$ 1 : 16
For every $1 of value invested, One Young World Ambassadors deliver $16 of social value, based on a Social Return on Investment analysis of 42 Ambassador-led initiatives addressing the 17 Sustainable Development Goals in 2022
SDG Impact Tracker
Interested in supporting impactful initiatives led by young leaders? Search this database of over 350 projects from the One Young World Community to find out more.
Puente Digital
Online access and skills have been able to transform lives, however, these opportunities are not equally available.In Colombia there is a need to invest heavily in the digital transformation as much of the population still lacks the necessary skills and education to prosper in an increasingly digitised economy (1).
Néstor Eduardo founded Fundación Puente Digital to make digital skills more accessible to groups that have been neglected so far. Fundación Puente Digital aims to inspire a new generation of digital leaders who can create change in their communities with technological solutions. Since 2018 Fundación Puente Digital has been operating in Colombia, in 2020 the foundation expanded its operations to México. Néstor Eduardo, with co-founders, the team, employees and volunteers, provides digital skills workshops to young people in rural areas. These workshops develop digital and soft skills by focussing on practical skills such as programming and robotics.
So far the foundation has provided this education to over 200 students, who have provided 20 unique digital initiatives. Puente Digital has also offered scholarship opportunities worth approximately 2.5 million pesos. In addition, the student volunteers who support the project as part of the organisation have been provided with workshops digital skills. This year Fundación Puente Digital is trying to establish partnerships in México to provide these workshops to students of rural public schools in Sierra Norte, Puebla, México.
ZNotes
Zubair founded ZNotes in 2014 as a blog to share IGCSE revision notes. Hundreds of thousands of students worldwide take the exact same exams and yet, the access to resources, advice, and support available for them varies drastically. Realizing this after his first set of international exams, 16-year-old Zubair did what he could do: set up a blog to share the resources he created for his own exams. Through word of mouth, these high-quality and concise revision notes were discovered by students all over the world, and ZNotes was born. Today, ZNotes has transformed into a global community-led learning platform with a mission to end educational inequality by providing free access to quality education and empowering young people in becoming global changemakers.
The notes are designed to be concise so students can get the complete content while accelerating their revision for exams. With over a hundred contributors, the growing international team of students leverages personal insights on examinations and collaborate to help others achieve their best results. The ZNotes Discord server also offers the space for students to engage in peer-to-peer learning with an active community of learners; answering and asking questions as well as receiving advice from other students from around the world.
ZNotes' mission to end education inequality has become even more critical with the exacerbation due to the COVID-19 pandemic. This has impacted learning outcomes for many students that have been preparing for their international examinations, as well as shedding light on the issues relating to unequal access to educational resources. Through their learning platform as well as live classes and podcast, ZNotes has reached over 3 million students from every country on this planet.
Itetero Iwacu Organization
Itetero Iwacu Organization - Rwanda
Joseph Dusabe
Ambassador-led Initiative
1:10
SROI
Malnutrition is a challenge that is proven to damage cognitive development which in the long term harms school and work performance (1). Joseph established Itetero Iwacu Organization in 2017 with peers at college in Kigali to help tackle these related global challenges.
Itetero Iwacu runs three main streams of impact. For education, it has launched the Itetero Bright Academy, which is a range of nursery and primary schools across the country. The organisation works with the government, model private schools, international educational organisations, and private providers to implement five aspects of its strategic plan: increasing access to both pre-school and primary education for vulnerable children, improving the quality of education through a competency-based and hands-on learning, incorporating basics coding skills and other innovative learning approaches, identifying and nurturing kids with special talents, and strengthening a spiritual and cultural education in order to help children enhance their social skills. The organisation also runs FOOEd, a nutrition programme to create school-feeding programmes that improve the school experience as well as inspiring the physical and intellectual growth of children. The team organises community workshops to teach pregnant women, mothers, and other interested community members on how to prepare a balanced diet using available foods in their households. Itetero Iwacu also partners with nutrition-related organisations to provide food supplements to malnourished children in the network.
