At the recent 2010 Skoll World Forum, one of the most passionate calls to action was made by Paul Farmer, charging social entrepreneurs around the world to come together to assist in rebuilding Haiti. Indeed, we are daily reminded that the direct damage wreaked by the earthquake is far less than the disruption of aftershocks rolling through a fragile economy. While we can hope that even more people heed Farmer’s rallying cry, it is interesting to look at how the concepts of social entrepreneurship are already being successfully applied to help rebuild Haiti.
From the side of innovation and technology development, inventive designs have been applied to both power delivery systems and easy housing solutions. A piece at Change.org has recently highlighted one entrepreneur who has made a suitcase-sized solar generator for use to power small devices and lighting. This is particularly a problem in many countries where central power supplies are unreliable or demand is too great for suppliers to provide on the existing infrastructure. Unfortunately, this leads to horrifying tales of hospital blackouts where surgeries are abandoned mid-way, or conducted in the dark, due to power loss (watch the remarkable TED talk by Patrick Awuah). The second innovation is an easily transportable, cheap, and durable housing unit that was developed by Rafael Smith, an Unreasonable Institute fellowship recipient. The shelter is easily collapsed for shipment to places experiencing natural disasters or political unrest, constructed of durable components, and raised off the ground to improve the sanitation and health for residents (see a nifty construction diagram and image of the “Uber” housing).
To increase the liquidity of resources and capital in an economy that has been severely damaged, we see principals from the microfinance sector being applied in new directions within Haiti. This includes partnerships between the non-profit microfinance institute Fonkoze, and MasterCard. Notably, Fonkoze’s expanded influence following the earthquake has also lead to the establishment of Zafen, a collaboration between Fonkoze, The Vincentian Family, DePaul University, and the Haitian Hometown Associations Resource Group. Zafen’s aim is to provide intrest free loans to enterprising Haitian individuals in order to assist in establishing and maintaining both non-profit and for-profit businesses that will improve nearby social circumstances. Intriguingly, while Zafen employs a model that is very similar to Kiva’s (empowering many people to make online contributions to fund microloans), it dodges a couple of contentious issues faced by Kiva’s critics. Namely, Zafen’s loans will be interest-free by acting in conjunction with its charitable organizations. Furthermore, Zafen’s loans are not pre-approved in the same manner as Kiva’s, which is to say that if a loan is not fully funded by online donors, the project will not be funded at all – therefore the selection of users on the site is more critical to determine the borrowers that will receive loans.
These efforts are but a couple of the many humanitarian approaches underway in Haiti right now. Have a favorite program, technology, or institution of your own? Share it below.
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May 14, 2010 at 2:59 pm
Fehmeen
You probably already know about Grameen Shakti’s initiative that sets up low-cost home solar power systems. They cost around $400 for a 50watt panel, which is enough to power some lights, a fridge, radio, TV, and charge a cell phone.
Then there’s the Q-drum project, which distributes ‘rollable water containers’ with which people living in arid areas of Africa can easily fetch up to 50 lt of water at a time from far off wells. http://www.qdrum.co.za/
I also have an interest in projects that enable the collection of potable water from dew and fog. I don’t have a particular name in mind, but this technology is pretty common now.
I love the idea of the make-shift home. Its use need not be limited to disaster prone areas, because there is plenty of shortage of stable/safe housing units in shanty towns and slums, and low-cost housing in villages in less developed countries.