TOWARD A THRIVING AND SUSTAINABLE WORLD
LETTER FROM THE CEO Dear friends and valued supporters, Engineers Without Borders Canada (EWB) works everyday with bold determination and impatience to challenge the status quo of extreme poverty. Throughout the past 15 years, we have worked to create lasting change in the communities we work with in sub-Saharan Africa. In the pages that follow, I am proud to showcase some of the bold and innovative social enterprises we support across the continent. We nurture and accelerate their success with our most valuable resources: our people and the flexible seed funding they need to succeed. Their impact changes the lives of millions in a durable and scalable way. This would not be possible without the generosity of our community of donors. Our track record is proven. It takes three to five years of EWB’s support for a social enterprise to go from being a single entrepreneur’s bold idea to self-sustaining growth and impact. I’ve had the privilege of meeting smallholder farmers who have doubled their family’s daily income thanks to services they received from social enterprises supported by EWB. This is the difference between vulnerability and prosperity. I write this letter with deep excitement for the potential impact ahead of us. There are 17.7 million small and medium-sized businesses in sub-Saharan Africa. They employ a quarter of the workforce. The sector is poised for growth and brimming with innovative potential. That’s why we’re focusing on breaking down the barriers to their success. Frustratingly, entrepreneurs are often overlooked in the quest for social change. Only a tiny portion of international development funds go directly to support entrepreneurs. With the generous support of our donors, we are focusing our efforts on bridging that gap by investing in social enterprises
that enable small businesses to thrive. We’re calling this group of ventures our Small & Growing Businesses portfolio, and we’ve launched the Accelerate campaign to enable them to thrive. Over the years, our mission has brought together thousands of leaders and supporters across Canada. Their passion is contagious, and with your support, our potential for impact is endless. I hope the people, stories and ideas shared in these pages inspire you. Your support makes our impact possible and is an incredible investment in a bright economic future for communities in sub-Saharan Africa.
Boris Martin | CEO
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OUR UNIQUE INNOVATION MODEL EWB supports innovations that create dignity and opportunity for millions of people. We are working to foster an enabling environment where great ideas that serve the poor can come to life. EWB leaders are trained to be exceptional problem-solvers and ambitious innovators. We invest in the entrepreneurial and creative capacity of these leaders, enabling them to design and execute game-changing innovations. EWB supports what we call ventures—innovative ideas that have the potential to transform entire systems that perpetuate poverty by improving the wellbeing and livelihoods of millions of families. To support these ventures to succeed and scale, we take a four-pronged approach:
1. Early-stage capital investment We take the risks other investors aren’t willing to take. We provide patient, philanthropic capital investments between $10,000 and $100,000 annually for three to five years to social businesses with a high potential for social impact. We seek innovators focused on social change, ready to iterate on good ideas to land on the truly transformative ones. 2. Exceptional volunteers The most in-demand resource for early-stage social businesses is exceptional, highly committed talent—the people that will grow the enterprise to financial viability while providing social value. EWB has a tested and proven model of recruiting, training, motivating and enabling highly effective volunteers to place within our ventures. 3. Whole system approach EWB takes a whole-of-system approach to creating change. This means that we connect businesses to mentors and investors and create a collaborative learning environment between ventures, sector peers, and institutional partners. In doing so, we seek to maximize their opportunities for growth and synergy. The result will be a system-wide change that will enable social businesses to thrive across sub-Saharan Africa. 4. Patient support There are many organizations that offer intensive support to startups for short periods of time, often only a few weeks. EWB works with a venture over several years. We offer steady resources and strategic support over a longer period to enable ongoing innovation, progressive iteration and the consistency they need to remain focused on social impact. In the meantime, we focus on building their internal capacity, independence and ability to grow beyond our support.
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LISHABORA HYDROPONICS | KENYA Portfolio | Small & Growing Business Smallholder dairy farmers in Kenya generate 3% of Kenya’s GDP, but their path out of poverty is blocked by inadequate access to low-cost, high-quality feed for their cattle. LishaBora is developing hydroponic systems to produce nutritious fodder quickly, using very little space, water and fertilizers to serve these smallholder farmers. This feed is enabling dairy farmers to access consistent, affordable, highquality feed for their cattle. Customers are seeing substantial benefits: increasing yields by up to 25%; lower land usage; and lower feed costs compared to other readily available commercial products. This means that these farmers, mostly women, are able to grow their businesses (more cows, increased yields) and bring greater economic prosperity to their families and communities.
Our Impact u
Increases of 20-25% in milk yield while still providing a low cost input for farmers. u
Winner of Kenya Climate Innovation Center $20,000 grant to expand capacity and test new products.
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RENT-TO-OWN | ZAMBIA Portfolio | Small & Growing Business Thousands of smallholder farmers and shop owners in Zambia are unable to grow their businesses because they don’t have access to affordable and appropriate productive assets (like water pumps or deep freezer units). Others can gain access, but lack the skills and information they need to select the right equipment or technology to help their business grow. Rent-to-Own works to provide these entrepreneurs with productive assets and a holistic set of services that allow them to increase their productivity and margins—leading to higher income and increased employment in their community as their business grows.
