Tanzania and kenya

Moyo safaris, 

Tanzania airport Kilimanjaro   serengeti.. worlds largest crater...

Entamanu lodge

Explorer lodge serengeti 

.

Hampta Pass

Between river, mountains and green land, it is amazing trek. This is close to Manali and can be done frm there via India hikes or other trekking entities. Cherries, beas river....

Campsites nearby to river banks and beautiful mesmerizing views.  

Universal camper

Kullu valley laho valley

5 days trek for those who hv stamina and endurance to stay put

Chitkul Rakcham

I had been to Chitkul the last village of India bordering Tibet. Though I had severe cold and cough, I somehow managed to hop on a local cab and travel to Chitkul frm Kinnaur. It was an amazing place but the travel to Kinnaur frm Shimla is tiring bcz of narrow road and slow speed travel. But worth travelling smone wants to go to Spiti valley from this side of Himachal Pradesh 

Better Use Water!!

Train travels have always excited me for the very element of surprise. One can never imagine what you can come across on these journeys. In the good old days when there wasn’t enough facility available to fly to places in short durations, these wagons used to carry people of sorts - all embarking on their own trips, yet connecting on the journey.

For me one such journey was really memorable. While boarding the train from New Delhi, an old lady occupied the berth next to mine. While the train started pulling out of the station, we greeted each other and the conversation started. At her age, it was amazing to find out that she is a solo traveller who has covered high altitude peaks in the Himalayas like Mount Kailash, Om Parvat and likes all by herself including other geographies of India – like the rainwater forests in Assam. For a 73-year-old, one would imagine the definition of the ultimate life is one of peace and comfort. Prabha Gogate however, is an ardent traveller and a very enthusiastic person. But what was more interesting that I found later in our conversation was that while many only talk about it, how sincerely conscious she was about leading her life in a healthy and sustainable manner, not only for herself, but for the community as well.  

India is facing a water crisis and by 2025 it is estimated that India's population will be suffering from severe water scarcity. When the whole world is posting updates on Facebook and sharing articles on how to save water, Prabha is one of those few who have been practicing better utilization of water, and saving it for over a decade now.  She prefers to recycle water.  She shared with me how she has been making use of Grey water treatment in her colony.

Greywater is commonly defined as wastewater generated from bathroom, laundry and kitchen. Greywater treatment process varies from simple devices that divert greywater for direct application such as irrigation to complex systems involving sedimentation tanks, filters, bioreactors, pumps and disinfection systems. While rainwater harvesting and Integrated Water Resource Management (IWRM) are water conservation measures, reuse of water is an important undeveloped technology. Reuse of water is important because it restricts water demand and reduces stress on treatment system. Specifically, greywater recycle augments existing water use efficiency.

The amount and quality of greywater will in part determine how it can be reused. Irrigation and toilet flushing are two common uses, but nearly any non-contact use is a possibility. Toilet flushing can be done either by direct bucketing or by pumping treated greywater to an overhead tank connected by suitable piping to the toilets. Floor cleaning, gardening, car washing and construction are some other areas where this water can be used judiciously.

The treated greywater can also be used for irrigating agricultural crops and turfs and for maintaining decorative fountains or landscape impoundments. Agricultural irrigation using greywater to support crop production is a well-established practice in arid and semiarid regions. This is the area where Prabha concentrated her efforts.

She started a recycling project in her Salunke Vihar building, where she collects kitchen wastewater from eight flats, accumulating the water into a 500-litre capacity tank in the building's backyard. She has combined the pipes of eight households together, so that the kitchen waste collects directly into the tank. The water is then treated with a chemical, which acts as a strong clearing agent and kills the water-borne germs effectively. One pack of the chemical every three months is enough for her tank's capacity.      

             

The processed water is then fed to varieties of plants maintained by Gogate in her garden - from Arabian banana and chikoo trees to magnificent floras like the jeevanjot, hibiscus, snow tub, madhavi champa and night-flowering jasmines. It was her love for plants and gardening that moved her to begin the project in the first place. The water is treated properly, so it doesn't even produce bad odour.

But paths of altruism are never smooth and success stories are incomplete without difficulties. Some of her neighbours , she says, were unsupportive and often mocked her initiative. They complained about foul smell, mosquitoes and charged her for using clean water for the plants. They completely refused to believe that she recycled the kitchen waste generated from their households. Nevertheless, Gogate handled the difficulties and the criticisms coming her way with patience and gentleness. Her hard work eventually found appreciation though. Many people visit her every morning for tulsi leaves or some fruits and she never lets them down.

In water scarce developing countries, greywater reuse in schools, hospitals and government institutions is proving to be an essential alternate water resource to fresh ground, surface or rainwater supplies.

