The mission of both of these nonprofits is to raise the most economically deprived families out of poverty within three years, preferably through environmentally sustainable means.

The approach is to provide families with interest-free loans that they repay within five months. Each loan comes with an important support package: a mix of education, advice, and problem-solving tools. Taken together, these efforts produce positive results, and in most cases, go a long way toward ensuring that loans are paid back. Once a loan is repaid, the family is eligible for another. The beauty of this system is that because the loans are short-term, families can start to see the benefits of the program very early on. This is inspiring and keeps the momentum going.

The main strategy is to create alternate sources of income. For example, if the first loan was given to raise chickens, the TC or AD staff might next suggest the family start growing vegetables using a “net house” that reduces the need for expensive chemical fertilizers and pesticides.

The staff also encourages farmers to adopt environmentally friendly practices, such as using biogas digester systems (fueled by animal waste) for cooking instead of chopping down trees for wood. Both TC and AD use a cash reward system as an incentive for this.

To track impact, a notebook is created for each family. It contains their financial information and is used to record loans and repayments. Each year, the family’s income is noted to see whether the support system is helping. If it isn’t, the staff meets to figure out how best to proceed.

These organizations also work very closely with local authorities (they have little choice, given the nature of the political regime). The staff contacts local authorities to determine which families are below the poverty line. 

Since TC and AD’s priority is education, they will first approach families with children who are not attending school. The authorities also provide enforcement when people are slow or delinquent in their loan repayments.

So, could this sort of model be replicated in other countries? Although tailored to the Vietnamese political and social reality, I feel TC and AD’s model of helping people rise out of poverty has some elements that could work elsewhere.

For example, in Nicaragua, where I spent some time in February, there didn’t seem to be any authority aware of the number of people living in poverty; there was no one keeping track of which families were falling through the cracks. It might be possible to go through various records (medical, school) and piece together that information, but because most rural communities in Nicaragua lack access to health services, such records might not exist. How would one systematically determine which families to help first, and who would enforce authority if necessary? Clearly, there is a cultural difference that might prohibit the same model being used here. However, once a culturally appropriate program was in place, it’s certainly possible to track progress in a notebook.

In Indonesia, which I visited as part of my trip to Asia, it seemed like the practice of tracking progress was seldom exercised. Measuring the impact of programs over time was supported more by anecdotal evidence than hard evidence. The same was true in Cambodia, which I also visited during this trip.

However, the notebook method used by TC and AD could be ideal in both of these countries and in others, as it is cheap, easy to use, and keeps all the records in one location. The loan system with extra support could work too.

These days, more donors and granting institutions want to know the impact of their donations. They often ask those they fund to measure and report results. There are many organizations in the developing world that don’t have the know-how to track their impact so that they can evaluate whether their goals are worth pursuing or if their method is successful. I believe the model used by Thien Chi and Anh Duong is simple enough to adapt to various situations and to other regions.

Marc Henrich is founder and executive director of Ecodana, a nonprofit that supports green solutions to poverty issues in developing countries. He is also working on a new venture that will market and distribute solar lamps in Central America.

In the early 1990s people cut down the big trees, and it became secondary forest, and then fires burned that down and that’s when the grasses took over. This grass (imperata cylindrica) is highly flammable and once established, it forms a dense carpet, making it risky and problematic for anyone to try and manage it. These days the area is classified as degraded land.

Donatus thinks there is hope for this land.

Back in 1996, he worked with a CIFOR (Center for International Forestry Research) team on a project in which they experimented with planting laban trees as a buffer zone to slow the spread of fires. Laban trees are not only slow to burn, but also grow quickly on this type of land. Planted at the right intervals, they create a shade cover that will eventually kill the grass and allow other trees to come up.

Donatus is a native Dayak of the Pesaguan sub-group. The indigenous Dayaks make up about 40 percent of the population of Borneo, and are comprised of over 200 sub-groups, each with their own dialect. Donatus created his own NGO, Mata Rantai—after heading the Dian Tama Foundation for 10 years—to focus his energies on tackling problems in his native land of Tumbang Titi.

Mata Rantai is concentrating on restoring traditional village land that has been overrun by the fire-prone imperata cylindrica grass, and changing it back to diversity-rich forest. The trees and plants that thrive in this forest will give local villagers an opportunity to generate income through cultivating rubber trees, rattan palms (used for making furniture), and medicinal plants, as well as fruit trees like durian, jackfruit, and banana.

