More than 1.5 billion people in the world live without access to electricity. India alone houses more than 35% of the world's population without electricity, approximately 579 million people. Kushant Uppal is working to change that.  

After earning a MS and Ph.D. from the University of Southern California, Kushant spent 15 years developing energy technology products in Silicon Valley. In 2006, Kushant began to realize that energy efficient products are both a key to rural productivity and a tremendous market opportunity. This drove him – and his family – to Hyderabad , India, where he launched Intelizon, a company dedicated to bringing energy services to rural India.

Earlier this week, I had the opportunity to speak with Kushant about his company, base of the pyramid strategy and the move back to India after 15 years in the United States.

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Guest blogger Virginia Barreiro is the Global Director of the New Ventures Project at the World Resources Institute. She holds a B.A. in Political Science from the University of California in San Diego and an M.A. in Latin American Studies from George Washington University.

By Virginia Barreiro

Last week a group of 42 people hiked together in Maroon Bells Colorado in the outskirts of Aspen, as part of a gathering that resulted in the formalization of ANDE - the Aspen network for Development Entrepreneurs. These individuals represent the most active organizations working on private sector solutions to poverty alleviation and sustainable development. We convened for two and a half days at the beautiful Aspen Institute to figure out how to do what we do... better.

Although varying in particular scope and approach, the organizations represented in the meeting all share a common thread: a strong conviction in the power of entrepreneurship as a way to tackle the world's most pressing challenges. ANDE members believe that through collective action, our organizations can drive greater resources in a more efficient manner to the entrepreneurs that will ultimately deliver social and environmental change.

Although many of these organizations have been working in this space for some time now, ANDE is the first formal platform for the sector. Comprised of investment funds, enterprise development organizations, intermediaries and donors, the network spent two whole days discussing key bottlenecks to scaling the growth of Small and Growing Businesses (i.e. SMEs) and, specifically, exploring some of the most pressing challenges faced by organizations in this space.

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Last week I had the pleasure of attending the Entrepreneurship and Development Reception, which marked the launch of the ANDE Network in Washington DC. My biggest takeaway: nothing says more about the bridging spirit of this initiative than the event being co-hosted by organizations representing the government, the donor community and the entrepreneurs working in the field -- as described below.

I asked Katherine Samuels -- Summer Associate at Agora Partnerships and co-host of this great venue -- to share her insights on the event and the network with the NextBillion.net community, to which she kindly agreed. Katherine is a candidate for a Masters of Public Affairs at the University of Texas, Austin.

By Katherine Samuels

Something was in the air, a buzz, a special energy. It was the feeling that I was witnessing the start of something new, something important for the development community. Following the Aspen Institute's initial launch of the Aspen Network of Development Entrepreneurs (ANDE) in Colorado, the Rockefeller Foundation sponsored an Entrepreneurship and Development reception last week, officially marking the launch of ANDE in Washington, D.C.

ANDE is a network of social entrepreneurial leaders who provide management assistance to Small and Growing Businesses (SGBs) in the developing world as well as foundations and investors who fund and support these efforts. ANDE organizations intend to pool their efforts to catalyze a movement that will unleash the resources needed to start, grow, and finance hundreds of thousands of small businesses in the developing world.

ANDE seeks to provide structure and encourage support for the SGB sector - the development community's answer to the issue of the "missing middle"; that is, assisting those businesses that are not served by local commercial financial institutions but are too large for microfinance programs and too small for traditional venture capital. Antony Bugg-Levine, from the Rockefeller Foundation, described this new movement afoot in the SGB sector of development that prompted the formation of ANDE.

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What defines a Base of the Pyramid (BoP) business? Here at NextBillion.net, our goal is to identify and discuss sustainable business models that address the needs of the BoP.

We have had many debates about the size, total income and expenditure of this group. NextBillion is currently hosting some debate about what development means. At the same time, we've been thinking about the role and importance of BoP businesses within the development community thanks to Michael Edwards' criticism of 'philanthrocapitalism'. But what exactly do we mean about when we talk about BoP businesses?