Measured Steps To Social Impact

The 18^th December, 2014 tweet chat by Doers’ Labs focused on identifying the main steps to measuring social impact, and the finer points of each step.  But the first question that organizations often ask themselves is, “why is measurement important?”  One participant in the tweet chat posed this  question provocatively, asking whether measurement is really important for for-profit social enterprises or only to donors and impact investors.  There are many reasons that measurement is important, for both for-profit social enterprises and non-profit organizations.  The reasons offered during the chat were concentrated on the importance of measurement to testing an organization’s assumptions of what it needs to do to reach its goals (create impact), and consequently providing the basis for short and long-term decision-making.

The main steps to measuring social impact are formulating: 1) a logic model, 2) assumptions, 3) indicators and 4) tools.  A logic model defines the end goal (impact) that an organization wants to create, its intermediate goals (outcomes) and links them to what it does through a chain of results.  While an organization’s end goal should be less flexible than its activities, often unfortunately it’s the other way around.

The assumptions in your logic model are what an organization’s measurement system should test.  These assumptions will often lead an organization to the questions it wants its measurement system to answer.  It is good practice to also identify the decisions that will follow from answering each question, for an organization to ensure that its measurement system is providing data that will be used. 

All too many times discussions of measurement begin with indicators.  However, organizations that hesitate to state impacts that are difficult to measure forget that what you can measure evolves over time.  An organization may choose to start by measuring outcomes, and as its knowledge and resources increase include impacts at a later stage.  Nevertheless, it is important that the logic model articulates a complete chain of results, to keep the organization headed in the right direction.

In addition, indicators are only one part of a measurement system, and are only useful in so far as they help an organization answer the questions that it identified in the previous step.  The tweet chat included a conversation on how rubrics can be used to turn qualitative data into quantitative indicators, to measure phenomena like social autonomy and empowerment.  However, the greatest power of qualitative data is probably in its ability to help an organization understand why change has or has not happened.  The usefulness of indicators is limited to understanding whether change has happened or not.  Therefore, identifying questions that go beyond indicators is critical.          

There was widespread agreement during the tweet chat that unless an organization goes through the steps above, it is unlikely to be able to design effective tools to collect data.  However, once an organization goes through the above steps, there are technologies available to help it design and administer tools to collect data.  Uniphore, Social Cops and Vera Solutions were some of the companies mentioned during the tweet chat who enable organizations to collect, visualize and disseminate data.  Finally, it was suggested that the “next practice” for organizations that have robust measurement systems would be to use this data to create social impact models much as is done in the field of economics. 

Importance of Fair work place?

If I narrate you story of an interview where the candidate negotiated hard for incremental compensation and higher incentive, what would be your first impression? What would be your assumption of this candidate’s gender, nature and working style? Or consider yourself on the panel of promotion board and you have to make a choice between a man and a pregnant woman, who would be your preferred candidate for promotion? These situations are not hypothetical neither uncommon, we witness many such events in a day-to-day working life. A recent survey undertaken, by International Center for Research on Women (ICRW) states, around two in five men in India – nearly 40.7% held rigid and discriminatory gender views. This segment believes women to be inferior. 

Now don’t be very worried if your answers in both the above situations were ‘male’. These are the result of the unconscious biases that we all have, which have been deep-rooted through our culture, people at homes, educational institutions and now workplaces. Everyone has biases... but this statement should not make you complacent, and let you justify in accepting it as a norm and continuing to live with it. It is important that you become more aware of these biases and be ready to challenge them in self as well as in others.

Our workforce demographics are changing, and as per one of the reports on gender mix in education in India, almost 47% of the total graduates, 48% of engineers, and 40% of MBAs are women. However, as per Oxfam’s report this year, India ranks second lowest in the Group of 20 (G20) economies when it comes to women’s participation in the workforce. It is above only Saudi Arabia, a country that does not even allow its women to drive.

This depressing figure doesn’t culminate just here, as per World Economic Forum (WEF) report from last year, India ranked 124 out of 136 nations in a tally comparing women’s economic participation. Embarrassingly, all the BRICS nations rank much higher than India. The 12 countries below India include countries riven by political instability, such as Pakistan, Egypt and Syria.

Observing all these startling, yet real data points, one is forced to ponder over reasons which are resulting in leaking pipeline, inhibiting women from establishing their position at the workplace and exploiting their own potential. Whilst, there are several social and economic factors that play an important role in augmenting or deteriorating progression and advancement of women. The environ of a workplace and the prevailing biases have an equal vital role to play in attracting, retaining, engaging and promoting women.

With the new Company’s Act coming into being, organizations are certainly forming policies, setting up internal committees but most seem to only tick the compliance, focused on ensuring how ‘men don’t get into trouble’ and how organizations can insulate themselves from potential complaints and negative publicity. However, this psyche in corporate India needs to change and they need to take up challenging programs for sensitizing employees about gender stereotypes and their unconscious biases that intercept in capitalizing advantages of diverse workforce and achieving greater participation of women at workplaces.