Donatus Rantan also wants to change the local Dayak tradition of slash-and-burn agriculture. This practice has to evolve, since there is less available land— forests have been cleared for monoculture crops like palm oil, and both legal and illegal mining. Slash-and-burn agriculture also creates smoke that fills the air every dry season and becomes a haze so thick that neighboring countries like Malaysia and Singapore formally complain to the Indonesian government.

The success of CIFOR pilot project is readily apparent. It is now a forest with rubber trees, young durian trees, and all kinds of other vegetation. I even see some wild pineapples and a smattering of banana trees. All this land, he reminds me, was overrun by imperata grass just 15 years ago—no trees, just grass.

Donatus is beaming. He tells me that every time he comes to check on the progress, he is amazed at how well it’s turned out. The durian trees are still too small to bear adequate fruit, but some of the rubber trees have already been tapped and the rubber has been sold to a Chinese broker from Ketapang, the district capital.

Indigenous groups allocate their land based on mostly handed-down customary land rights, but unfortunately the current law does not fully protect them. Almost no titles to the land exist in written form, so although the locals understand whose land is whose, legally it is a grey area.

According to current legislation, customary land rights can be removed for the sake of public (government) interest. Donatus thinks that restoring this land back to forest—by applying the same methods he and the CIFOR group used on the pilot project, and by getting the local people to manage and cultivate it—will give them a heightened sense of ownership. This, in turn, will discourage the government from giving the land rights to big industry.

The issue of customary land rights is in debate, and it seems reasonable that if we can create more positive and sustainable examples of land restoration, it will put pressure on the government and other agencies to curtail mining or palm oil concession licenses. Mata Rantai’s efforts might just be what indigenous people need to boost their claim that they are the forests’ best hope for a sustainable stewardship. 

Read an interview with environmentalist Donatus Rantan at Ecodana.

This should not come at a surprise, but when it comes to identifying the solution, the jury is still out.

One of the pitfalls in education reform to date is the belief in a one-size-fits-all solution, which has been proven untrue time and again. This is no less true in India, where I write from today. The country’s urban capitals prescribe education policy on the whole, while the majority of citizens (70 percent, or approximately 830 million) reside in rural areas. Student persistence is low (only one-third complete high school) and workforce preparedness is inadequate (24 million unemployed).

The million-dollar question is how do we make education engaging and relevant at scale—a colossal challenge with the realities of poverty, politics, illiteracy, teacher absenteeism, gender inequality, and undeveloped infrastructure that results in frequent power outages and flooded roads during monsoons.

This past week, I was on my third school visit with Lend-A-Hand India (LAHI), a social enterprise committed to transforming rural education (in its first 5 years it has partnered with 60-plus schools across 3 states; more here). While this trip focused on installing corporate-donated computers at Mangaon School in rural Maharashtra, I was more interested in observing the implementation of the Introduction to Basic Technology (IBT) program. This program is the foundation of LAHI’s reform strategy, and it’s gaining momentum—the Maharashtra government has acknowledged it as an integral part of rural high school curriculum. This recognition has resulted from LAHI’s efforts to scale the program and advocacy by the IBT’s curriculum innovator, Vigyan Ashram.

Mangaon School is unique as a purely ashram school serving tribal, nomadic communities of rural Maharashtra. The 400-plus students’ families income levels are extremely low (on average, between 60-100 rupees, or US $1-2, per day), with access only to seasonal jobs such as sugarcane harvesting or bricklaying. Due to these communities’ transient nature, education typically has not been feasible nor prioritized, regardless of quality. On the contrary, child labor is the norm.

What I saw, heard, and experienced at the Mangaon School was inspiring, even without the added context of the students’ impoverished families and limited futures. Students were constructing greenhouses, wiring solar-powered LED lights, building benches and tables, drawing engineering plans, mass-producing chikki sweets, and tending their worm-fed compost that they package and sell in the village—all as part of the IBT curriculum. And they were into it. While the agriculture instructor looked on, a class of 10th graders worked together to plant crops that help feed fellow students.