The advocacy department of Itetero Iwacu Organisation helps children living with birth defects and NCDs to get effective healthcare. This also benefits parents living with NCDs. These efforts are powered by academy teachers and community health counsellors. The team runs SMILE AFRICA TV, a YouTube-based TV channel that broadcast to advocate for the rights of children in danger, spot children with talents to be nurtured, and provide a platform for kids to entertain their fellow kids and the online community in general. The channel also provides educational resources for kids around the world, connects kids with people who might be interested to sponsor their education, as well as fundraising the money to support vulnerable kids at risk.
OptionsMD
Morgan Hewett and Kyle Pierce founded Options MD in April 2020 after they watched a family member battle treatment-resistant depression. After watching him try medication after medication to no avail, they knew there had to be a better way.
30% of people with mental illnesses will not respond to conventional treatments (1). These patients are commonly referred to by the medical community as “treatment-resistant”. In order to alleviate their severe, debilitating depression, they often need cutting-edge treatments, which exist but are extremely difficult to access. On the other hand, cutting-edge treatment providers have difficulty finding the right patients to try the next generation of medications.
Options MD has developed a proprietary treatment and provider matching software to help Americans with treatment-resistant depression finally access treatments that work. Patients interact directly with the software, taking a short assessment and then being able to review personalized treatment and doctor recommendations.
They built a team of medical researchers from institutions like UPenn, Stony Brook University and UCLA as well as technologists from Linkedin and OptumRX. They've received investment from angels like CVS Health's former President and United Healthcare (through their Accelerator with Techstars), and have a waitlist of 1,700 patients with treatment-resistant depression that is growing at 30% MoM. They are currently testing and refining their MVP.
Hout Bay Volunteer EMS
Hout Bay Volunteer EMS - South Africa
Matthew Rosenburg
Ambassador-led Initiative
1:8
SROI
Hout Bay Volunteer Emergency Medical Service (HBVEMS) is Cape Towns oldest volunteer ambulance service. The organisation has been operational since 1994, but Matthew joined back in 2008 as a volunteer medic. In 2013, Matthew took on the role of CEO, managing the executive committee to ensure the smooth operations of the service.
HBVEMS and its volunteers are committed to improving the access to emergency healthcare and training community members in first aid. It achieves this by running an emergency ambulance over weekends and public holidays, in conjunction with the Western Cape Dept. of Health - Emergency Medical Service. The organisation targets geographically isolated communities in Hout Bay that have low rates of health insurance and a high disease burden. In the past 5 years, the organisation has responded to over 3,000 emergency medical incidents, and 95% of recipients of their service are significantly socio-economically disadvantaged. Each call attended to by the organisation's volunteers allows the provincial EMS ambulances to respond to other pending calls. Priority calls are responded to in an average time of 9 minutes, 61% of which are medical emergencies and 34% are responses to trauma. During the pandemic, volunteers have slightly reduced operations to minimise the risk of the spread of the virus. The ambulance was modified to ensure crew safety and so that it could stay operational, and thankfully trauma-related incidents reduced.
The organisation is also expanding its training and education programmes, to empower people to protect their peers and react in an emergency. Having trained 30 people in 2019 to administer first aid, this branch of operations was put on hold as a result of the pandemic. However, the organisation aims to reach an estimated 100 people per year once the Covid-19 restrictions relax.
Eye Care for All
The Gambia spends 42% less on healthcare per capita than other Sub-Saharan nations and 36.45% of healthcare costs are covered by external resources. Recognising the need to bridge the gap in funding access to healthcare in her country, Fatoumatta founded Eye Care for All.