With more and more women acquiring higher education, and entering the workplace, it is imperative that organizations are well prepared to accept and include women and leverage their strength for collective advantages of people and business. Instead of teaching men or prescribing suggestive appropriate actions or conversations to them we need to make them understand the impact of their biases and insensitivities. They need to realize that sensitivity is not by exceptions, it is an expectation. The business case and imperatives of having more women in organizations have been illustrated several times in various reports, surveys, seminars and forums but now we need to take ‘affirmative actions’. We need to weed out the unconscious biases and preconceived notions about gender. We need to show respect and dignity as professionals. We need to appreciate and be conscious of people’s background, preferences, appearance, and ancestry.  The power of inclusion and specially gender is such that it can increase India’s GDP by more than a quarter if it can match male and female employment rates (according to a report by consulting firm Booz & Co.)

Translating the "Corporate Social Responsibilty" mandate on ground

While going through the CSR reporting in India, Survey Report 2013 by KPMG I stumbled upon a heading ‘Regulation drives reporting‘. This seems so true in the common scenario. The natural human behaviour is to react to a situation than to respond knowing fully well that it is the response that is going to achieve positive result vis-a-vis reaction. Can a CSR report generated out of reaction mitigate the risks that companies face due to social and environmental impact? I read an article where the writer had been asked to recommend 7 short reports (under 20 pages). We love reports which spare us the jargon and reflect the real picture.

 Why report at all? Yes its required due to the new section 135 in Companies Act but it’s just a part of the existing Financial Report and one can do the to the point reporting to meet the legal requirement. The companies worldwide have been doing CSR reporting without any legal binding simply because it enhances the returns from their CSR efforts. The impact of a CSR project can be enhanced if it is reviewed periodically by stakeholders. To do that we need to have a CSR policy that envisages active stakeholders’ engagement. The new CSR regulation also envisages the companies to initiate the process by creating a committee which puts together a well thought CSR strategy. In words of Sun Tzu, “Strategy without tactics is the slowest route to victory. Tactics without strategy is the noise before defeat.”  The corporate sector has realised that along with traditional functions like marketing, branding, R&D etc., CSR is also a viable component of their overall business objective. The current reporting as is observed in the CSR Reporting Survey by KPMG 2013 merely indicates that the company is performing its social responsibility. There is a room for improvement so that CSR projects provide substantial benefits to all stakeholders and the business. It’s a win-win situation where the CSR can enhance impact for the society and profits for the business.

At present the reporting is higher of the positives and low of the negatives. Generally, the financial statements indicate the inflows and outflows and net result. Similarly the CSR reports should be made to reflect the efforts versus impact. Currently he CSR projects by the businesses are standalone activities without any linkages to the value chain of the business and fail to indicate the impact of the business on the social and environmental issues. To sum up the CSR reporting should use lessons from the financial reporting to develop a CSR reporting system to inform the stakeholders and yield better connect.

Socially Yours

In the cyber-noise that is social media today, one can’t be blamed for wondering at the real value of trying to be heard out there in the midst of the world posting photographs of their school reunions, dinners, puppies, children, family get-togethers et al. 

However, recent numbers tell a compelling tale.

• Facebook is the most browsed social network on social media with a large base of 100 Million users, clearly it is not fading away anytime soon in India. More than 80% of those users access Facebook via their mobile phone.
• Total Twitter users in India are 33 Million and from this base 76% of users access it via their mobile phone.
•  LinkedIn has 26 Million India users, of the total 300+ Million users.
• Of the total chunk of 70 Million total users in Pinterest, 5.5 Million are from India.

(source: http://blog.digitalinsights.in/important-statistics-digital-and-social-media-users-in-india/05224987.html)

While the top brands on Facebook are dominated by the telecom industry, there is a very strong case for the social sector as well.

1. Monies: It is possible, without ANY expenditure, to run a hard hitting social campaign. Yes, even without resorting to buying digital media. This is important for cash-strapped social campaigns.
2. Honesty: Social media enables transparency and honesty like no other medium today.
3.  Immediacy: The response time on social media is very VERY fast. Almost instantaneous in the case of Twitter in particular.
4.  Reach: Time it right and post the right kind of localized matter and presto: you have a world-wide reach.
5.  Partners: With the right kind of content, you can reach out to partners who would be difficult to access outside of the virtual world. Tag them, follow them, play relevant content and watch the magic.   

These are only a handful of reasons why it makes sense to be on social media, in particular for anything social (forgive the pun) that you might be doing. I once ran a gender safety campaign single-handedly off social media and look at the kind of response it generated (without any media outreach or PR on my part).

Now that I have (hopefully) sold you on the “why”, let’s take a quick look at the “how”. This is fairly involved and like any other outreach, requires an understanding of basic principles of communication.

Just like any sustainable communication strategy, social media needs strong content. This does NOT mean inventing news when there is none, but feeding in interesting content in a strategic manner. The content life-cycle lies at the heart of any social media strategy worth its salt. The “offline” feeds into the online and back into the “offline” or real-world to create a self-sustaining cycle (see figure)

The key to social media success lies in engagement rather than just adding on likes and followers. And the key to that lies in how strong your content is and how well it is presented. Do you listen to your followers? Respond to them? Invite them to engage with you in a manner that is not lost in the sea of social media?