The IBT program at Mangaon School (and each IBT partner school) recruits local entrepreneurs to teach the vocational curriculum empowering students to develop new innovations that benefit their local economy. I learned that their solar-powered, rechargeable lights were big sellers at the local market, where villagers typically endure daily power outages.

Headmaster Ankush Kale explained that, prior to IBT program integration into the curriculum, the school ran 1st-7th grade only. At the end of 7th grade, children would return to their families and become laborers—few other options existed, and advanced education was rare, as families were eager to gain another source of income.

When the IBT program came to Mangaon 4 years ago, the school started offering education through 10th grade, with positive results. Two classes, totaling 70 students, have graduated thus far. Of these 70 graduates, 100 percent passed the 10th-grade board examinations, and 97 percent are furthering their education at technical, vocational, or other diploma-granting institutions. This is a great achievement regardless, but taking into account the background of these children, the results are phenomenal. As Mr. Kale explained, “When we find these kids, they don’t even have clothes on their back. Now, they are thinking about starting their own businesses.”

This was not just another attempt at fixing rote learning—it was a well-executed strategy for long-term transformation. These graduates are pioneers of their communities and are motivated and armed to make something out of their lives. Through IBT and the Mangaon School, they have been propelled into the next level of educational and career advancement, and have developed skills along the way that grant them access to employment opportunities they would not have had otherwise. In addition, students have made other softer-but-significant achievements, including finding their voice, gaining confidence, defining their interests, and connecting with other education-bound peers. Before we departed that afternoon, a class of students stood proudly in front of us, exclaiming their future aspirations: “Teacher!” “Nurse!” “Electrician!” “Architect!” These students have built the courage to step out from the cycles of hardship that their ancestors have endured to make a livelihood for themselves, and undoubtedly, their future generations will be transformed because of it.

“No problem,” Mr. Bun replied. “Take the stove for a free trial. My two sons and I will come for noodles each morning.  Noodles cost you less than the stove saves you each day. That way you can use the money you save on fuel to pay for the stove over time.

Mr. Bun’s “noodle contract” meant the noodle shop owner could get the efficient stove cheap. In addition, he could quit providing the free breakfasts if the stove broke.

The problems this noodle contract solved—lack of funds, uncertainty about product quality, and concerns about durability—apply to many new products, not just cookstoves. But getting more cookstoves into the hands of more cooks is imperative. The World Health Organization estimates that smoke from unsafe stoves kills a million or more children a year in developing countries. In addition, the low efficiency of traditional stoves’ mean they worsen poverty, deforestation, and global climate change.

With my colleagues in Uganda, I have been testing a novel sales offer that shares the advantages of Mr. Bun’s noodle contract: a free trial, time payments, and the right to return the stove if it does not work. With this sales offer, the customer pays all or most of the cost of the new stove with money she has already saved on fuel—removing almost all risk in trying and keeping an improved cookstove. We have run two randomized trials of the novel offer with the charcoal-burning Ugastove in Kampala, Uganda, stoves that retail for $7-$11.

Among the 355 potential customers who received the novel offer, 47 percent accepted the free trial. And among those customers, only 2 percent returned the stove. While some moved away or defaulted, we received over 97 percent of scheduled payments. We also found that the offer increased sales about twice as much as offering just the free trial or just time payments plus the right to return.

These results apply only to one model of cookstove in one city. But they suggest that more flexible sales offers can greatly speed the adoption of efficient cookstoves. More generally, it is likely that a similar sales offer combining a free trial, time payments, and a guarantee can help speed the adoption of long-lasting goods ranging from solar lights and water filters to sewing machines and irrigation pumps.

But much remains to be learned about how to apply the new offer to safer stoves. Our next step is to market the Ugastove through community groups, to reduce the cost of collecting payments and increase the rate of sales. This summer we will be testing sales through some of BRAC-Uganda’s network of 150,000 women organized into microfinance groups. (Pilot tests at a handful or groups conducted in March 2011 were positive.)

Then we must find an offer that works with different types of stoves and learn how to motivate salespeople to provide the new sales offer.  If we can disseminate the new stoves at scale, we face the most important challenge: determining how well self-proclaimed “improved” stoves reduce the terrible health and environmental problems associated with traditional cookstoves.

Water has long been out of sight and out of mind for most Americans.  Now, however, with water needs growing increasingly acute, higher bills aren’t the only issue gaining attention.

