TRANSFORM impacts three million lives in Bangladesh
Tuesday, 10 October 2023
TRANSFORM, an impact accelerator that unites corporates, donors, investors and academics to support visionary enterprises, has announced a key milestone as research shows it has positively impacted over 10 million people across Africa and Asia, says a press release.
Led by Unilever, the UK's Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO) and EY, TRANSFORM advances the development of innovative business models through a combination of grant funding, business insight and research to help solve global challenges. Since its launch in 2015, TRANSFORM has supported over 100 projects in 17 countries.
More specifically, TRANSFORM is working with revolutionary businesses in Bangladesh. These include supporting Drink well, Refill Bangladesh and Bhumijo.
Drink well provides affordable, safe drinking water to people living without piped water in Bangladesh, using water ATM machines and pay-as-you-go prepayment cards. Refill Bangladesh designs and pilots a scalable refill station distribution model to counteract the problem of plastic pollution in Bangladesh caused by single-use sachets; and Bhumijo enables women and men in Dhaka to access safe, clean public toilets where over 2.5 million customers have benefited so far, alongside the creation of a dignified employment for a largely female workforce. TRANSFORM is now focused on accelerating its impact, with the ambitious goal of reaching an additional five million lives across the next two years.
In addition to the support given to the existing projects by entrepreneurs and researchers, it has announced support for 15 new enterprises since January, with each receiving a tailor-made combination of funding and business support.
One of the new projects in Bangladesh, the Digital Villages Programme, being led by BoPInc, will test the use of technology to support a network of women entrepreneurs who are distributing health products to remote micro-retailers in rural Bangladesh -- improving women's connectivity and access to impact products.