Think on it.

We’re always there if you want to take the discussion on social media further. Just join the doer’s lab on social media (22^nd January 2015). These labs are by and for practitioners and focus on practical tools and knowledge.

Creating a "culture of reflection"

Seven years ago, when I found myself actively involved with the social sector, I was deeply touched by the sheer number of interesting and passionate people I started meeting, all with a common goal of doing good. The reaction to the projects I worked on, the feedback from those who it touched made the whole shift from the corporate sector so totally worth it!

As I understood the sector better, and the process of running high impact social projects better, I realised that in so many cases, that the impact could have been so much more had it been captured well, gaps analysed and addressed to make the processes more efficient. In many cases, there is a strong "culture of doing" but an active "culture of reflection" is missing.

In one of the projects we at niiti were working on, where large scale rural livelihood initiatives have been deployed, we were amazed at the sheer scale of operations, the dedication of the staff and the commitment of the organisation for grassroots level change. Its admirable because bringing large scale change at the grassroots isn't the easiest thing. It takes a lot of hard work, unflinching commitment and selfless people to make it work.

But sometimes, "doing" can overwhelm and consume one so much that one forgets to pause to reflect. Given that almost all social sector projects are run rather frugally, determining from time to time whether processes can improved to make them more efficient may actually be more helpful in achieving the final mission.

Monitoring and evaluating (M&E) projects on a regular basis help bring in a "culture of reflection", and help identify gaps and inefficiencies in running operations, so that they can be improved or changed to achieve better results. This of course, is easier said than done. Often, to implement a good M&E design in an organisation requires change management strategies as a precursor. For, passionate grassroots workers may feel uncomfortable with the M&E team scrutinising their work, and may resist or rubbish the whole process in its entirety. These are legitimate concerns and absolutely need to be addressed. I recently chanced upon a wonderful site (http://www.unodc.org) where some examples of the right approach to bringing in this reflective culture through implementation of a good M&E process are.

Often, monitoring and evaluation as a task is thought of as an end tool to "measure" social impact. Yes, it definitely could have uses to measure social impact, but creating organisations that are open, adaptable and focussed on achieving  their social mission through processes that are most effective in a dynamic environment is a far greater output of having monitoring and evaluation programmes as an integral part of operations. 

Demystifying the Company Bill 2013 - Part 2

To create sustainable social impact, funding is important but often it is not directly proportionate to the depth of impact.  The Companies Bill, 2013 (Section 135 of the Indian Companies Act) makes it imperative for corporates in India to spend a portion of their profits on CSR (Corporate Social Responsibility). On Dec 19th, 2013, we initiated a conversation on twitter to discuss the various aspects of the law and how organisations can leverage this for creating lasting impact and execute this in the spirit that it was intended.

We have attempted to summarize the conversation that came up during the tweet chat in the form of two Q&As for ease of reading. The first one (posted here) is around the legal aspects of Section 135 of the Indian companies Act that was passed earlier this year. The one below outlines recommendations around choosing, monitoring, evaluating and reporting on CSR projects.

If you have any questions on the Bill that have not been covered here, or have a point of view to share on any aspect of doing business in a responsible manner and creating sustainable social impact, please write to us at info@niiticonsulting.com or leave a message on our twitter or facebook pages. 

Q1. Isn't it enough for us to measure how much money we’re spending, to know if we’re being effective or not?

 A1. In the social sector, it is not always the case that if you spend more money the amount of positive impact you create will increase.  Usually what people do with what they get – be it products, skills or a  sense of empowerment – determine the positive impacts/changes in their lives that they are able to realize.  You must measure these “things people do” and the impacts that they realize to know if you are being effective or not.

Q2. Isn't this something that can wait until the project is over?

A2. To know whether someone has realized a positive change in his/her life or not, you have to know what his/her situation was (the baseline) before your project began.  In turn, you need to have articulated what impacts you expect your project to create, and how, to know what baseline data to capture.  All of this should happen before the project begins.  In addition, regular monitoring during the life of the project will help you to detect problems early and make course corrections if necessary.  This requires you to know what to monitor, which again should be connected to the impacts you want to create.

Q3. What will a project evaluation tell us?

A3.Project monitoring will answer questions like, “What is the progress toward goals?”  “What are the short-term results (outcomes)?”

Q4. What will a project monitoring tell us?

A4. Project evaluation will answer questions like, “Why did these outcomes occur?” “What are the long-term results (impacts)?”  “What unanticipated results occurred?”  “What are the knock-on impacts?”  Some evaluation designs can also answer the question of whether the project caused the outcomes measured.

Q5. What are the steps to setting up an M&E system?

A5. The first step is to create a logic model that articulates what impacts you expect your project to create, and works backwards through your outcomes, outputs, activities and inputs.  The second step is to formulate indicators at all these levels: impacts, outcomes, outputs, activities and inputs.  The third step is to determine which indicators you will measure through monitoring, and which through evaluation.

