Today three different organizations came to meet us in our hotel to give presentations and engage us in what turned out to be amazing discussions about social enterprise.
Under the Mango Tree:
The founder and CEO Vijaya Pastala came to speak with us about how Under the Mango Tree came to be and how its been able to maintain itself since its 2009 inception. She told us that the name pays homage to the fact that it’s common to have meetings and to gather under the mango tree; it provides shade! This social venture was started as a means to address three main problems: agriculture and farmer livelihoods, the decline in productivity, and market access. What was good to know about this organization is that it was easily received by the government. In fact, a National Beekeeping Commission Report came out in 1976 which emphasized how policy plays out in the social markets: no need to reinvent the will, just pick up the pace where your issue of interest fell off of the government’s radar.
While very attractive and a nice selling item, the honey-making aspect of this NGO is merely a by-product. The impetus behind this operation is from the bee boxes and agriculture development of poor farmers. Their main objectives are to produce more farmers willing to make the investment/take the risk by paying for the start-up services that Under the Mango Tree offers. The organization has the trending hybrid status which basically means that they are both not for profit (on the training, replicable, research, and policy advocacy side) as well as for profit (market access and productivity side). Within their for profit shop, they function through the gifting, food, and hospitality/consumption markets. They even have a white label agreement with a few shops where they package their honey and sell it the hosting market’s brand label (similar to Trader Joes' approach).
They are solely grant funded and use their resources to support their training modules, supplies, and capacity building for staff. Their grant writing is done by their small team that is also supported by their fellows and interns. So they don’t have the resources or perhaps even the need to hire a contracted grant writer/consultant which was good to know! She showed us a really detailed yet simple cash flow chart that was unique in that it showed how profits and investments would go back into the community. There are four channels of how the farmers make money and there are also long-term, indirect goals making this NGOs work an easy sell. The impact chart was done for the most recent fiscal year to address the entire family- not just the male farmer. In their year-long training process, where they groom Master Trainers to cost-effectively educate the community on how to maintain their agriculture activities, they have a 70% retention rate. The bee spot is totally run by volunteers which I really love and want to establish in my business plan.
She said that the data and monitoring inputs are key indicators of their success. And that their research and evaluation are the primary tools used for policy change. This point was really important for me because I feel like a lot of advocacy work gets lost as mere lip service. She said that there is no need for them to persuade the government that their model is the best model. Their research instead shows that their model is the most appropriate model for tribal farmers. Her advice to future social entrepreneurs was to stay small as to lower the cost of administrative and infrastructure fees. She also said that it would have been better for her to get started as a single woman so she wouldn't have to wear so many hats simultaneously and would have more money saved. That gives me hope and anxiety at the same time that I can get my idea off the ground now!
ATMA is a consultancy organization built to strengthen organizations to impact education. Since there are so many non-governmental organizations here in India (1 per every 400 people), they decided to follow a partnership model where they would team up with existing NGOs to make sure that they were running in a more cooperative, centralized fashion. I asked what their main fundraising strategy was and learned from their newest associate (who has a finance background) that it is largely about effective communication and passion. This was really good to hear and got me thinking a lot about my business plan’s initial strategies for start-up funding. Also, their current executive director started off in the company as a volunteer!! But to be honest, that was about the only impressive item that I learned about this company. That they empower and invest in the youth to serve larger functions in their organization was no doubt encouraging and has allowed me to imagine myself in higher regard sooner than I expected, but I wasn’t really too thrilled about their organization as a whole. I really didn’t see how they have been successful given that they have been established for over five years and only have a few successful partnerships. They don’t seem to be doing anything incredible for the community and haven’t addressed any stated needs that I can identify. Also and quite ironically, their main representative demonstrated no passion for their work and was so rehearsed that I didn’t feel any real attachment to the long-term impact they were making in education. I am glad however that we met with this NGO because it definitely highlighted some areas for me to avoid and be conscious of in terms of who I decide to work with and why.
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