Everything BoP is currently in fashion. The 'BoP business' term is catchy, but unfortunately it has no easy or clear-cut definition. That BoP business initiatives are currently so popular is, of course, a wonderful thing. All of a sudden, people want to consider alternatives to traditional, top-down development.

On the other hand, being fashionable is also dangerous. We – the base of the pyramid movement – risk forgetting the big picture. We're involved in a debate that more and more people are joining, and in the process, we risk diluting the meaning of what BoP businesses truly are.

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This post is the first in a two part series exploring China’s role in Africa’s development. Part 1 focuses on the breakdown and impact of African exports to China, and Part 2 focuses on the role of Chinese investment and imports in Africa.

I think that those of us who are interested in the potential of market-based development need to initiate a conversation around one of the biggest elephants in the room, and that is the role that Chinese foreign direct investment (FDI) and aid is playing in Africa's development. In particular, this inflow could fuel potential base of the pyramid (BoP)-focused enterprises and mean new opportunities in both employment and a greater access to choice in goods and services for BoP consumers.

I became interested in doing this piece on a recent trip to Hong Kong, where I was studying strategies that have been taken to propel corporate social responsibility in Asia. One morning at breakfast I came across the headline, "China’s Investments ease Africa's Poverty, says World Bank report" in the South China Morning Post. This July 12th headline grabbed my attention, as it was clearly at odds with those I had been seeing in the U.S., such as last August’s New York Times story entitled, "China's Trade in Africa Carries a Price Tag."

So, which is it? Clearly, the two seemingly opposing articles demonstrate that this is a very divided issue, and the strong journalistic stances risk convincing people one way or the other, when the reality of the effect is probably somewhere in the middle.

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Guest blogger Lauren Withey is a research analyst working on the World Resources Report at the World Resources Institute. She is a contributing writer to the newly-released World Resources 2008 - Roots of Resilience: Growing the Wealth of the Poor.

By Lauren Withey

Sofia Begum never imagined that she would be running her own poultry business. In 2000, the former housewife from northern Bangladesh was struggling to make ends meet for her family. She and her husband, a fisherman, were too poor to send their children to school. Like most of the families around them, the couple relied heavily on the local wetland to provide the protein and income necessary to sustain their daily lives. But degradation to the wetland from agricultural pollution, sediment from deforestation upstream, and overfishing had taken its toll in recent years. Fish harvests had fallen dramatically and the communities reliant on the wetlands had few other economic opportunities to fall back on.

Fortunately for Sofia, a new effort was just beginning in the area that aimed to help her community develop alternative income sources while restoring the wetlands under community management. The Managing of Aquatic Ecosystems through Community Husbandry (MACH) program was funded by the US Agency for International Development (USAID) and executed by four civil society organizations with the support of the Bangladeshi government.

Communities across northern Bangladesh created two types of groups to carry out this process: Resource Management Organizations (RMOs) designed and implemented wetland management plans to aid the wetlands' recovery, while Resource User Groups (RUGs) served as training and financing mechanisms to develop alternative income sources. Specialty vegetable farms, fruit orchards, livestock-rearing operations, energy and clothing businesses, small stores are just a few of the fruits of the RUG's efforts in MACH communities.

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Many of us in the base of the pyramid community, myself included, often wonder, "is this business really making a social impact?" Sure, there are real indicators of success, but what action drove that particular outcome? As I ponder the social impact of business, I'm reminded of an old marketing adage: We know at least 50 percent of our efforts are working – we just don't know which half. (Hat tip to Brian Trelstad for bringing this up in a meeting.)

In order to build truly inclusive businesses, our sector must start tracking impact over time. This we can probably all agree on. But the challenge is not so much in creating buy-in around the idea of measurement, but in finding a way to integrate an effective and user-friendly system for doing so in an already resource-constrained work environment.