Q 6. Isn't there a standard set of indicators we can just use?

A6. If your indicators are not relevant to the changes your project is trying to create, they will not tell you anything about whether you have been successful or not.  Therefore, it is very important that your indicators are directly relevant to your project.  However, once you have decided what you want to measure, standard indicators can sometimes be useful in telling you how to measure it.

Q 7. What is a good evaluation design?

A7.  A good design is one that is both feasible and is able to meet the requirements of the evaluation (in terms of what needs to be assessed, and the levels of statistical precision needed).  Some of the factors that determine feasibility are the time, data and resources available.  Without a control/comparison group, you will not be able to say definitively that any positive changes that have been measured were caused by your project and not by external factors.

Demystifying the Company Bill 2013 - Part 1

To create sustainable social impact, funding is important but often it is not directly proportionate to the depth of impact.  The Companies Bill, 2013 (Section 135 of the Indian Companies Act) makes it imperative for corporates in India to spend a portion of their profits on CSR (Corporate Social Responsibility). On Dec 19th, we initiated a conversation on twitter to discuss the various aspects of the law and how organisations can leverage this for creating lasting impact and execute this in the spirit that it was intended.

We have attempted to summarize the conversation that came up during the tweet chat in the form of two Q&As for ease of reading. The first one is around the legal aspects of Section 135 of the Indian companies Act that was passed earlier this year. The one to follow is around choosing, monitoring, evaluating and reporting on CSR projects.

If you have any questions on the Bill that have not been covered here, or have a point of view to share on any aspect of doing business in a responsible manner and creating sustainable social impact, please write to us at info@niiticonsulting.com or leave a message on our twitter or facebook pages. 

Q1.Which companies fall in the ambit of CSR under Sec 135 of Indian Companies Act?

A1.Sec 135 is applicable to listed public ltd companies having either of the following in a given financial year:

• net worth of INR 500 crore (INR 5 billion) or more

• turnover of INR 1,000 crore (INR 10 billion) or more

• net profit of INR 5 crore (INR 50 million) or more

Q2.What are mandatory requirements under the CSR Sec 135?

A2.The companies need to:

1.  Formulate a CSR committee

2. Assign responsibilities to the committee that include formulating the CSR policy for the company, proposing the means to achieve the targets and monitor from time to time

3. Company’s board to ensure that the committee comprises of atleast three directors and one of them should be an independent director

4. The Board’s report under sub-section (3) of section 134 (o) shall disclose  the composition of the CSR  Committee

5. Approve the CSR Policy for the company and disclose the contents of such Policy in its report and also place  it on the company's website, if any

6. Ensure that the activities as are included in Corporate Social Responsibility Policy of the company are undertaken by the company.

7. Attach to statements laid before a company in a general meeting, a report by its Board of Directors, which shall include the details about the policy developed and implemented by the company on corporate social responsibility initiatives taken during the year.

Q3. What are the responsibilities of the CSR committee?

A3. CSR committee shall

(a) Formulate and recommend to the board a CSR policy that shall indicate the activities to be undertaken by the company as specified in Schedule VII. Activities which may be included by companies in their CSR policy are activities relating to:

 (i) eradicating extreme hunger and poverty;

(ii) promotion of education;

(iii) promoting gender equality and empowering women;

(iv) reducing child mortality and improving maternal health;

(v) combating human immunodeficiency virus, acquired immune deficiency syndrome, malaria and other diseases;

(vi) ensuring environmental sustainability;

(vii) employment enhancing vocational skills;

(viii) social business projects;

(ix) contribution to the Prime Minister's National Relief Fund or any other fund set up by the Central Government or the State Governments for socio-economic development and relief and funds for the welfare of the Scheduled Castes, the Scheduled Tribes, other backward classes, minorities and women; and

(x) such other matters as may be prescribed

(b) Recommend the amount of expenditure to be incurred on the activities.

(c) Monitor the CSR policy of the company from time to time.

Q4.What is the prescribed amount to be spent on CSR activities in a year by the company?

A4. The Board shall make every endeavour to ensure that the company spends, in every financial year, at least two per cent of the average net profits of the company made during the three immediately preceding financial years, in pursuance of its CSR policy. For eg If the profits (profits before tax calculated as per Sec 198) of the company in the three preceding years are:

2010-11 – Rs.1000cr

 2011-12- Rs.1500cr

2012-13- Rs.2000cr

Then, CSR spend for the financial year 2013-14 should be at least 2% of (1000+1500+2000)/3 i.e. Rs.30cr.

Q5.What is the penalty for not spending the amounts for CSR activities as aforesaid?

A5.Sec 135 prescribes formulation of the CSR committee, amount to be spent by the company on CSR activities and inclusion of a report by its board of directors about the CSR policy developed and implemented by the company during the year in the statement of accounts presented by the company in its Annual General Meeting.

