Inclusive businesses often struggle with challenging operating environments that can prevent them from adopting inclusive business models, replicating to new geographies, and reaching more people who live at the base of the pyramid. Effective and efficient inclusive business policies can help to overcome these barriers.

As the bridge that connects policymakers and inclusive businesses, the Global Platform for Inclusive Business (GPIB) conducted a survey in the spring of 2016 to crowdsource policy ideas and challenges that companies face specifically as inclusive businesses. The results of the survey are intended to inform future research and policy efforts and ensure that they remain relevant to the needs of inclusive businesses.

GPIB reached out to a broad network of inclusive businesses, including the inclusive business clients of the World Bank Group’s International Finance Corporation (IFC); members of the United Nations Development Programme’s (UNDP) Business Call to Action; members of the World Business Council for Sustainable Development; partners of the Inclusive Business Action Network; the inclusive business network of the Asian Development Bank; among others. The goal was to reach a variety of inclusive businesses representing a range of sectors, sizes, years in operation, and approaches to inclusive business.

The survey asked questions related to:

• Obstacles to success for inclusive businesses
• Awareness of government efforts to support inclusive business
• Internal initiatives that inclusive business respondents have implemented to overcome obstacles
• Recommendations from respondents for future policies that could address unmet needs

The survey focused on the four main policy areas identified in the G20 Inclusive Business Framework: capacity, financing, information, and rules and regulations.

Read the full survey (pdf).