Looking Beyond the Known: Changing Mindsets through Design-Led Entrepreneurial Solutions
15 – 16th October 2019 | GIZ Berlin Representation, Berlin
On 15th October, Ms Poonam Bir Kasturi took the stage to share how design-led waste management solutions have generated changes in perceptions and behaviours around waste in India. Ms Kasturi’s business, Daily Dump (SEED Low Carbon Award Winner 2018 from Bengaluru), is leading the way as India’s first company to design a home composter, adapted for tight urban spaces and with a unique terracotta design.
Ms Kasturi was welcomed as keynote speaker during the BEYOND THE KNOWN: Practitioners’ Exchange to Discover New Ways to Promote Entrepreneurship & Support MSME Development from 15-16th October at the GIZ Representation in Berlin. The two-day, intensive practitioners’ exchange hosted 120+ practitioners actively developing and delivering MSME development support across emerging markets. Practitioners were engaged not just to share learnings, but to actively co-create innovative solutions that go “beyond the known” of the status quo in entrepreneurship promotion and MSME development support.
Following on from her welcoming remarks that emphasised the central role of market-driven, community-based solutions in addressing key environmental, social and economic challenges, Ms Kasturi was invited to respond to questions from Mr Norbert Barthle, Parliamentary State Secretary to the Federal Minister for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ). In her interview with Mr Barthle, Ms Kasturi reemphasised the core contributions of entrepreneurs in emerging markets to designing context-relevant solutions that tackle climate change and support the implementation of the Paris Agreement. She also noted the importance of development cooperation to look more closely at the support provided to entrepreneurs in emerging markets, especially in terms of access to finance.
Furthermore, SEED insights from Business Development Services (BDS) Standard development in South Africa and from the SEED Practitioner Labs Climate Finance across India, Thailand, Uganda, Ghana and South Africa were pitched as “knowledge gifts”, or examples of ongoing, collaborative initiatives to rethink entrepreneurship support in emerging markets. Combining insights from these SEED programmes as well as of other practitioners’ in attendance, practitioners left the event with ideas and action plans for collaborative new approaches to shape the future of MSME development in emerging markets.
For more information on the SEED Practitioner Labs Climate Finance knowledge gift click here.
For more information on the BDS Standard knowledge gift click here.
The SEED Low Carbon Awards 2018 were supported by the German Federal Ministry of Environment, Nature Conservation and Nuclear Safety (BMU) through the International Climate Initiative (IKI).
The Beyond the Known practitioners’ exchange was organised by the German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ) with the Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ), European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD), International Finance Corporation (IFC), International Labour Organisation (ILO) and Swisscontact, in partnership with the Government of Luxembourg, Norwegian Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Credit Suisse.