There are no direct penalties for not spending the moneys. However, non-inclusion of a report as aforesaid by the directors will attract penalties prescribed in Sec 134 which shall not be less than fifty thousand rupees but which may extend to twenty-five lakh rupees and every officer of the company who is in default shall be punishable with imprisonment for a term which may extend to three years or with fine which shall not be less than fifty thousand rupees but which may extend to five lakh rupees, or with both.

Q6.How is this beneficial for the companies?
A6. Although there are a few companies feeling governments have passed on its duties to businesses and neither want to be forced to spend on social initiatives nor are equipped to deal with the implementation of such a policy, there are numerous positives to this coin:

• Development of goodwill for capturing and sustaining markets. Therefore, CSR can be used as business strategy to reduce investment risks and maximize profits by taking all the key stakeholders into confidence
• Long-term gains as opposed to short term profits, which are the outcome of good CSR policies
• Environmental stability and sustainability – being an important resource for companies – is ensured
• Social stability
• With globalization, the negative aspects of businesses have been intensified, and exploitation is widespread – CSR policies may work to counter this effect
• Lastly, a successful company cannot exist in a society that fails, and therefore a company being a member of the society is required to contribute

Q7.Would donations to the PMRF or others be accepted as CSR activities?

A7.Contributions to the PMRF and such funds are included in the list of the activities that may be undertaken by the companies. However a CSR committee would highly underperform if the best option they prescribe in the CSR policy is to contribute to the fund. Project based investments, and not mere donations, which involve innovative social inventions/initiatives that factor in hazards, risks and vulnerabilities. Baselines surveys, social impact assessment and meticulous evaluation including documentation along with training and re orientation of the staff will help to contribute positively to the society.

Q7.Would donations to the PMRF or others be accepted as CSR activities?

A7.Contributions to the PMRF and such funds are included in the list of the activities that may be undertaken by the companies. However a CSR committee would highly underperform if the best option they prescribe in the CSR policy is to contribute to the fund. Project based investments, and not mere donations, which involve innovative social inventions/initiatives that factor in hazards, risks and vulnerabilities. Baselines surveys, social impact assessment and meticulous evaluation including documentation along with training and re orientation of the staff will help to contribute positively to the society.

Vayali - A social enterprise for conserving folklore

The frogs are croaking and filling in the silence of the night. The rain has just stopped, but one can still hear the occasional drops falling on the ground from high trees. I am sitting with a small group of musicians in a village in central Kerala. One of them manages to hook up a weak halogen lamp from a broken electric socket. A yellow pool of light creates an island in the darkness.

The musicians begin to open black canvas bags. They take out long bamboo sticks. Thick bamboo stems. A black leather case with steel clips clicks open. It reveals an array of neatly packed bamboo flutes in varying shapes and sizes. Slowly the band sets up their bamboo instruments.

The first instrument is a thick bamboo stem with a series of notches cut into it. A stick runs over the notches and a curious sound emerges. It mimics the frogs croaking. The other members join in with their instruments. The percussionists pick up the rhythm with their bamboo drums. A large hollow bamboo section has been filled with seeds. It's called the rain stick. The seeds fall from one end of the bamboo to the other and create the sound of falling rain. The flautists join in. Their eyes are closed and a tune, hauntingly beautiful manifests itself into the dark jungle that surrounds us.

Music. One of the 2 universal languages. A language that has the power to bridge cultures and bring people together. I have traveled to a small village named Arangottukara in Kerala. Someone had told me about the Vayali folklore group and their amazing bamboo band. So I have come to see whether we can create a small music video and take their music to a larger audience across the world. I do not speak their language, but we understand each other.

Most of the band members are daily wage earners. Carpenters, painters, odd jobs at construction etc. But those jobs are for the day. When the sun sets and night covers their village, they come back to their music. Back in their village, they are masters of the bamboo band and owners of a rich folk heritage.

The bamboo band's performance extends far into the night. There are many songs, many tunes and many stories. We end with a round of smiles. Black tea is served. I sit in silence and listen to the night. The frogs are still croaking, but the bamboo band's music continues to play in my head.

Vayali is a registered non-profit. It consists of a group of young people, engaged in preserving their folk roots. Please share their music far and wide and if possible invite the band for shows and performances. Know more about them by visiting their web-site: http://www.vayali.org

Green Traveling: How to Change the World

In every city there are multiple ways to recycle and live a sustainable existence. Businesses and individuals have been bombarded with toxic chemicals and non-biodegradable materials for so many years that many people don't realize how they're contributing to the pollution of our planet. With the help of a few organizations, it's becoming clearer what we can all do to help the growth of our planet. One industry in particular seems to be at the forefront of embracing the sustainable movement. Businesses within the travel industry have been innovating the green industry.

Most businesses in the travel industry understand that comfort and class means bringing part of the indoor outside. Natural light, solar heated swimming pools; high efficiency windows and outdoor entertainment areas are a few ways that businesses have been able to cut down their dependency on utility companies. At home, individuals are looking for ways to better utilize energy. There are all types of solar heating shingles that transform rooftops into solar energy generators. Many homeowners are remodeling to include sunrooms, skylights, big windows and energy-smart appliances.