We’re learning that the water we drink may not be as safe as we’d like, that moving and treating water and wastewater carries major environmental and economic impacts, and that even in affluent areas of America, we can no longer take water resources for granted.

For those of us in Silicon Valley, an irreplaceable resource and a half-a-trillion dollar annual global market for goods and services (Lux Research) sounds like a recipe for new businesses.  But where is the Silicon Valley for water?

We’ve relied on the startup and venture capital communities to drive innovation in many sectors of the economy.  Water, however, represents only about one percent of startup investment. How can we inspire entrepreneurial communities to deliver on our ever-pressing water needs?

Imagine H2O, a San Francisco-based organization, offers one answer.  Its annual prize acts as a magnet to attract new water startups, and its specialized accelerator program and ecosystem of industry leaders helps develop prize winners’ solutions so they reach the people who need them.

Earlier this year, Imagine H2O announced the winners of this year’s prize, over $100,000 in cash and services for water startups that save energy in their products or services.  The winner, Hydrovolts, is a Seattle startup that develops hydropower from canals and other waterways to offset the major energy requirements of transporting water. Runners-up Blackgold Biofuels, based in Philadelphia, turns sewer grease into biofuel, and FOG Busters, an Oakland company, removes the fat, oil, and grease in wastewater so that they can be recycled.

These startups pair technology innovations with viable business models.  The venture capital community has taken notice and, fortunately, so have major water agencies.  Leaders from the Southern California Metropolitan District, America’s largest water agency, the San Francisco Public Utilities Commission, and East Bay Municipal District all attended the Imagine H2O awards ceremony, demonstrating government agencies’ increasing interest in water entrepreneurship.

The startup community responded to the energy challenge with an overwhelming groundswell of innovative companies and financing to support their development.  Imagine H2O aims to catalyze a similar response to our water challenges, turning those challenges over time into entrepreneurial opportunities.

This blog was originally posted on SmartPlanet

Then, in 2009, a small community development corporation obsessed with local food and social justice began brainstorming the idea for an urban farm. And they knew just the perfect place.

The Ohio City Fresh Food Collaborative took core soil samples and determined the land free from any toxin that would prevent farming. With a five-year lease at $10 per year (no, that’s not a typo, it’s really just $10 per year), the Ohio City Farm was born. To tend the land, founding partners and licensees were selected—the Refugee Response, Great Lakes Brewing Co., Central Roots, and members of the CMHA Green Team.

Refugee Response, a nonprofit group working on local resettlement of immigrants, runs 1½ acres of the farm. Fifteen refugee trainees, paid $10/hour, work the farm with over 100 varieties of heirloom fruits and vegetables. In addition to agriculture training, the refugees are offered free financial literary and culinary classes.

“The farm addresses many urban issues from vacant land reuse to local food, to population loss,” said launch Project Director Graham Veysey. “The cross disciplinary nature of this project is one of the many exciting sustainability efforts in Cleveland that is making it a truly green city on a blue lake.”

Take for example Oregon’s Clean Water Services, a public utility that in reviewing its options for meeting state temperature requirements for treating waste and sewage water found a natural means that met state requirements, saved money, and lowered risk to the single clean water source for Washington County. By including the entire ecosystem in its assessment of investment options, Clean Water Services discovered that using forest shade to control water temperature complied with the law for a fraction of the cost of installing chillers (priced at $102 to $255 million) at four treatment facilities, which cool treated water output. The company planted trees and shrubs along the Tualatin River at a projected cost of $12 million over five years to lower river temperatures. In addition, the trees prevent soil erosion, which can affect water quality.

Although compliance is often a trigger for incorporating natural capital into strategic planning, increasingly organizations are looking beyond regulations, finding new products and markets that broad thinking about the services an ecosystem can provide. They are discovering value in the byproducts of the things they make and sell—even in the waste they generate in production processes. Lindt USA, a chocolate maker, for example, harvests cocoa beans as part of its supply chain, and so has long factored the value and supply of the cocoa bean as an integral part of its business case. Recently, however, the company has entered into a partnership with Public Service of New Hampshire (PSNH), New Hampshire’s largest electrical utility, to use its cocoa bean shells—a byproduct of production—to produce electricity. By considering the entire cocoa bean as a natural capital asset, Lindt has eliminated its processing step in Switzerland and can now ship its cocoa beans directly from equatorial countries to its manufacturing plant in Stratham, NH, reducing costs and reducing its carbon footprint by not disposing of its byproduct in landfills. And PSNH burns a half-ton less of coal for every ton of shells it receives to produce electricity.