Eye Care For All is a community-based organisation that provides free individualised home-based and community eye care services for the less privileged in society, including the elderly, refugees, people with disabilities, mentally challenged, orphans, and prisoners in The Gambia. Due to the exorbitant cost of eye treatments, the organisation has built a network to cover unaffordable costs of eye treatments, from surgery and medicine, to travel and other indirect expenses. The main treatments provided address glaucoma and cataracts, prevalent conditions which often go untreated. Another project includes the distribution of prescription glasses, donated to teachers via the Special Needs Unit at the Ministry of Education and community members. During Covid-19, the organisation has distributed 1,500 face masks to an overcrowded prison to protect 750 staff and inmates. Additionally, due to the closure of the referral Eye Hospital during the pandemic, Fatoumatta and her team have offered free online counselling and consultations. They have provided 380 free cataract surgeries for the elderly who were blind from cataract. One hundred cataracts were funded from the OFID's grant in 2019, one hundred and twenty-five cataracts were sponsored by Lifeline Pillars and House of Innocence Charity in 2020, thirty cataracts sponsored by ADRA Gambia in 2019 and the rest were sponsored by our volunteers and some Gambians who live in the diaspora.
Fatoumatta attended the One Young World 2018 Summit in The Hague as part of OFID's delegation. Recognised by the organisation, she was the recipient of a €5,000 grant to support the work of Eye Care For All. The team have also received crucial support from a charity based in the UK called ""Aidgambia - The Community Health Charity"" during the COVID-19 pandemic. Fatoumatta also leads Prospect for Girls providing vocational skills training and health education to vulnerable women and girls in The Gambia. In 2020, their project supporting women with disabilities was suspended due to the pandemic. Instead, they ran a sensitisation campaign in partnership with the US Embassy to raise awareness on the virus and how to prevent its transmission.
Lifeaz
In France, each year, over 50,000 people die prematurely from cardiac arrests. This, and the fact that 80% of out-of-hospital cardiac arrests occur in the home, inspired Johann to conceive the enterprise Lifeaz in 2015 (1). The premise is simple, to make defibrillators as commonplace as a fire extinguisher.
There are two main aspects to Lifeaz's work. The first has been the development of the first defibrillator designed for individuals, named 'Clark'. It is completely automated, selecting the correct therapy to be used without the need for the individual to make an informed decision. It comes with clear visual and vocal instructions for use and is lightweight and portable. Clark also has simple monitoring guidelines, a green light indicating all is well and a red light indicating an anomaly. It also automatically updates to receive the latest innovations. The second, and equally important, part of the programme has been education. Training in life-saving skills should be accessible to everyone, and Lifeaz has developed a programme inclusive of people regardless of their social category, age, or location. The Everyday Heroes app includes digital learning programmes to equip people with the knowledge and reflexes to act in an emergency. With support from partners, it also runs training in person.
In November 2020, Clark became available to the general public for purchase, having previously been in the workplaces of company partners since the end of 2019. After a long period of developing the programme and the product, it has managed to educate over 80,000 people. Additionally, Clark has been used to intervene in approximately 100 emergencies. As the product becomes more widely adopted by the general public in France and beyond, Lifeaz's impact will grow exponentially.
Salvando Latidos
Cardiovascular diseases remain the primary cause of death globally, making up 31% of all recorded fatalities per year (1). This shocking statistic highlights the vital importance of the work of Dr Carlos and Salvando Latidos AC.
The organisation was founded in 2018 founded by a group of health professionals who, concerned about public health problems coupled with the social context of Mexico, set out to create an altruistic, non-profit platform to prevent, diagnose, care and rehabilitate people at-risk or suffering from cardiovascular diseases. Dr Carlos joined the organisation in November 2018 as General Director.
The initial focus of Salvando Latidos was to provide basic medical training, most notably CPR training, to make people better aware of the danger of heart conditions and better equipped to intervene in an emergency. However, with Carlos' support, the organisation scaled its fundraising capabilities to expand its operations and the scale of its impact. Salvandos is now one of the most recognised Cardiovascular NGOs in Mexico. An estimated 6,300 people have been trained to perform potentially life-saving CPR and first aid. An additional 188 patients have detected heart conditions from the early diagnosis campaign. Through partnerships with physicians, the organisation has ensured 269 patients have received consultancy, diagnosis tests and essential surgeries. Patients are charged according to a socioeconomic evaluation, to ensure that treatment is affordable to all who need it, even free if needed.