Water is a precious resource on Earth. However there's so much waste that occurs because water waste is typical of the way that we build our homes and businesses. There are better ways to cut down on water waste. For one, you can install low flow toilets and showerheads. You can also use tank less water heaters. There are even better systems for reducing water waste for landscaping.

For example, the Palazzo Resort in Las Vegas has a drip irrigation system with moisture sensors that reduce the amount of water necessary to keep planets watered and happy. They also replaced parts of their outdoor areas with artificial turf grass. This has saved eight million gallons of water per year. The Palazzo was even named the “Most Eco Friendly Hotel in America”. 

The worldwide market for green materials continues to grow. It was at $116 billion just for this year and is expected to grow to $254 billion by 2020. However, there is a lot of work to be done in order to reach our worldwide goals. Sustainable facilities like the hotels and casinos found in Las Vegas continue to drive innovation. There are many areas that must go without water and other areas, which are overcome by landfill waste. By recycling, reducing waste and looking for sustainable options, we can reduce our carbon footprints every day and maintain this beautiful planet that we live on. It's imperative that we make the right decision for future generations and the survival of Earth.

Hippocampus Learning Centres: Shaping young minds in rural India.

In India, a large network of primary schools run by the government addresses the education needs of poor children in the 6-14 years age group. These schools have not been successful in delivering learning outcomes. Data from recent studies like ASER and others indicate that children by 4th grade do not meet the requirements of their class, with the gap widening alarmingly as they move into higher grades.

The problem begins at the early learning level.  According to a recent study by the World Bank, by the time poorer children in many countries reach school age, they are at a significant disadvantage in cognitive and social ability.  In India, a country with   200 million children in primary school, 50% of these children struggle with learning. This can be partly attributed to a lack of pre-school options for low-income people living in rural India which in return results in these children struggling at the primary school level and further leads to drop-outs and a low pass percentage at   the high school level.

A multitude of attempts (both through well-funded government programs and through high-impact NGO offerings) continue to be made to improve the situation. These range from teacher training to curriculum redesign but there is much to do still to create the desired impact.

Hippocampus Learning Centres (HLC) set up in 2010 attempts to address the learning crisis for rural children as well as provide livelihoods for local women.  Our Centres provide pre-school education services to the rural children at an affordable cost as well as provide training and employment opportunities to local women thus addressing two large societal needs- early learning and employment for women- through a financially sustainable and scalable model. HLC Centres are located in the heart of the villages making it easily accessible to all children.

As of June 2013, HLC has opened Kindergarten Centres in 104 villages in the two districts of Mandya and Davangere with plans to expand to more Districts in the coming years. We have trained and employed over 164 women from rural areas to teach at these centres, and have over 3000 students enrolled. The Kindergarten program is a full-day program targeted towards 3-6 year olds, has 3 levels of Pre-Kg, Lower KG and Upper KG. Besides early learning services, HLC also provides remedial programs in Math and English at the primary level.

We have seen demonstrable improvements in learning for the children, and are continuously updating our curriculum to maximize learning for our students.Our curriculum has been developed by individuals who specialize in the field of primary and pre-school education in India. Additionally, while preparing the curriculum we have taken into account factors such as our students' and teachers' backgrounds, focusing on aspects like language challenges, and seek to pro-actively address these factors. We also take into account the foundation necessary for our students to do well once they begin primary school. Our teachers who have been with us over the last 3 years are now stars in their communities and a strong role model to young girls.

HLC's goal goes beyond providing critical early education. It is also to make learning an enjoyable activity and build curiosity in young children to question and dream so that they will continue that approach to learning throughout their lives. 

To know more visit www.hlc.org.in  or email lilypaul@hippocampus.in

Daily Dump - re-imagining India’s relationship with waste

Bangalore’s exponentially growing population, with ever growing consumption needs, has created a stinking trash problem.  The problem is made worse by the all-too-common “not my problem” mindset that most of us have.  Most of us think if we just throw our waste far away someone else will deal with it-the government, rag pickers, municipality, etc. Waste management is a problem in our country which cannot alone be solved by municipal waste workers and the informal trash sector. It is time for each one of us to step up and start owning our waste.

An Indian family of four produces an average of 2.2 kilograms of waste per day. In a city of more than 10 million, that is a lot of trash!  What most people don’t know is that 60% of that waste is organic material (kitchen and garden waste), which can easily be composted into nutrient rich manure at home.  There is absolutely no reason for perfectly natural tomatoes, capsicum, and mango to go to the landfill where it combines with batteries, plastic bottles, and other mixed waste slowly poisoning the ground and water.  Even worse, garden waste like dried leaves and dead branches, which make great mulch for gardens, are commonly burned, releasing dangerous toxins into the atmosphere. 

