Building big-hearted businesses - Star Metro Perak

20 Nov 2017

IT has been more than a year since Ipoh was declared a Social Business City by Perak Mentri Besar Datuk Seri Dr Zambry Abd Kadir during the Pangkor International Development Dialogue in September last year.

Since then, the Ipoh City Council had been busy meeting and having town hall sessions with various organisations and individuals to plan and create the ideal Social Business City where people can solve various local and social issues.

Ipoh Datuk Bandar Datuk Zamri Man said the city council wanted everything to be in place before they went full steam ahead.

“The implementation of the Social Business City is still at its early stage.

“We are still having a series of town hall meetings and public engagements so they can have a better understanding of the concept,” he said.

“We are also planning to have collaborations with our twin sister city Fukuoka, to learn more from them on the implementation of the concept,” he added.

He said the city council was also discussing with Malaysian Global Innovation and Creativity Centre (MaGIC) to help set up a Social Business Hub to attract more social entrepreneurs with calibre.

“The Social Business Hub is among our plan to allow start-up businesses to thrive.

“When in operation, it will become the centre to develop new and interested entrepreneurs,” he said.

Once implemented, Ipoh will be the first Social Business City in South-East Asia and the second in Asia, after Fukuoka and the fifth in the world.

The other Social Business Cities include Wiesbarden in Germany, Pistoia in Italy and Barcelona, Spain.

A social business is aimed at overcoming an issue for the benefit of needy and unfortunate persons and does not prioritise on generating profit.

It is an alternative to social welfare aid system for continuous and sustainable financial source.

Revenue from its investment capital will be reinvested for the purpose of achieving sustainable social impact.

Zamri said it was the state’s vision to have Ipoh emulate the existing Social Business Cities that had successfully resolved its social and environmental issues.

“In Ipoh, we hope to implement a social business model to address issues pertaining to poverty, drugs and safety.

“We also want to open up opportunities for youth to develop their potentials, talents and ensure equity development,” he said.

Zamri said the city council’s role was to encourage the development of social businesses through cooperation with the non-governmental organisations, dedicated folk, state government and private agencies to resolve certain issues.

“We will increase our efforts to promote this business concept to more entrepreneurs.

“We have identified several of these entrepreneurs that we can work together with to hold activities,” he said.

“Some of them are working closely with us during the monthly Car-Free Day programme,” he added.

Zamri said long before Dr Zambry made the announcement, there had been many social businesses operating in the city.

Among these, he said, were Daybreak, Ray of Hope, Salvation Army, Anning and several others.

Another example, Zamri said, was Koperasi Alam Hijau Perak Bhd (Kohijau), which was set up to tackle the issue of solid waste management.

“They have introduced a merit system whereby participants would be rewarded by sending in their recyclable waste to special bins to be recycled.

“Another example is MBike, which prepares environmental-friendly electric trishaw services for tourists in the city,” he said, adding that MBike has about 30 trishaws and several bicycles to be rented out.

“It has received positive response from tourists visiting heritage sites in the city,” he added.

He said MBike was also planning to provide the bicycle-sharing service, known as Cycledios to several other towns in the state, pending approval from the respective local governments.

Zamri said he believed that social businesses would be the model for the future.

“Not only that it will be a main contributor to the country’s economy, it will also help resolve a lot of issues that cannot be handled by the Government alone without the involvement of other parties.

“Given ample training and support from the Government, social business will have a big positive impact on the state and country,” he said.

https://www.thestar.com.my/metro/metro-news/2017/11/20/building-bighearted-businesses-ipoh-also-wants-to-set-up-hub-to-develop-social-entrepreneurs/

Nobel Peace Prize Laureate, Professor Muhammad Yunus meets Practitioners of Social Business at Yunus Centre in Dhaka, Bangladesh

28 July 2017 - Dhaka, Bangladesh

Assoc. Prof. Dr. Richard Ng with Nobel Peace Prize Laureatte, Prof. Muhammad Yunus 

Over 2,000 people from 40 countries converged in Dhaka for the 7^th Annual Social Business Day held from 29 to 30 July in Dhaka hosted by Nobel Laureate Professor Muhammad Yunus. Social Business Day is an annual conference organized by the Yunus Centre to celebrate the groundbreaking idea of social business and to highlight new developments.

