Publication database

This paper provides insights into how business models can be structured to generate profits to justify investments, while integrating and serving the needs of the poorest citizens. It uses three cases of successful partnerships from Bangladesh and India. The paper aims to generate ideas about the opportunities available to companies working in tandem with local entrepreneurial organisations to build business models that are able to achieve multiple strategic objectives concomitantly.

This report suggests a conceptual framework on ways through which companies can support social entrepreneurship. It focuses on: (1) a company’s core business operations in the workplace, marketplace and along the value chain; (2) its social investment and strategic philanthropy activities; and (3) its engagement in public policy dialogue, advocacy and institution building. It outlines the ‘business case’ on how alliances can help companies meet their business goals, and offers a set of recommendations for business leaders, social entrepreneurs, foundations and governments on how they can work together to increase the scale and effectiveness of these alliances for mutual benefit.

This study examines the current state of tourism in The Gambia, West Africa, and proposes a series of practical measures to enhance the flow of benefits to the poor. It is based on a framework of international ‘best practice’ for boosting benefits for the poor, combined with innovative local economic analysis that maps the current flows of benefits to a range of stakeholders from the tourism value chain in The Gambia.

This journal covers different topics of microfinance and microenterprises. It contains articles on sources of microfinance, best practices of microfinance institutes and on the role of the public sector and commercial banks in supporting micro entrepreneurs from the base of the pyramid. It highlights how the poor can access the markets with a special focus on public procurement markets, the development of associations and partnerships and on value chains and linkages.

This report reviews the potential for business to contribute to public health systems in developing countries - it outlines the challenges facing public health systems and why good health systems matter to business. It discusses the role of the private sector across three areas: core business activities, philanthropy and social investment, and public policy dialogue, advocacy and institution building and it provides successful case examples and initiatives.

This report suggests a conceptual framework on the contribution of business to development - it focuses on three corporate ‘spheres of influence’: (1) a company’s core business operations in the workplace, marketplace and along the value chain; (2) its social investment and strategic philanthropy activities; and (3) its engagement in public policy dialogue, advocacy and institution building. It provides recommendations and a set of six strategies that companies can apply to protect and/or build both market value and social value.

This report explores six interconnected challenges that are of particular concern for business as they further affect the integrity of ecosystems and their capacity to provide services: water scarcity, climate change, habitat change, biodiversity loss and invasive species, overexploitation of oceans, and nutrient overloading. It discusses their implications for businesses and provides examples of corporate responses.

Este informe presenta una reseña sobre la insuficiencia de las actuales cadenas de valor para viviendas al servicio de poblaciones de bajos ingresis en países en vías de desarrollo, y presenta un análisis de soliciones innovacores para vivienda que han desarrollado emprendedores sociales en el mundo.

This report analyses the success of Kick Start's Money Maker Pump innovation and shows how important it is to provide enabling technologies which the poor can creatively adapt for their own purposes, rather than beginning with a narrow and clearly defined value proposition.

This report provides an overview of Vietnam’s political economy, the growing importance of the country’s private sector, and the enabling environment for small enterprise development and corporate social responsibility. It illustrates two multi-sector partnerships: the Vietnam Business Links Initiative (VBLI) and the Vietnam Cleaner Production Centre (VNCPC), that both aim to address core obstacles to small enterprise development and pro-poor industrialisation in developing countries.