Because of these and other stumbling blocks in creating social metrics, Rob Katz and I were particularly intrigued by the newly released Measuring Impact Framework developed by The World Business Council for Sustainable Development (WBCSD). This framework, which has been in the works for nearly two years, is designed to guide companies – from small enterprises to large multinationals – through the process of measuring and assessing impact, and making better-informed future decisions within the context of a larger development paradigm.

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Last month, the Silicon Valley Microfinance Network cosponsored "Microfinance West: The Investment Opportunity Conference." This event, which brought together some of the leading commercial players in the microfinance field, was heavily geared towards institutional and retail investors in the financial community. The topics ran the gamut from attracting capital to mitigating risk to benchmarking against other asset classes.

Though the focus was clearly financial, heavyweights from the development side also presented, including Elizabeth Funk, Chairman of the Board of Unitus, and Mary Ellen Iskenderian, President of Women's World Banking. The most provocative comment, however, came from Janine Firpo of Sevak Solutions as she described the evolution of financial services in the US and how technology has continued to lower the costs of transactions.

Warning the audience in advance, Janine shared her thoughts on an area that many might consider to be heretical. She challenged the attendees to question whether default rates on microfinance loans were really the right place to focus, or if in fact the emphasis on achieving 99% repayment rates might be somewhat misguided. Most microfinance institutions today follow a high-touch model, relying on a loan officer that makes frequent visits to his or her clients to collect loan payments and continually reinforce their need to repay. While this has been extremely effective it is also inherently unscalable; as the client base increases, the number of loan officers needed to serve them must also increase.

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I've been spending the week at one of a series of 8 conferences on eHealth, brainstorming with other entrepreneurs, venture capitalists, health informatics specialists, and policy experts. The setting could hardly be more lovely--the Rockefeller Foundation's Bellagio center looking down on the deep waters of Lake Como and looking up at the sheer granite cliffs of the Alps.

The scale of the scenery seemed to match the scale of our task, to figure out how to unlock the eHealth marketplace—that is, unleash entrepreneurship and market forces combined with technology—to provide better health care, or for many rural communities in developing countries, any health care at all.

The barriers are well understood. Very limited access to health care facilities in rural and many peri-urban areas. An absolute dearth of doctors, nurses, and pharmacists in rural areas. Low quality care—few diagnostics, widespread fake drugs. High costs for drugs, doctors, and hospital care that can bankrupt poor families. Can technology help—especially information and communications technology? And how to jump start its use in poor countries when even rich countries have not yet adopted systematic eHealth strategies?

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Guest blogger Monica Touesnard is the Managing Director of the Base of the Pyramid Learning Lab, a program of the Center for Sustainable Global Enterprise at the Johnson Graduate School of Management at Cornell University. She is currently working to expand the scope and reach of the BoP Learning Lab through the creation of an international network of Learning Labs with academic partners in Brazil, Mexico, China, Canada, Spain, India, and South Africa. Monica earned a general management MBA from UNC's Kenan-Flagler Business School with focus on Sustainable Enterprise and has a B.A. in East Asian studies from McGill University in Canada.

By Monica Touesnard

One can find various established economic activities within low-income communities: small shareholder farmers, moneylenders, microfinanciers, mom-and-pop shops, and many more. Though vital to base of the pyramid communities, these types of small businesses do not necessarily constitute BoP enterprises.

In that light, determining the distinguishing characteristics of BoP enterprises became a key discussion topic at the inaugural BoP Learning Lab Global Network Director's Summit this past June. This global network of institutions is actively engaged in generating knowledge about BoP enterprise development. As such, defining what it means to be a BoP enterprise is critical.

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If you have between 2 and 5 years of professional experience, a strong interest in social enterprise/ venture philanthropy and a desire to spend 10 months working for organizations in Latin America, Africa or Asia, please read on.

The LGT Group is the asset management group of the Princely House of Liechtenstein. Each year, the Group's philanthropy arm conducts a call for applications to its fellowship program, through which it engages professionals and social enterprises in developing countries, seeking to go beyond financial support and offer their portfolio organizations access to increased intellectual and social capital. This year's program features organizations working in an interesting array of disciplines in Brazil, Colombia, South Africa and Tanzania.