Social Business Day showcases the concept of social business with leading experts in the field. The annual event attracts the participation of international and local actors, corporate and social leaders, NGOs, students, and innovators, and connects them with the social business network. It also creates an opportunity for participants to engage in different interactive plenary sessions and workshops to broaden their understanding in specific areas of interest.

Coined by Muhammad, founder of Grameen Bank, a social business only repays investors their original investment, and reinvests 100% of its profits back into the business to solve social problems.

 
The focus this was on why and how wealth concentration is a threat, and what should be the strategies to tackle this issue at regional, national and global levels. In addition, the event hosted several exciting plenary and interactive breakout sessions. One of the sessions followed up on 2015’s vision of ‘Three Zeros- Zero poverty, Zero unemployment and Zero net carbon emission’ presented by Nobel Laureate Professor Muhammad Yunus.

Malaysia was represented by 20 participants from MyHarapan, IDR, KOHIJAU, UUM, UTP, UKM, USM, and DHL.

Last September, Professor Yunus was in Ipoh during the Pangkor International Dialogue where he declared Ipoh as the 5^th Social Business City (SBC) in the world and 2^nd in Asia after Fukuoka, Japan.

When I was introduced to this event by IDR, I immediately agreed to participate as it will provide me an opportunity to meet up with other social business practitioners. I was inspired by what Prof. Yunus has done to help the poor solve the many unemployment problems by creating entrepreneurs.

Koperasi Alam Hijau Perak Berhad (KOHIJAU) was set up by members of Ipoh City Watch on 1^st of April 2016, 5 months before Ipoh was declares a Social Business City. Our aim was to make Ipoh the most liveable city in Malaysia. At that time I have no idea about Social Business. However, KOHIJAU has been taking initiatives to help keep the city clean through the KOHIJAU-ICYCLE Recycling Reward Point System through collaboration with the neighbourhood watch Rukun Tetangga Jelapang and Residents Associations as well as other NGOs.

According to Prof Yunus, a social business must fulfil 7 principles;

• Business objective will be to overcome poverty, or one or more problems (such as education, health, technology access, and environment) which threaten people and society; not profit maximization.
• Financial and economic sustainability
• Investors get back their investment amount only. No dividend is given beyond investment money
• When investment amount is paid back, company profit stays with the company for expansion and improvement
• Gender sensitive and environmentally conscious
• Workforce gets market wage with better working conditions
• ... do it with joy

I am sure KOHIJAU has fulfilled most if not all the principles of a social business. KOHIJAU collaborates with other NGOs in educating the public about recycling and reduction of garbage from going to the landfill through the KOHIJAU-ICYCLE system. 60 percent of the income generated from the sales of recyclables collected through this system will be channelled back to these NGOs to fund their activities in helping to solve other social problems.

During the 3-day Social Business Day in Dhaka, I was honoured to meet Prof. Yunus on stage to present our KOHIJAU-ICYCLE recycling system. He was impressed and happy to note what we did. He also agreed to sign on our banner to show his support in promoting a recycling culture for a sustainable environment.

Several Bangladeshi participants from the local universities showed their keen interest in learning from us. They have invited me to come and present it at their universities. It was a great honour for us. I believe the system can help change the mindset of the people as illegal garbage dumping is a huge problem in Bangladesh.

My presentation also caught the attention of an NGO from USA, the Winner’s Circle. The team were there to do video recording of good social business programme. They were impressed with our recycling system as well as our plastic bags which is made of sugar cane waste, which can decompose in 80 days. I was honoured by their gesture of sticking the “Who I am makes the difference” sticker on my shirt to show support for being passionate about my project.

