Archive for Bangladesh

Asia’s Social Changemakers: Samantha Morshed, founder Hathay Bunano (Bangladesh)

Samantha Morshed is the founder of the social enterprise Hathay Bunano in Bangladesh. Born in the UK and educated at Oxford Brookes in physics, Ms. Morshed’s interest in social enterprise started in 2004 with a basic question how do you create sustainable employment without debt or radical change in lifestyle for rural women?

In the Bangladesh slums, building leaders not extremists

We had previously reported about FYSE’s Paragon fellow Ejaj Ahmad, a young social entrepreneur who founded the Bangladesh Youth Leadership Centre. Alaka Dhara Halder, a graduate of the Bangladesh Youth Leadership Center and now a member of Princeton University’s Class of 2014, recently wrote about her experience in The Washington Post: The young rickshaw-puller had [...]

1st job center for slum dwellers in Bangladesh (the world?)

The the highly successful Dhaka Project is taking a bold step in 2010 by setting up the first job center for slum dwellers in Bangladesh (the world?). The Dhaka Project belives, that the cycle of poverty can only be broken if parents have enough income to sustain a meaningful lifestyle for them and their family. [...]

Adidas, Grameen ink MoU to make shoes in Bangladesh for world’s poor

German sporting goods giant Adidas has inked a Memorandum of Understanding with the Nobel laureate Muhammad Yunus’ Grameen to make low-cost shoes next year in Bangladesh for poor and barefoot of the world. Yunus, who was awarded the 2006 Nobel Peace Prize for his development of micro-credits that benefit poor people, told Xinhua Wednesday, “Grameen [...]

Asia’s Social Changemakers: Faisal Islam – Bangladesh

In Bangladesh more then 70% rural farmers are illiterate and about 98% do not know any international language (like English). Beside that they have no access to ICT for fostering their entrepreneurship with better technology adaptation, building market channel and communication linkage. Inaccessibility to ICT and modern technology due to language and technical limitations are [...]

What can companies learn from social entrepreneurs?

I recently read a report about what companies can learn from SEs by Johanna Mair and Christian Seelos. The two researchers propose three models of collaboration (integrated, symbiotic, and complementary) that companies may use to formulate global strategies that will serve their own sustainable development needs while also serving society’s need for innovation. 1. Integrated [...]

Application deadline Asia Pacific Future 100!

7 days to go! Just a quick reminder that the application deadline for the Asia Pacific Future 100 program is approaching! 31st August 2009 Apply now and join the most outstanding community of young entrepreneurs and social Changemakers in Asia ! For info and applications: future100@fyse.org www.fyse.org

Asia’s Young Changemakers: Maria Conceicao (Bangladesh)

Inspiring interview in Gulfnews about Maria Conceicao, Founder of The Dhaka Project in Bangladesh: If you really commit, you can win. I come from a simple, traditional Portuguese family. Born in Lisbon, I dreamed about traveling the world and visiting new destinations. At 18, I decided to start working and my first job took me [...]

ClearlySo: Social Business in Bangladesh

ClearlySo highlighted in an recent article that there is a great opportunity in Bangladesh to reduce poverty the income generating activities of more than 20,000 NGOs can be mobilized into successful social businesses. The have highlighted some common threads and problems; some clear reasons why those 20,000 NGOs are not migrating into social businesses: commercial [...]

Barefoot and…Speaking up for Her Rights

In Bangladesh, there are now 11,400 reasons to treat poor rural women fairly. They are the fleet of ‘barefoot lawyers,’ working all over the country to educate citizens, particularly women, about their rights. Sharmin is a typical barefoot lawyer.  A shy woman in her 30’s, Sharmin was married at age 14, despite the fact that [...]