We Have Ten Years Left To Meet the SDG Deadline
Four recommendations for my colleagues in the sustainable development sector on the vital role of local, invention-based enterprises
By Carol Dahl, Executive Director, The Lemelson Foundation
By any standard, 2020 has been a landmark year of disruption. For the development community, this disruption occurs at the beginning of the final decade to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), our shared blueprint to improve the lives and livelihoods of the most vulnerable and protect our planet.
Although the world has made considerable progress in areas such as maternal and child health, it has lagged behind in others such as food security and climate change. Low and Middle Income Countries (LMICs) still have the furthest to go over the next decade, even before COVID-19 threatened setbacks for health systems, education and economic stability.
Adversity prompts us to challenge previous assumptions of what’s working. Innovation works during a time of crisis, as we’ve seen with the rush to find new ways to develop and manufacture personal protective equipment (PPE) and ventilators, as well as search for a vaccine. What has been laid bare is the lack of resilience in our ability to respond and the over-dependence on our global supply chains. This has been a wake-up call for all, regardless of geography.
My experiences in fields of science and technology, global health and improving social and economic opportunity in LMICs have provided a number of perspectives on sustainable development. As we look to recover globally from the human and economic devastation caused by COVID-19, I believe four priorities are critical in enabling us to collectively deliver on the SDGs in LMICs over the next 10 years:
1. Embrace for-profit models. High-impact, scalable solutions cannot be sustainable relying on grants, donations and/or government subsidy programs. Small and growing businesses (SGBs) that are engaged in research and development of new physical products — Invention-Based Enterprises (IBEs) — have already shown promise in addressing key challenges related to health, food production and energy access.
These businesses foster economic development by creating robust, formal-sector employment opportunities and strengthening local supply chains, while creating needed products. IBEs are part of Africa’s growing knowledge economy and have the potential to produce higher wages and more stability than micro and informal sectors, which will not be able to absorb the youth bulge seen in many LMICs, especially those on the African continent. New businesses beget more business — creating exponential job opportunities and fostering a commitment to local growth. And finally, founders of successful enterprises become a critical cornerstone and resource to building vibrant and productive entrepreneurial ecosystems.
2. Recognize novel physical products built for the local context are essential to addressing the SDGs. New devices are critical to improving health diagnostics and treatments, increasing agricultural productivity and providing reliable and sustainable energy. These technologies need to be affordable, long lasting and robust enough to endure conditions found in low-resource settings such as heat, dust and unreliable power. Delivering physical solutions at scale often takes more time and money than software and purely business process innovations due to the need for prototyping, iteration and manufacturing. But they can yield essential sustainable interventions in the long run, while building economic benefits for local communities.
3. Prioritize support for local innovators. By this, I mean supporting inventors and innovators who are born and raised in LMICs. The sector has historically relied heavily on global philanthropy, nonprofits, NGOs and government initiatives for the development and distribution of new products and services, mostly driven by innovators who were born or reside outside LMICs. This existing talent and research infrastructure is often easier to fund, but it ignores the fact that local inventors and entrepreneurs are often best equipped to recognize and develop the solutions that will have a sustainable social and economic impact.
4. Invest in the ecosystem. Investing in local solutions can be tougher at first, but the pipeline of innovation can be dramatically increased if there is investment in local ecosystems. For innovators to succeed, there needs to be a supportive system of business enablers and entrepreneur support organizations. This includes everything from R&D translation and physical facilities to technical talent development, mentorship, and finance and policy support. Investment in this ecosystem to create a collaborative infrastructure, and mechanisms for appropriate types of funding and support at different stages of development will enable a larger pool of innovators to succeed — and ultimately multiply the creative solutions available.
Two companies, one in India and the other in Kenya, highlight these principles, as well as the benefits of fostering local innovation — benefits that became apparent as they stepped in to solve pandemic-related challenges.
Biosense — From anemia to COVID testing
The company Biosense in India was hatched in an Indian college dorm by medical students who wanted to solve one specific problem they witnessed — the widespread issue of undiagnosed anemia. It leads to a cycle of compromised health for women and developmental challenges for children. They created an inexpensive, needle-free diagnostic tool to detect anemia in low-resource settings, particularly in rural clinics. This success led to the development of additional diagnostic tools for other endemic diseases and chronic conditions, and profitable growth for the company. Last year Biosense was acquired by Indian company Tulip Diagnostics.
During COVID-19, Biosense was able to rapidly pivot when there was a shortage of nasal and oral swaps for testing. It already had the resources, the factories, the labor and raw materials in place. It was able to solve the supply chain problem by setting up an end-to-end production line in three weeks, along with getting regulatory approval from the Indian Council of Medical Research. Since the pandemic, about one out of three tests conducted in India were done on a Biosense swab.
But Biosense might not have existed without a supportive ecosystem and funding partners to provide access to working capital and technical assistance. The young startup received early incubation from
Villgro, India’s oldest and foremost social enterprise incubator. It brought a powerful mix of local mentorship and non-financial support to help it develop its first prototype and make its first sale. Financial assistance also came from The Lemelson Foundation and the social impact investment firm Menterra to help the company develop and scale its model.
Read a Q&A with Biosense co-founder Abhishek Sen here.
Hewatele — Local oxygen source for COVID patients
Hewatele, a locally grown startup in Nairobi, is another example of a company in the right place at the right time. It was created to address challenges in distributing oxygen in low-resource settings where specialized care and equipment like ventilators are scarce. Swahili for “plentiful of air,” Hewatele uses innovative technology adapted to local conditions, addresses high-delivery costs through a deposit model for their oxygen cylinders and employs a bottled milk delivery model for last mile delivery.
The need for oxygen only became more acute during COVID-19, and Hewatele was well placed to deliver and scale their product and services. The company has also collaborated with Rice University’s global health program, Rice360, to tackle the problem of PPE shortages by developing and deploying a decontamination chamber in Nairobi using UVC emitted through specialized bulbs to disinfect and recycle N95 masks.
In October, Hewatele received the inaugural Rotman Innovation of the Year Award from Grand Challenges Canada, recognizing it as an initiative they’ve supported that had the largest sustainable increase in lives saved or lives improved over the past year.
Read a Q&A with Hewatele CEO Dr. Steve Adudans here.
Partners like Villgro Kenya, which was spun off from Villgro to support local solutions to Africa’s toughest health challenges, played an important advisory role for Hewatele and other young companies. Early in the pandemic, it put out a call for innovations from the East African ecosystem, and is funding the most promising COVID-19 response solutions for rapid production and deployment. Villgro Kenya has relaunched as Villgro Africa, taking a more comprehensive and integrated approach to supporting local IBEs addressing the full range of development challenges across the continent.
As we embark on this next decade of sustainable development looking toward the SDG 2030 goals, we need to employ every tool in the toolbox. For-profit, IBEs can unleash the talent, intellect and capacity in the countries most affected, and are most suited to provide local solutions to our global challenges. And as new challenges like COVID-19 emerge, we’ve seen the importance of local IBEs to adapt and fill important needs and supply chain gaps.
But these businesses would not have been there without the direct support and strengthening of the surrounding ecosystem that allowed them to grow and provide impact at scale. To realize the potential of local innovation, there also needs to be an entire ecosystem of business enablers and entrepreneur support organizations like Villgro and Villgro Africa to address the needs of invention-based SGBs.
By investing in this infrastructure now, we will be ready to tackle both today’s challenges and the unknown challenges of tomorrow.