As with so many organisations in 2020, the Covid-19 pandemic interrupted Salvando Latidos' activities. Between March and June, Carlos partnered with fellow OYW Ambassador Adan Ramirez to provide vital PPE to 5,000 underresourced physicians. In August, adapted operations recommenced in the form of general medical education programmes, through which 26,136 people have been educated.
Streetwise Transformers
Streetwise Transformers - Kenya
Margaret Osolo Odhiambo
Ambassador-led Initiative
1:3
SROI
There is a troubling trend in many Sub-Saharan countries that the number of street-children is on the rise as a result of increasing poverty, family instabilities and social disintegration, and in Nairobi, this is a particularly prevalent issue with estimates of over 60,000 children taking to living and working on the streets (1). Margaret is the Health Lead at Streetwise Transformers, a humanitarian community-based organisation that is committed to restoring human dignity for marginalised and vulnerable populations of homeless children, young adults, and families. The target demographics primarily live and work on the streets and street-connected environments in Nairobi.
The organisation has a keen focus on improving their health, well-being and living standards. It does so in different areas including Education and Skills Development, Health programing, Sport and Talent development, Alternative Economic Livelihoods as well as Advocacy and lobbying for basic human rights. These activities are carried out by a network of qualified volunteers and staff members who shape and execute these programmes. Streetwise Transformers has facilitated Outreach Programs through tracing, rescue, rehabilitation and reintegration of over 500 children and youth out of the streets.
In the area of health, for which Margaret leads the organisation's programmes, Streetwise Transformers has managed to reach over 2,749 children, young adults, women, people living with disabilities and families living and working in the streets and street-connected environments. The health programming focuses on health literacy, safe access to health and hygiene products as well as friendly healthcare services for the marginalized communities in the community and through the distribution of dignity packs, referrals, access to safe spaces, among others. The support programmes range from the promotion of menstrual, sexual and reproductive health, mental health, health literacy, and disease prevention. They also promote the need for clean water, hygiene and sanitation. Activities address drug and substance abuse and management of non-communicable diseases.
Farmz2U
Aisha founded Farmz2U with the aim of helping farmers farm better with tailored agricultural expertise and access to market. Created following a personal health experience, Aisha saw the need to address unsustainable practices in food production not limited to excessive use of chemicals in food production and increasing levels of food waste.
Despite Sub Saharan Africa having a significant portion of the world's fertile land, smallholder farmers in the region (which make up 80% of all farmers) rarely achieve profitability and commercial scale. With Africa’s population doubling by 2050 (1), the continent must expand its agricultural production capacity to ensure global food sustainability. The Sub-Saharan African region has the necessary resources required to grow its agricultural operations including fertile and unused land, a growing youth population and favourable government policies. Nonetheless, the market is disconnected and farmers have poor access to capital, quality-assured inputs and technical expertise to produce optimally. Furthermore, they have little influence on the value chain.
Farmz2U uses technology to support farmers with agricultural advisory and decision support services. Furthermore, it increases smallholder farmers’ access to market services including finance, input suppliers and produces buyers through API integrations (which are doorways to other service providers). For instance, data sharing with banks (within regulatory constraints) reduces the default risk of loans to farmers.
Farmz2U’s solution supports farming operations across production in the agricultural value chain while increasing farmers' connectivity with service providers, and it was recognised as a promising practice by the Food and Agricultural Organization of the United Nations in 2020. Since launching in 2019, Farmz2U has worked towards the primary objective of increasing agricultural productivity and income for smallholder farmers.
Khuthaza Foundation NPC
Khuthaza Foundation NPC - South Africa
Bianca Wannenburg, Sipho Mabusela
Ambassador-led Initiative
1:5
SROI
South Africa is a country rife with inequality, and some of the most extreme inequality manifests in the form of food insecurity whereby an estimated 6.5 million people suffer from hunger (1). The pandemic has exacerbated the issue significantly in 2020, as informal workers lost their source of income and poverty increased rapidly.