Our Impact u
S old over 1,400 income-generating assets to date; since 2013 has supported business growth for 1,000 clients, impacting the lives of 5,200 people in rural Zambia. u
Increased income for clients by $1.4 million. On average clients receive benefits for three years, with an increase in income of $683/year. u
Achieved an overall repayment rate of 96%. Rent to Own Africa is supported by EWB and other partners, including AECF/AGRA.
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NUMIDA TECHNOLOGIES | UGANDA Portfolio | S mall & Growing Business Uganda’s estimated 450,000 micro, small and medium enterprises (MSMEs) generate 90% of the country’s private sector production and are its top job creators; but, without financing, they operate far below their potential. Since MSMEs are unable to convey their creditworthiness due to their lack of financial records, financial institutions spend significant time and money assessing prospective borrowers. They then pass on these costs to the borrowers in the form of high interest rates while also requiring high collateral. Loans become prohibitively expensive and inaccessible, depriving even creditworthy small businesses of the capital they need to grow. Numida has developed TrackApp, a mobile application aimed at unlocking financing for the millions of African small businesses who need it. TrackApp helps entrepreneurs build reliable financial records to improve their business decisions and demonstrate their creditworthiness to formal lenders. It makes financial record-keeping easy to share with lenders, decreasing barriers to getting a loan. It also helps financial institutions lower their risk and costs, ultimately leading to improved lending terms for their clients. TrackApp is currently being piloted in Kampala, Uganda.
Our Impact u
artnered with two financial institutions in Kampala that P have agreed to incorporate TrackApp data into their lending processes.
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onnected with over 1,000 entrepreneurs who have downloaded TrackApp, C converting about 7% of them to active users.
PHOTO CREDIT: ALANNA HOWELL
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FARMDRIVE | KENYA Portfolio | Small & Growing Business As of June 2016, EWB is supporting FarmDrive, a financial technology company in Kenya making strides to improve the livelihoods of smallholder farmers through innovative technology. FarmDrive harnesses the power of data analytics and mobile technology to aggregate and analyze information about smallholder farmers from traditional and alternative data points, including produce buyers, agricultural input dealers and the farmers themselves. Using this data, FarmDrive builds comprehensive, dynamic credit profiles that allow financial institutions to provide financial services, such as loans, to smallholder farmers. This tool will help bridge the $450-billion financing gap for smallholder farmers, whose businesses stagnate without access to credit, preventing them from offering more economic opportunities to their communities. For financial service providers, FarmDrive’s method minimizes the risk of lending to farmers. For farmers, it offers access to affordable credit through their mobile phones when they need it.
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VOTO MOBILE | GLOBAL Portfolio | Small & Growing Business VOTO Mobile’s mission is to increase participation, transparency and accountability in the services delivered to citizens in the developing world and to empower communities to drive positive social change. Using voice and text services through mobile phone technology, VOTO is overcoming traditional barriers of distance, language, literacy, access to infrastructure, bureaucracy, social roles, and power dynamics between the development sector and its beneficiaries. VOTO’s platform has allowed journalists to conduct surveys of government corruption, rural clinics to distribute maternal health education, policymakers to study vaccine supply chains, economic development organizations to reach out to farmers, urban planners to monitor water distribution access, and academics to research the effects of public health interventions.
Our Impact u
I n January 2016, VOTO surpassed 3 million unique users across 29 countries who have successfully interacted with their platform for initiatives related to health, education, governance, investigative journalism, agriculture and urban planning.
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sed by 500+ organizations, with 100% retention rate among major clients, U including a 4x increase in work with the World Bank and three repeat contracts with UNICEF.
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KWANGU-KWAKO | KENYA Portfolio | Small & Growing Business According to UN-Habitat, there are as many as 200 million people living in informal settlements in sub-Saharan Africa, growing by as much as five million people per year. Kwangu-Kwako builds safer homes for families in these informal settlements. This initiative manufactures pre-cast concrete panels locally and uses them to construct homes and community structures for informal settlements in Nairobi. These reinforced buildings improve the quality of life within these communities by staying cooler in the equatorial sun, being more secure, and, importantly, reducing the spread of fire, which helps to keep families and their possessions, investments and businesses safe. By using locally made materials, they also create economic opportunities for the residents of these settlements.
Our Impact u
Leveraged our support for an additional $88,000 in funding from FSD Africa and individual donors.
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WASH CATALYSTS | MALAWI Portfolio | G overnance & Sustainable Services EWB has invested in and worked with partners in Malawi’s water and sanitation sector since 2006. WASH Catalysts aims to shift the rural water and sanitation sector from projectized approaches to a service-delivery model, where services are delivered by permanent institutions, such as local government. WASH Catalysts provides opportunities for district water officers to innovate and improve on how they provide water and sanitation services to communities. For instance, through a new District Fellowship program, WASH Catalysts provides technical support to district offices to enable better service delivery, foster an open forum to share innovative approaches, and coordinate efforts of district-level and national stakeholders to improve water and sanitation services across the country.
