We find that social businesses and social intrapreneurs make for pretty inspiring reading. How about you?

Yunus Social Busines (YSB) and its sister organisation Zero Poverty Ventures are cooperating with Global Social Impact (GSI) and the Open Value Foundation, founded by María Ángeles, to bring expansion funding to high potential Social Businesses in East Africa.

How should we give? Along with the issue of how much, questioning the model into which we donate our money is becoming more and more pertinent in the modern age. As we seek to optimise the way we spend and invest our money, it’s not surprising that we are also looking to optimise the way we give. There is a scarcity in the philanthropic capital available - so it’s important that it is spent well.

Our Chief Investment Officer, Karen Hitschke, spoke to Gerd Hübner for Hauck & Aufhäuser Magazine about the investments we make with our philanthropic venture funds. Read the article in German below.

Networks exist in many forms and serve a vast array of different purposes. There’s the beautiful synergies in nature that allow humans and trees to breathe each other’s waste, and there’s the way that organisations function through a distributed network of interacting social animals. In all these examples, shared purpose and communication (of one type or another) are key.

People often talk about the food and water shortages in developing countries. But for some reason, worldwide access to medical care is an issue that’s not spoken about enough. No one should risk death because of a distribution problem in the medical industry but unfortunately this is the case.

The MAN Impact Accelerator #2 isn’t quite over yet and now is your chance to celebrate the journey and the closing of another successful batch.

We spoke to the founders of Godson Export Commodities, Godfrey and Marketing Director Anne Macharia to understand why they started the business and what they have learnt along the way. Godson Export Commodities collects, processes and exports chia, quinoa, and sesame grown by smallholder farmers in Uganda.

The ancient Greek philosopher Diogenes once famously noted that: “we have two ears and one tongue so that we would listen more and talk less“. The act of listening as a means of truly understanding an entrepreneur is an important skill when it comes to tackling the challenges they face.

Earlier this year we took a group of philanthropists and partners to visit some of the social businesses in our portfolio in Uganda including Godson Commodities, Impact Water & Tugende. We also visited Kenya to see some of our pipeline companies.

Yunus Social Business’s ‘Social Business Accelerators’ help corporates connect to exciting social entrepreneurs and engage their employees in unique mentoring experiences for social change.

Download the latest report to explore some of our highlights over the last year, including:

At the halfway point through the program we find ourselves sitting back and reflecting over the last five months. And what a fine journey of progress and development it’s been. We’ve seen our entrepreneurs learn and share all sorts from methodologies to frameworks to general advice about life and business.

Check out our new video telling the stories of rural farmers! They provide higher incomes and safe jobs for rural farmers in Colombia. They work in areas affected by armed conflict growing baby vegetables and edible flowers. 🌱 🌿 🥕🌷 🌹

At Yunus Social Business we are proud to support female entrepreneurs all over the world who are innovating to solve social problems in a sustainable way. The theme for International Women’s Day this year is “Think equal, build smart, innovate for change”, so we wanted to take some time to celebrate the women we work with who are doing just that!

India has an enormous population of 1.4 billion, within it there are a staggering amount of people who live rurally with no access to a reliable or regular electricity supply. Roughly a third of the planet’s electricity deficit is in India with only 82% of its inhabitants having access to electricity – meaning a total of 239 million people are left in darkness (as of 2016).

Along with The Center for Sustainable Finance and Private Wealth (CSP) at the University of Zurich went out and about around São Paulo at the start of February to explore the ecosystem of social businesses and investment. Take a look at our fantastic week in the video:

Tugende is a Social Business that helps mototaxi drivers double their incomes by owning their motorcycles. They have helped over 18,000 motorcycle taxi drivers with higher incomes, including the drivers’ families, that’s over 85,000 people.

So, here we are. The time for change and personal re-shaping through resolutions is upon us already. But this doesn’t just mean an opportunity for personal improvement, it also means a time for professional self-development too.

In this guest post, Ritu Soni Srivastava (https://ritu.io/mentorship-basics/) talks about her involvement as mentor of the MAN Impact Accelerator (our corporate innovation accelerator program) and the 3 things she would encourage every mentorship program to adopt.

Already in the crucial latter half of my 20s, I was seeking opportunities where I could accelerate the growth of my personal and professional capital more than my financial capital.

Financing and supporting early-stage businesses in Uganda is not an easy task. In this report with USAID we look at what we have learned from our portfolio over the last few years and how this helps to inform our investment criteria going forward.

The first week of this year's MAN Impact Accelerator launched at full throttle and our expectations were met and over-exceeded.

Impact Water have reached 1,000,000 children in Uganda with clean drinking water. And the best bit? They aren’t a charity but a pioneering social business.

In August we began scouting for the second round of the MAN Impact accelerator, searching for impact-driven and purpose-led startups in mobility and logistics.

With the recent accessibility of 360 cameras, many businesses and nonprofits are exploring the possibilities of virtual reality to communicate their message and we wanted to give it a go for ourselves!

As an entrepreneur, when your company gets to a certain stage the question of whether join an accelerator often arises.

Today, the world’s first Social Success Note or "SSN" is launched at the Skoll World Forum by Yunus Social Business, The Rockefeller Foundation, UBS Optimus Foundation and Impact Water.

We live in a world where giants like Uber and Amazon are disrupting logistics and pushing the boundaries between reality and science fiction.

YSB has joined forces with MAN Truck & Bus, a Munich-based manufacturer, to launch the ‘MAN Impact Accelerator’ and provide support to where it is needed the most.

The first exciting announcement for us this year at Davos was the release of UBS’s World Economic Forum white paper “5 ways wealth managers can support the UN Sustainable Development Goals: our lessons from 2017” documenting innovative solutions to solving inequality.

Over 9 million Ugandans lack access to safe drinking water, that equates to the entire population of London. Without access to clean water, it is estimated that 440 children still die every week due to waterborne diseases.

A growing number of companies around the world have launched social-business subsidiaries as part of an agenda to bring about positive change.

More than 40 million Brazilians live in housing that suffers from residual damp, mold, and poor ventilation, all factors that contribute to serious public health problems.

Our serial entrepreneur Gjergji is setting up a textile social business to create over 130 better paying jobs with exceptional working conditions for vulnerable women in Albania.

Do you want to know more about our CEO and Co-founder, Saskia Bruysten? She was recently interviewed on Social Business and her personal success story by the German newspaper Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung.

Malaria is one of the major health problems in Bangladesh. According to the WHO World Malaria Report 2009, 11 million people in Bangladesh are at risk of malaria.

While Bangladesh produces sufficient rice to nourish its people, diets often lack vital nutrients such as vitamins and minerals.

Fresh water is abundant in Bangladesh, in the form of numerous groundwater resources that are shallow and easy to exploit. However, for essentially geological reasons, almost all of the groundwater is contaminated with arsenic, very often at levels that make it a health hazard.

Unusual Pioneers is a platform for corporate leaders and social intrapreneurs turning business into a force for good. Established by Yunus Social Business, The World Economic Forum’s sister organisation, Schwab Foundation for Social Entrepreneurship, and Porticus.