Bianca and Sipho co-founded and run Khuthaza Foundation, a registered non-profit in South Africa. Its purpose is to fight food insecurity, provide waste management education and promote environmental sustainability for a better world. The organisation sees itself as the custodian of responsible production and consumption with the goal of reducing future economic, environmental and social costs, strengthening economic competitiveness and reducing poverty.
The three main avenues of impact are food gardens, waste management, and tree planting. Khuthaza designs and builds food gardens in corporate parks, schools and previously and currently disadvantaged communities, to achieve zero hunger and healthier communities. Since 2019, it has managed to carer for 1,950 adults and children. Khuthaza also organises community cleanups, teaching communities how to upcycle using eco-bricks to build seedbeds, park benches, and other structures, activities which have contributed to the collection of over 14 tonnes of plastic waste. Currently, the eco-bricks are used to build raised beds for community food gardens. The ultimate goal is to construct affordable housing using eco-bricks.
Finally, the team sources trees and succulents, organising planting events to help with CO2 sequestration and urban cooling in Johannesburg. These activities planting more than 2,200 trees has contributed to the removal of an estimated 104,000kg of carbon from the atmosphere.
Jasberry
Thailand is the world's second-largest exporter of rice and yet a large proportion of rice farmers live in poverty, and so in 2011, the government reacted with a controversial subsidy programme (1). MBA students Palmmy and her co-founder, Neil, conceived their own sustainable, scalable and irreversible solution to the challenge.
Jasberry (previously Siam Organic) is a social enterprise that solves the problem of farmer poverty through innovative organic products with global appeal. This began with the eponymous variety, jasberry rice, discovered by researchers which not only brings higher yields and lower costs for the farmers but also has nutritional benefits for consumers. The organisation connects with farmers, individuals and cooperatives, to train them on how to grow the crop as well as supplying them with high-quality non-GMO rice seeds. They work with the farmers to modernise their agricultural methods and encourage them to share knowledge and best practice. In addition to the transition of crop and methods, Jasberry provides micro-financing through a partnership with Kiva. Jasberry also runs an IT programme to help farmers to integrate technology into their methods.
Farmers are required to keep at least 25% of their harvests for household consumption regardless of their yield to ensure food security. The rest, Jasberry purchases directly. As part of processing the rice, the farmer's cooperative employs 50 women in the packaging facility to ensure that the local community benefits at all stages of production. Beginning with just 25 farmers in the first year, the organisation now works with 2,500 farmers, increasing their average daily salary from $0.40 to about $5.80 per day.
Rhythm of Life
Rhythm of Life - Uganda
Harriet Kamashanyu
Ambassador-led Initiative
1:26
SROI
There are approximately 1.6 million Ugandan's living with HIV (1), a demographic that suffers significantly from marginalisation and socioeconomic disadvantages. The rate of infection rises drastically for female sex workers (FSW). In Kampala, it is estimated that one in three FSWs are HIV-positive (2). Harriet founded Rhythm Of Life in 2013 to support HIV-positive FSWs and their families. She has been challenged to find a solution for one community challenge whilst at university, which was when she conceived the idea to break the cycle of mother-daughter prostitution.
The project operates via three streams. Through the first, it seeks to equip the women and girls with new skills by full-sponsoring their education at primary, secondary, and tertiary levels. The second is health outreaches, which connect the HI-positive women and girls with regular healthcare access. Doctors and counsellors visit them, or they are connected to local health clinics and hospitals. The organisation has lobbied to ensure that health centres respect the referral cards of FSWs, which has often been an issue with the women receiving healthcare in the past. The organisation also teaches the women new vocational skills to help support them financially, or even to transfer out of the industry,
Through the Rhythmic Voices advocacy campaign, girls have become ambassadors against the stigmatisation of HIV positive nationals all over the country and in the entire world. Women and girls supported by the organisation were hit hard by the pandemic. FSW ""are enduring economic losses, increased risk of violence, and reduced access to HIV prevention and treatment"" (3), and so Harriet has ensured that Rhythm of Life continues to support them with food and shelter. This aspect of the programme has been so successful it will be continued beyond the pandemic.