Daily Dump, a social enterprise based out of Bangalore has come up with innovative and indigenous solutions to address how we treat our organic waste by teaching individuals to compost at home. Daily Dump’s terracotta composting units, make composting household organic waste easy, turning it to nutrient rich manure in about three months.  Additionally, Daily Dump sells large, community composting units that are ideal for schools, offices, and apartment buildings. 

Think you’re too busy to compost? Composting only takes about five minutes a day; about the same amount of time it takes to brush your teeth.  Afraid of smell or pests or don’t think you have space?  Daily Dump has created products to simply composting at home easily and produce no smell, minimize the risk of pests, and look beautiful in a garden or on a balcony.  They  provides service plans for new users to get started.  And, when you’re done, your compost can be mixed with soil to provide excellent nutrition for your plants, you can take it to your favourite park and dump it under a tree, or sell the compost back to Daily Dump.

Since 2006, the Daily Dump has successfully kept more than 10,000 kgs of organic waste out of landfills and that number is growing.  They are in the process of designing new and easier products that will hopefully help to spread the habit of composting across India bringing that number even higher. It is their hope that, by showing people how easy composting can be, they can  catalyze people to begin making small changes in their buying and throwing habits that will add up to a large, positive impact on Bangalore’s trash problem.

To  know more about Daily Dump or to buy their product contact Ponnam Bir, compostwali at dailydumpcompost@gmail.com or +919916426661 or visit www.dailydump.org

Masoom – Lighting Up Night Schools

Masoom is an NGO set up with a passion for establishing quality education in night schools, through its “Night School Transformation Programme”. Masoom began its intervention in the year 2006 with a research project supported by “Partners for Urban Knowledge Action and Research” (PUKAR). Having examined the conditions of night schools in Mumbai through this research, Nikita Ketkar founded Masoom in the year 2008.

Masoom's vision is to support youth “learn while they earn”, and mission is to enable night school students achieve their full potential through educational and policy support. Masoom’s model is the only comprehensive model being implemented in the history of night schools. Currently  they are working with 15 night schools in Mumbai, and will be expanding to 30 night schools in 2013-14.

Vocational guidance session

What are night schools?

Night schools are those that function in the evenings, catering to students who work during the day. Night schools are primarily attended by disadvantaged youth who have earlier had to drop out of school to take up jobs to financially support their families. However, they still nurture the desire to pursue their education – this is what brings them to night schools even after a long day at work. Night school students are typically in the age group of 15 to 25 years.

There are 210 night schools in the state of Maharashtra, out of which 150 are in Mumbai. Of the 20,000 youth that study in night schools all over Maharashtra, around 10,000 to 15,000 study in Mumbai night schools run by various trusts.

Challenges faced by night schools

Due to the lack of infrastructure and poor supervision, the quality of education in night schools is dismal, which leads to a high drop-out rate among students. Some of the hurdles are -

1. Night schools function for only 3 hours a day as compared to the 5-6 hours of day schools, but have the same syllabus to cover.
2. No Government policy recognizes or support night school education.
3. Most teachers work in day schools, and teach at night schools as a second job.
4. Shortage of funds for running the schools.
5. Low attendance despite continuous enrolment drives due to the numerous external challenges faced by night school students. 

The Masoom Intervention

Masoom has developed a three-pronged intervention model to improve the quality of education in night schools. Called the ‘Night School Transformation Programme’, this intervention has been designed to address the unique needs of night schools and provide them with the support they need to transform to high quality educational institutions.The Night School Transformation Programme includes:

1. Educational infrastructure building and support – Masoom provides access to critical educational infrastructure and resources. This includes textbooks and notebooks, nutrition, mobile science labs, audio-visual teaching aids, etc. For the schools with blind students, we also provide Braille learning tools.
2.  Capacity building – Masoom works closely with various stakeholders in the school like the trustees, headmasters, teachers, parents and non-teaching staff. Students have the opportunity to improve their employability skills through english conversation classes and computer courses. Through Masoom’s Career Cell, students receive vocational guidance, scholarships, placements, etc.
3.  Advocacy - Masoom works towards raising awareness and advocating amongst the public and key decision-makers about the urgent need of policy level changes to be made and implemented in favour of night schools.

Masoom Mobile science lab

Masoom teacher's residental training

    

The impact of Masoom’s intervention

1. Enrolment of out-of-school students increased from 5 to 100 between 2008 and 2012. Student outreach has increased from 60 students to almost 900 in 2012. 
2. SSC pass rate of students increased from 36% in 2008 to 72% in the Masoom supported night schools in the March 2013 SSC exam. Out of the current 15 schools, one achieved over 90% and two achieved 100% pass rate. 
3. Access to the Braille program has increased from 12 to 50 students. 
4. Over 100 teachers have been trained through various capacity building workshops conducted by Masoom. 

Future plans

In the coming year, Masoom will focus on the sustainable development of night schools through a strategic approach to school development. In the long term, they envisage replicating their model in other states in the country, to set up night schools where there are none.

To volunteer for enrolment drives, english conversation classes or to donate stationery, notebooks, etc. call 24713273/ 9167577131 or email nikita@masoomeducation.org