addressing poverty in Africa and Latin America
- Categories
- Investing, Social Enterprise
- Region
- Global
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