Our Impact u
Since 2014, supported 11 of 28 district government water development offices and established a local network of sector innovators. u
Launched a joint national advocacy initiative between UNICEF and the Water and Environmental Sanitation Network to convene politicians, NGOs and bureaucrats at both the national and district levels to determine how resources for WASH service delivery can be funnelled more directly to local government offices.
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MINING SHARED VALUE | GLOBAL Portfolio | G overnance & Sustainable Services Mining Shared Value’s (MSV) mission is to increase the local procurement of goods and services related to global mining operations so that host countries gain more economic and social benefits. Local procurement epitomizes the positive role that the private sector can play in development. Purchases of local goods and services, like those supplied by local construction workers in Burkina Faso, create local jobs and income, transfer skills and technology, and help to create vital domestic business networks. MSV aims to accomplish its mission by acting as a resource, hub, and champion. MSV creates and compiles resources to help the mining sector develop and operationalize local procurement policies and procedures. It connects industry personnel and development practitioners to create a thriving community of practice. It also advocates for the inclusion of local procurement in company frameworks, industry standards, and government policies and programming both in Canada and abroad.
Our Impact u
In 2015, MSV became a founding member of the World Bank’s Extractives for Local Content Development Community of Practice, which connects the world’s leading experts and practitioners on local procurement and centralizes existing research and guidance on this issue.
PHOTO CREDIT: JEFF GEIPEL
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EWB FELLOWSHIPS In order to succeed, our ventures need exceptional, highly committed talent. EWB has a tested and proven model of recruiting, training and enabling passionate, committed and effective volunteers to meet this need. Every year, we recruit 20-25 volunteers for 12-month fellowships with our ventures. Fellows bring the skills, knowledge and capacity our ventures need to scale and become sustainable social enterprises. They work alongside ventures and other sector leaders to develop and execute initiatives that will contribute to a more thriving and sustainable world. I don’t have the words to describe just how critical Pierre’s support has been to Numida. Pierre’s accounting expertise has been a blessing... Numida wouldn’t be anywhere close to where it is without the three Fellows that EWB invested. - Catherine Denis, Numida Technologies speaking about Pierre-Gabriel Grégoire, EWB Fellow
My greatest achievement to date has been the construction of our second system, which is now feeding 30 cows. - David Lipinski, EWB Fellow, LishaBora Hydroponics
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ACCELERATE Over the next three years, EWB will raise $15 million to enable small and growing businesses across sub-Saharan Africa to thrive. To make this possible, we launched the Accelerate Campaign, an unprecedented fundraising effort to fuel our impact.
ACCELERATE CAMPAIGN GOAL: $15,000,000
40%
30%
18%
12%
$6,000,000
$4,550,000
$2,675,000
$1,775,000
Venture Seed Fund
Embedded Volunteer Fellowships
Technical Assistance, Strategic Support, and Sector Influence
Portfolio Management, Fundraising and Operations
ACTIVITIES 30 Social Impact Ventures Investing in individuals and their ideas will drive sustainable impact. Our portfolio managers support a set of ventures that together create important changes in agriculture, health and income generation through improved services and policy change. 100 Fellowships Volunteer placements provide much-needed human capital to enable ventures to scale their operations and accelerate their impact. A community of innovators in Africa EWB will identify and support local innovators by building a community of leaders in sub-Saharan Africa who are committed to promoting innovation and social change in their communities.
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BOARD OF DIRECTORS Shayne Smith, Chair Vice President - Government and International Relations TetraTech
Catherine Karakatsanis Chief Operating Officer Morrison Hershfield
Louis Dorval Co-founder & Chief Programs Officer VOTO Mobile
Mary Lynne Forestell Senior Director, IT Finance Bell Canada
Tim Brodhead Robert Ironside Senior Advisor Environmental Engineer Social Innovation Generation Ian Froude Frances Westley Past Venture Leader JW McConnell Chair Citizen AttachĂŠ in Social Innovation Miriam Hird-Younger University of Waterloo Past Venture Leader, AgEx Anita Lazurko Former University of Calgary chapter president, former Junior Fellow WASH Catalysts, Malawi Rasheeda Yehuza Founder, Tech Needs Girls
AMBASSADORS Rupert Duchesne Global Chief Executive AIMIA Catherine Karakatsanis Chief Operating Officer Morrison Hershfield
George Roter Head of Core Contributor Participation, Mozilla Co-Founder, EWB Don Thurston Philanthropist & Past Chair, EWB Board of Directors
David Wilkinson Provost and VicePresident (Academic) McMaster University
Don McMurtry Philanthropist & Entrepreneur
You can be part of the EWB story. Our community of supporters makes our impact possible. Your support is an investment in the people and ideas driving game-changing solutions to global development challenges.
Make a gift to EWB today! Invest in people who can create a thriving and sustainable world. Contact our Partnerships team at (416) 642-9165 to learn more.
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CONTACT US Engineers Without Borders Canada 365 Bloor Street East, Suite 2000, Toronto, Ontario, M4W 3L4 TF 1 (866) 481-3696 x242 | T (416) 642-9165 | www.ewb.ca | partner@ewb.ca