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The Grassroots Business Initiative (GBI) seeks to strengthen and scale up innovative social enterprises that create sustainable economic opportunities for the poor, empowering and engaging them as entrepreneurs, consumers, employees and suppliers.

GBI supports such enterprises – referred to as Grassroots Business Organizations – and the intermediaries that support them, with appropriate financing (grants and “patient capital” loans) and capacity building.

Grassroots Business Organizations often provide the only realistic means of expanding market access and business support to the poor in hard-to-reach regions and population segments.

Established in 2004, GBI now works in Africa, Latin America and Asia, with some 30 different projects aiming to bring income generating opportunities and needed products and services to the poor.


GBI Highlights:

CFW Shops, of the Sustainable Healthcare Foundation (SHEF) in Kenya, has built a solid reputation among its customers for good quality health services. Although the Kenyan government offers free healthcare through its clinics, many choose to go to their local CFW clinic where they consider the service more reliable, and the products more reliable and in stock. CFW Shops' franchise system allows for close quality control and high standards, while keeping the prices down. The benefit is clearly felt by the local population. To learn more about how SHEF is making a difference in Kenya, read the Business Daily article.


Honey Care Africa is featured in Business Daily article for their top quality, organic, fair trade honey. Read full article.



Drishtee and Digital Divide Data, two of GBI's social enterprise partners, are highlighted along with GBI on Voice of America, which investigates their work in providing basic services and generating sustainable jobs for the poor.
Read full article.


Indonesia: IFC Launches Innovative Project to Help Local SMEs. IFC, with the support of Indonesian business leaders, has launched a new project to support the growth of SMEs through business knowledge transfer, experience sharing, and financial assistance, Kompas reports. The first loans under the program totaled $33,000 and were given to three young entrepreneurs. GBI Director Harold Rosen said that IFC has a wide range of experience in supporting the growth of small businesses.



Spotlight On:

Irupana - From Cereal to Rural Electrification
Established in 1987, Irupana is a socially responsible small enterprise that manufactures certified organic food products sourced from subsistence farmers who would have little other market for their goods. In line with its commitment to the community, Irupana has recently set up Bartolina Sisa, a social fund that in effect separates Irupana’s social activities from its commercial ones. The fund’s first project, in partnership with Barefoot College, is an initiative to bring solar electrification to three rural communities in Bolivia.

In August 2006, three women were chosen by their communities, and sent by Bartolina Sisa to train in solar energy for six months in Tilonia, India. These women left Bolivia at the end of November, and in six months they, along with fourteen other rural women from The Gambia, Afghanistan, Sierra Leone, Mali and Cameroon, learned to assemble circuits and lamps, install solar units and check for and repair faults. The Irupana initiative focused on the electrification of three rural Bolivian communities, Churubamba, Yacupampa and Soloja, with a total of 110 houses.

This project aims to improve the quality of life of rural people and farmers who supply Irupana with grain, while using renewable energy and empowering women. The key difference between this project and other solar energy projects is that women were trained to be Barefoot Solar engineers, so they have the capacity to maintain the equipment and thus ensure the project’s long-term sustainability. In particular, semi-literate, middle-aged women were chosen to show that technology can be simplified and taught to anybody, not just engineers. These communities are also organizing to form a fund for the financing of future repairs.