Soup N Stew
Statistics supporting claims that women are less likely to be the head of households in poverty, leading to the conclusion that women are therefore better off, does not truly reflect the realities of poor women (1). This is not reflected on the ground, as it is estimated that twice as many women as men live below the poverty line (2).
Zainab established Soup N Stew, initially as an affordable and hygienic supermarket for people who had previously been reliant on poor, open markets. After being operational for a year, the organisation began to run grocery drives for poor women, especially poor widows, in December 2018. These relief packages are supplied on a monthly basis to women whose households had lost their primary 'breadwinner'. Nigeria’s food inflation has risen by 110.5% in 5 years, between September 2015 and September 2020 (3). Ensuring food security is essential for the women and their families, as it is increasingly less affordable for those living in poverty.
The latest development for Soup N Stew was to launch a microloan programme, to empower the women who had lost their jobs in the informal economy with financial capital. All the recipients go through a personal assessment process to ensure they have a bank account, and the necessary business understanding to be a success. The loan is flexible and there is no punishment for failed repayment. This capital helps women to sustainably bring themselves out of poverty, by supporting their existing entrepreneurial skills. The organisation has also provided vocational skills training to empower women further to secure their financial independence.
Moving forward, Soup N Stew is closing the previously run store to focus exclusively on emergency grocery deliveries, microloans and business grants for an increasing network of small-scale businesswomen. The nutritional programme is reaching almost 10 households per month, and the microgrants have supported 8 small enterprises with a 100% repayment rate.
NEXT
In 2019, twelve Zurich Insurance employees founded NEXT with the encouragement of the company’s senior management and inspiration from the One Young World 2019 Summit in London. The initiative’s goal is to promote intergenerational dialogue, and future-proof Zurich with regards to its role as a service provider, employer and corporate citizen.
The team has launched 7 different country hubs with the support of 14 Ambassadors. Each core member is afforded 10% of their time to run the programme’s various social impact initiatives. To maintain a fresh team with new ideas and impetus, members rotate after one to two years. This group of intrapreneurs have run a wide array of initiatives in 2020.
The flagship event was the NEXT Virtual Summit 2020. The team virtually convened changemakers, entrepreneurs, and experts to share insights and inspiration around the role generations can play in solving major challenges such as climate change, sustainable development, social innovation, mental health and wellbeing. There were over 500 people in live attendance and a further 400 who have accessed the recordings. The recordings are available on the NEXT YouTube channel.
Additionally, and as part of its commitment to support social innovation, NEXT distributed $100,000 to its scholars running impactful social enterprises. NEXT is also sharing its expertise outside the company through its role as a founding member and co-chair of One Young World’s NextGen Working Group.
In 2020 they launched the first cohort of its innovative NEXTChange programme, a cross-generational mentorship scheme developing 19 pairs of leaders. These are two initiatives that will further embed sustainability and increase the dialogue between generations in the business. In 2021, the team aims to open new hubs in new countries in addition to the current ones.
How to use to the SDG Tracker
Search for projects by the following case study categories:
- Ambassador-led Initiatives: qualitative and quantitative analysis of the social impact of projects which are led by young leaders in the Community.
- Business for Social Good: written case studies for initiatives ran by corporate partner organisations, led by young Ambassadors/employees.
- Leadership Stories: short biographies of Ambassadors who are growing into influential leaders for social good in some of the world’s largest companies.
- Covid Young Leaders Fund: detailed case studies of grant recipients from One Young World's 2020 funding opportunity for projects tackling the COVID-19 pandemic.
- Lead2030: detailed case studies of the Lead2030 award winners and how their projects have generated impact from participating in the programme.