SDG1 Archives | Tony Loyd

One Million New Change Creators, with Adam Force, Change Creator Magazine

September 25, 2017 Tony Loyd

Change Creator is a platform for motivated social entrepreneurs who are ready to create solutions to the world’s problems. What would it take to produce one million new change creators per year for the next 10 years? That’s the question that Adam Force, Amy Aitman, and Keisuke Kubota of Change Creator Magazine sat down to answer. The result of that question is a new strategy. Change Creator Magazine is a multimedia platform empowering forward-thinking change creators and established enterprises to drive social progress. Their mission centers around three of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). They focus on SDG 1, No Poverty; SDG 6, Clean Water and Sanitation; and SDG 7,…

Be Curious, Leap In and Learn with Paul Polak

May 1, 2017 Tony Loyd

Paul Polak is the founder of iDE. At the age of 80, he launched three new social enterprises. Paul was born in Czechoslovakia near Germany. In 1938, his family watched as refugees poured across the border. Paul says, “The conventional wisdom in 1938 was that Hitler was a joke and all this stuff would blow over. If you accepted that conventional wisdom, you’re no longer around to talk about it.” Paul’s father was willing to challenge the status quo. He moved his family to Canada in 1939. This lesson of challenging conventional thinking was an important life lesson for Paul. One key to his success is, he is willing to leap…

Miller Center for Social Entrepreneurship, Executive Director Thane Kreiner

151, Thane Kreiner, Miller Center for Social Entrepreneurship 20th Anniversary

February 1, 2017 Tony Loyd

The Miller Center for Social Entrepreneurship accelerates the growth of social enterprises who serve the poor and protect the planet. The Miller Center for Social Entrepreneurship is about 40 miles south of the world’s most fertile entrepreneur ecosystems, Silicon Valley. Located within Santa Clara University, they have a rich heritage as part of the Jesuit tradition. These two factors give them a unique perspective on how the best practices of rapid business growth can be applied to some of the most pressing issues of our day. Through their Global Social Benefit Institute (GSBI), the Miller Center has worked with over 600 social entrepreneurs in 65 countries. Thane Kreiner, Executive Director…

Ken Oloo is working to end youth unemployment

150, Ken Oloo, Filamujuani | Using Film to Fight Youth Unemployment

January 29, 2017 Tony Loyd

Ken Oloo works to end youth unemployment for young people from informal housing such Kibera in Nairobi, Kenya. Ken Oloo grew up surrounded by abject poverty. And yet, he was ambitious. At an early age, he vowed that by the time he was 25 years-old, he would be on the cover of Fortune or Time magazines. When he was nine years-old, he began to use his father’s camera to take pictures. Soon, he met other photographers who taught him the craft of photography and film. After high school, Ken took up photography full time, earning money by filming weddings and events. As he tried to escape from poverty, he took…

African Entrepreneur Collective, Sara Leedom

149, Sara Leedom, African Entrepreneur Collective | The Real Job Creators: African Entrepreneurs

January 22, 2017 Tony Loyd

African Entrepreneur Collective builds the capacity of African entrepreneurs to create jobs. Sara Leedom has a history of working in the social justice space in the US and in India. She worked on affordable housing for people with HIV. She worked on teen pregnancy prevention. She worked on education equity. In 2012, Sara and a friend, Julienne Oyler were traveling through Mali. As they got to know their tour guide, he revealed that he wanted to launch a company. At the time, Mali was experiencing political turmoil. The country was under trade sanctions from France. To make matters worse, the country was experiencing a severe drought. The entrepreneur acknowledged the…

Unlocking the value of the Moringa Tree with Kwami Williams of MoringaConnect

148, Kwami Williams, MoringaConnect | Unlocking the Value of Moringa to End Poverty

January 16, 2017 Tony Loyd

MoringaConnect connects smallholder farmers and consumers with the value of Moringa. This month on Social Entrepreneur, we’re focusing on Sustainable Development Goal 1, No Poverty. Around the world, there are people and programs working to help the poor to permanently overcome persistent poverty. Some programs work better than others. One factor that helps determine the success of poverty elimination programs is a systems approach, with consistent application over time. In order to do that, there needs to be a steady source of funding. According to the World Bank, in Sub-Saharan Africa there are 389 million people living on less than two dollars per day. Most of these are rural poor,…

Break the cycle of poverty with Okocha Nkem

147, Okocha Nkem, Mamamoni | Empower Women to Break the Cycle of Poverty

January 9, 2017 Tony Loyd

Mamamoni is a social enterprise that empowers women to break the cycle of poverty with free vocational skills and mobile loans. When Okocha Nkem was a child in Lagos, Nigeria, her father died. Because her mother had no marketable skills and no access to finance, the family was stuck in a cycle of poverty. When a family friend visited them, and saw their condition, he took pity and gave Nkem’s mother a small amount of money. Instead of using the money to buy much-needed food and school fees, Nkem’s mother took the money and traveled to a far off-village where she bought vegetables. She brought them back to Lagos and…

No Poverty, Sustainable Development Goal 1

January 2, 2017 Tony Loyd

Sustainable Development Goal 1 is to end poverty in all its forms, everywhere. Disrupt Poverty from Tony Loyd on Vimeo. On the podcast Social Entrepreneur, you meet changemakers who are ending poverty in all its forms, everywhere. These social entrepreneurs are facing difficult circumstances. And yet, they’re having a massive impact. In January, we will be highlighting some of these changemakers. To set the context, here are a few facts about poverty: The international poverty line is defined at $1.90 or less per person per day. Sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia account for about 80% of the extremely poor. Poverty is relative to one’s context. Because the cost of living…

146, Gayathri Vasudevan, LabourNet | Sustainable Livelihoods through Education, Employment and Entrepreneurship

January 2, 2017 Tony Loyd

LabourNet is a social enterprise that enables sustainable livelihoods by bridging the gap between education, employment and entrepreneurship. Gayathri Vasudevan worked in crisis situations. She provided humanitarian aid during a riot. She provided aid in the aftermath of an earthquake. But she found the work depressing. “I wanted to do more solutioning,” she told me. After completing her PhD, she worked for the United Nations, International Labor Organization for eight years. There, she saw a disconnect between the policies she was helping to draft and the results on the ground. She remarked, “In India, we’re very good at white papers. We can write very well. We define everything well. But…

Ted Barber of Prosperity Candle creates opportunities for women

145, Ted Barber, Prosperity Candle | Opportunities for Women to End Poverty

December 30, 2016 Tony Loyd

Prosperity Candle is creating opportunities for women to end poverty. Can a meeting over coffee and cannoli change the world? For two years Ted Barber and Amber Chand met once every few weeks in a café in Northampton, Massachusetts, trying to come up with a way to end poverty. Both were busy working around the world, so they knew something about the conditions on the ground. Over these two years, they began to narrow in on their criteria for success. They wanted to work in post-conflict zones. They wanted to work with women, because, as Ted told me, “Dollar-for-dollar, investments in women result in greater change over time, than [investments]…