Job creation and enterprise development
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SEKEM: A Holistic Egyptian Initiative
After living in Austria for 21 years, Ibrahim Abouleish returned home to Egypt to do something about the difficulties he observed during visits. In 1977, he founded the Sekem initiative to promote social and environmental development through economic and cultural activities.
Construmex: Facilitating Remote Housing Investments for US-based Mexican Migrants
Construmex, an initiative of Mexican construction and building giant CEMEX, was launched after the company’s success with Patrimonio Hoy, a socially minded business initiative targeted at low-income consumers. Since its inception in 2001, Construmex has helped more than 14,000 Mexican migrants in...
Rajawali’s Express Taxi: Working with Taxi Drivers as Business Partners in Indonesia
The 1997 Asian financial crisis created a job vacuum in Indonesia, with companies forced to lay off 1.4 million workers. A decade later, unemployment rates continue to rise and poverty defines the context for Indonesia’s economy, social relations and security. Express Taxi, a subsidiary of the...
Sustainable Cashew Production in Guinea
Guinea grows about 5,000 tons of raw cashew nuts a year. Meanwhile, its much smaller neighbour Guinea-Bissau, with similar soil and climate, produces 80,000 tons. Encouraged by the growing consumer demand for cashews, Guinea has begun to focus on expanding cashew production—a good candidate for...
UNILAB supports Governments campaign to make medicine accessible to the poor
The market price of medicines in the Philippines is among the highest in the world—40%–70% more than in neighbouring countries, according to the Philippine Department of Health. Some drugs cost 10 times more in the Philippines than in neighbouring countries.
Partnerships bring fuel services to northern Mozambique medical clinics
In a country with 500 doctors for almost 20 million people, initiatives that can expand the reach of health services to rural people are in critical demand but in short supply. In northern Mozambique, the big challenge for health clinics is the lack of reliable fuel to light medical operations and...
Integrated Tamale Fruit Company: Organic Mangoes Improving Livelihoods for the Poor in Ghana
The Integrated Tamale Fruit Company—operating in the Savelugu-Nanton District in Ghana’s Northern Region, an area of widespread poverty—cultivates certified organic mangos for local and export markets. To boost its power in the export market with higher production volumes, the company established a...
Vodafone and Safaricom Kenya: Extending the Range and Reliability of Financial Services to the Poor in Rural Kenya
Kenya has fewer than 2 million bank accounts serving 32 million people. To bridge the gap, Safaricom Kenya, one of two mobile service providers in Kenya, developed a technological solution in partnership with Vodafone. The result was MPESA, an electronic money transfer product to make financial...
Strategic partnerships improve child health in Mali
Pésinet, devised in 2002 by Brussels-based Afrique Initiatives, is an early warning method for monitoring the health conditions of children from low-income families. Its concept is simple: mothers subscribe to Pésinet’s services for a nominal fee, and in return a local Pésinet representative weighs...
PETSTAR: Adding Value to the Chain of Recycling While Improving the Scavengers’ Working Conditions
With about 85,000 tons of waste generated every day, Mexico is the 10th largest garbage producer in the world. At the same time, tens of thousands of scavengers, including children, are making a living by collecting saleable items from open-air dumps in very poor, informal conditions.