In its best form, incorporating natural capital into business decision-making not only mitigates risk of noncompliance but also creates solutions for supply chains and markets.  Likewise, the benefits not only fall to a corporation’s bottom line but also can create sustainable business opportunities for others. DaimlerChrysler, for example, used to rely largely on plastic fillers for its Mercedes-Benz headrests. But recently, the company began partnering with the South American environmental organization POEMA to help farmers improve their farm management by promoting sustainable mixed-use agriculture. The farmers’ production of coconut fiber, from which DaimlerChrysler used to source some of the material for the headrests, has increased fourfold. With less risk of input shortages, DaimlerChrysler has now stopped using plastic fillers, realizing 5 percent savings in the process.

Just as the notion of human resource management has migrated to a practice of active investment in human capital, so the concept of natural capital is catching on with strategic planners, enhancing both corporate sustainability and bottom lines.

Serita Cox is a manager with The Bridgespan Group in San Francisco.

Robert Searle is a Bridgespan partner in Boston and head of the firm’s environmental consulting.

Young people’s voices are critical to our global dialogue. As the G-20 leaders gather to map out strategies for global economic recovery, I hope they seriously consider the recommendations made by youth leaders. Why? Because the world’s youth population—1.1 billion young people ages 15 to 25—is the largest in history. Eighty-five percent of them live in developing countries. Their voices count as they will face the consequences of our actions today.

We should not lose sight of the opportunities presented by this “youth-bulge”. The global financial crisis has compounded the challenges in many developing countries. Unemployment rates in Africa increased and disproportionately affected youth.  The sheer numbers of young people entering the workforce mean that they will play a pivotal role in enabling sustainable economic recovery. For this to happen, we must invest in their potential.

When we listen to youth from developing countries talk about what they need to succeed in today’s global economy, they point to market-relevant skills, access to financial services and technology, and opportunities to contribute to their communities. Many of them are already economically active. Education, entrepreneurship and employment of youth will spur economic growth and social progress. Investment in these areas should be addressed by our G-20 leaders in the plans for global economic recovery and poverty reduction.

It’s terrific that young people are engaged in discussions at the G-20 Summit. I hope that world leaders are inspired and motivated by the ideas, experiences and leadership of these young people. Youth are shaping today’s global economy. They want to contribute to the future they will inherit.

Reeta Roy is president and CEO of The MasterCard Foundation, a private, independent foundation based in Toronto. Its global mandate is to enable people living in poverty, particularly youth, to improve their lives – and the lives of their families and communities – by expanding their access to microfinance and education.

The group’s conclusion on Copenhagen is not newsworthy but their opinions on where to go from here are interesting. They all felt that we had too much hope in Copenhagen from the beginning. It was a mistake to put so much pressure on a short event and impossible to expect immediate consensus around such a complex global issue. However, Seema Paul, a panelist from Indian-based Shakti Sustainable Energy Foundation, said that the commitments that India made at Copenhagen have been very influential in getting the country moving towards a common goal. She truly feels a shift in the attitude towards climate change in India. Paul Hawken also said that we should be pleased with the fact that the haphazard global meeting was at least a platform for numerous civil society organizations to connect and collaborate. Overall, however, they concluded that while we can’t completely give up on political accords, the importance of on-the-ground action, the sphere of the social entrepreneurship community, seems to hold more hope.

One barrier that was raised, however, is financing for the immense changes that must be made. Mindy Lubber of Ceres and Mark Fulton, Deutsche Bank’s Global Head of Climate Change agreed that the problem is not a lack of capital but it is a lack of incentives for funding projects to decarbonize the developed economies and get developing economies on a low-carbon growth trajectory. We need to re-orient the vast amounts of capital that already shifts around the world every day. According to Fulton, whether it is markets with a guaranteed floor price for carbon or other risk-reducing mechanisms, the financial world and the business community need more predictability and confidence in this arena, and perhaps this is where there is a role for political action – creating smart mechanisms, not just targets.