The deadline for applications is September 14, 2008. Click here to learn more about the programs and the specific requirements for applicants.

The Social Enterprise Knowledge Network (SEKN) brings together a number of Latin America academic institutions interested in exploring the concept of social enterprise and market-based solutions to poverty. Last week the network convened for a research colloquium in Harvard Business School to share the major findings of their upcoming publication titled Inclusive Business in Iberoamerica: Challenges and Opportunities.

It was an interesting venue in which I had the opportunity to learn about thriving BoP business models in Latin America like Cruzsalud in Venezuela, which is bringing high-quality healthcare services to the poor of Caracas. It was also exciting to meet and talk to very interesting people like Nancy Barry and Michael Chu, surely two of the most influential characters of the microfinance revolution. Interestingly, both have moved on from microfinance to engage in the broader BoP/ Social Enterprise space. Stay tuned for upcoming posts in which I'll summarize my conversations with both of them and their current ventures.

I would like to use the rest of this post to present two simple ideas that I believe could be of use to SEKN, as it enters its new research cycle. In particular, I see great opportunities for the network to more effectively deliver its messages and findings while also turning their academic research into action, by further engaging with students and practitioners in the countries where the network is present. 

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This post is the second in a two part series exploring China’s role in Africa’s development. Part 1 focused on the breakdown and impact of African exports to China, and Part 2 focuses on the role of China’s investment and imports into Africa.

Investment

It is no surprise that most Africans are welcoming Chinese investment and products. The history of traditional Western aid and investment in Africa is one of a nagging "I correct you because I want what's best for you" parental-like stronghold over the continent. Tired of "the politically motivated, finger-wagging approach of western governments," Africans have welcomed China’s emphasis on pure business. Numerous sources quote the lack of political motivation, as well as societal or environmental demands, as one of the primary reasons that Africa is welcoming the Chinese investment.

Sahr Johnny, the Sierra Leonean ambassador in Beijing, was quoted as saying the following regarding China's projects in Africa:

The Chinese are doing more than the G8 to make poverty history. If a G8 country proposes a project for Sierra Leone, there is an environmental assessment and evaluation of the human rights and governance situation. The Chinese just come and do it.

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If you're in the market for a job in the base-of-the-pyramid space, you might want to check out the five current job openings listed on Acumen Fund's web site.

There are two openings in India, one for a Business Development Manager and the other for a Portfolio Associate.  Both are accepting applications and hope to close the application period early next week (August 20).  View both job descriptions in PDF format, and consider applying.

The Acumen Fund Pakistan office also has an opening, this time for a Business Manager.  Apply by September 10.

Finally, here in New York, we're recruiting a Senior Accountant and a Talent Intern.  Neither has a set application deadline, but the sooner you submit information, the better.

As always, if you know someone qualified for these positions or others listed on NextBillion.net, please share them freely - and thanks in advance for your help.

Happy job hunting...

I was recently pointed to GreenMango - an interesting project and winner of the Echoing Green Fellowship. GreenMango is based out of Hyderabad and profiles small time, base-of-the-pyramid owned businesses such as plumbers, carpenters, tailors, mechanics and electricians. The data and service is also currently restricted to Hyderabad. The platform is currently in Beta version - with a simple interface to search for local businesses, using filters for business type, business name, or the area/pin codes.

Unlike Babajob, which depends on a more complicated variant of social networking, GreenMango offers a simple design and user reviews - that help one connect directly with the business. I was not able to write a review for my electrician, but I suspect that similar to popular auction sites, few people may try to game the system. While initiatives such as GreenMango as laudable in concept, even the more socially conscious friends I speak to seemed to prefer to use offline referrals to identify such help.

The question is: Is GreenMango a scalable concept? Does the initiative create value for the individuals in the businesses profiled? (To be fair, not all social initiatives are launched with the goal of achieving scale - and our interest in this analysis is only to better understand models that might scale)

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