When these adjustments are made, according to Lubber, “the internet revolution will look very small in comparison to the clean-tech revolution.”  However, we need to look before we leap and take a critical look at some of the technologies that are under the guise and rhetoric of innovations for climate change and energy security as Paul Hawken pointed out with the un-recyclable cadmium glass used in some PV solar cells and Lubber mentioned through her shock at Shell’s huge investment in filthy and destructive Canadian tar sands.

To leave this on a more positive note, Mattias Wackernagel of the Global Footprint Network reminded us that we need a language shift away from shaming and blaming nations, companies, and individuals and towards a race for success and an inspirational movement for change. Finger pointing does not motivate, and frankly, nor does trying to reach consensus in a sea of varied parties that need varying solutions. So let’s celebrate the competition among nations such as the Maldives, New Zealand, and Costa Rica to be carbon-neutral, the investments of companies such as Deutsche Bank  and Climate Change Capital towards solutions and the achievements of individuals such as this year’s Skoll Foundation award recipients who are working on climate change issues, including Michael Jenkins, Adalberto Veríssimo & Carlos Souza, Jr. and Ambrosius Ruwindrijarto & Silverius Oscar Unggul.

Grace Augustine is a Masters in Management Research candidate at the University of Oxford Saïd Business School. She formerly worked for Deloitte Consulting and the William Davidson Institute and blogged for NextBillion.net. She has an interest in cross-sector partnerships for a low-carbon economy and sustainable development.

The day opened with an acoustic song by Adam Gardner, guitarist and lead singer for Guster. The mellow tunes put everyone at ease before a presentation by professional marathon swimmer and Guinness record holder, Martin Strel. He told stories about swimming the infamous Amazon River in Brazil, the Yangtze in China, and the great Mississippi River in the United States. He swam to raise awareness around not only how precious our water supply is, but also to draw attention to how polluted and mistreated these resources can become without attentive care.

Panelists from IBM, Google, Stanford University, and Fortune Magazine shared insights and engaged with the audience over issues of sustainable disaster relief strategies, adaption and evolution of enviro-media, and innovations in energy. A favorite on the agenda was a water purifier put on display by Yobie Benjamin of Emicus, a community powered emergency information network. The machine used reverse osmosis and could produce clean water for hundreds of people using only a 3 by 5 foot flexible mat of solar cells for power.

Cameron Sinclair, CEO of Architects for Humanity, also shared stories about exciting and at times frustrating community rebuilding efforts. Sinclair spoke passionately about strategies for reconstruction in Haiti centered on empowering local people through hands-on education and industrial training as a way to achieve long-term sustainable solutions. In a funny anecdote, Sinclair recalled a guerilla marketing strategy used to get informational videos to the general population. Training videos were leaked for free to bootleg film merchants who then sold them on the street corners for a dollar! It worked and soon the instructional videos were being distributed all over.

Highlights for the day were presentations by Google Earth creator, Rebecca Moore, and Mary Crowley, founder of Project Kaisei. Moore spoke for our rainforests and about the need to engage and re-value the roles that Indigenous populations are playing in the fight to preserve such beautiful and unexplored resources. Crowley spoke on behalf of our oceans and educated the audience with footage and narrations from her last sailing voyage to the great Pacific Garbage patch. The Garbage patch is an area of ocean, close to the size of the state of Texas, so polluted that every time a net is cast into the water, it pulls up human trash. She shared possible solutions and even invited the audience to brainstorm with her. 

It was an inspiring day and a valuable perception-widening experience. I hadn’t really thought about how environmentally disruptive, despite the good intentions, sending a quarter million plastic water bottles to Haiti could be. Without considering the repercussions for communities with no means of recycling, the aid sent down has now become plastic pollution all over the Port Au Prince. The take-away for the day was that despite how big the environmental problems we face today seem, there are roles for each of us to play, from entrepreneurs, to scientists, educators, and volunteers, that can, when carried out collectively, create the large-scale impact that we seek.

Shane Moise graduated from UC Santa Cruz with a B.A. and holds an M.A. in Policy, Organization, and Leadership Studies from the Stanford School of Education. He is passionate about creating positive balance in his own life and enabling social change leaders to take on the world through education, civic engagement, and personal development. He plays rugby for the Olympic Athletic Club in San Francisco and is an artist.