In Perak, KOHIJAU has launched or in the process of launching 52 recycling bins throughout Perak with 18 of them located within Ipoh since September 2016. To date, 3,000 people have signed up as recycling members and contributed closed to 30,000 kg of recyclables paying out almost RM3,000.

Our bins are mostly sponsored by the government and private companies to enable the people to drop their recyclables at a convenient location. We welcome corporate companies to assist by sponsoring and participating in the recycling programme as part of their CSR activities. Each bin costs RM2,000. Sponsoring companies will have the company’s logo displayed on the recycling bin. They will also get the report on the amount of recyclables dropped at the bin.

16 SBC units have been created involving NGOs, schools, cooperative societies, and Rukun Tetangga. More SBC units are expected to be created to ensure every district in Perak is represented. KOHIJAU-ICYCLE will also set up units in other parts of Malaysia. It will be a source of additional income for NGOs and their members to fund their social activities while ensuring a clean and sustainable environment.

KOHIJAU has to date signed MOU with NGOs from Guangzhou (China), Plan@Earth in Cochin (Kerala) and recently with EBM Global Recycling inTay Tay, Manila (Philippines). Hopefully, another MOU with the Grameen Group and SouthEast University in Dhaka will be signed as our next partner in Bangladesh. The MOU will enable our partner to use the KOHIJAU-ICYCLE system to reward recycling points for contributors.

Members who contributed their recyclables will be rewarded with recycling points. They can check their recycling points www.icycle-global.com and redeem their points with cash, coupons or donate to charity of their choice.

‘Turning socks into snowmen’ project teaches young about charity - Malaysiakini

19 Dec 2016

The noble idea of a father, Andy Chan. has helped to kick-start a charitable cause to raise funds for a home for abused women in Klang.

Chan, whose 11-year-old daughter, Isabelle recently organised a workshop to teach primary school children how to turn white socks into cute little snowmen, said the fundraising project was intended to encourage young people to think about giving to charity.

“We are not only teaching them some art and craft, where the finished products end up collecting dust or in the waste paper basket,” Chan said. “We want them to think about other people who are less privileged than themselves.”

In the process, Chan said that the early exposure to entrepreneurship will also help the children to become good businessmen in future. They feel proud about their handicraft when people start buying from them.

“The beauty of this idea is that it is duplicable,” he said. “Each snowman is sold at RM20.With each child producing six snowmen, they will be able to raise RM120 each just by selling to family and friends.”

Enthusiastic response

At their home in Kelana Jaya last Thursday afternoon, the Chan family helped some 10 other kids and their parents to make the snowmen.

Eight-year-old Shaun Ng became excited when he managed to sell his first two snowmen to a neighbour, who told him that that the snowmen looked so cute.

“I am going to make more snowmen, and raise more money to help feed the people in the home,” he said, adding that he now has a back order of some 40 snowmen. He is trying hard to recruit his five-year-old sister Alyson as a partner in the project to help meet the demand.

“One generous lady, in particular, offered to buy 20 snowmen,” he said. “RM400 may be a small amount of money for some people, but it will certainly go a long way to help the old folks.”

Another eight-year-old from Becon House Sri Inai International School, Swarnina Poddar, said that after learning to make the snowmen, she now hopes to volunteer herself to help out whenever there is another workshop conducted.

“I enjoy raising funds for the poor,” she said. “This may be the first time I am doing it, but it will certainly not be the last.”

Six-year-old Teoh Enjie said it was fun to make the snowmen toys to sell. “What I like about this workshop is that I can bring a smile to the old people at the home,” he said. His friend, June Mulquiney, five, said she also enjoyed making the snowmen. “Mum will help to sell the snowmen to raise funds for the poor,” she said.

Aerin Tham said it is cool being able to help the needy. The 11-year-old from Nobel International School said that at the same time, he had lots of fun making the snowmen.

Hailing from Puay Chai (2) in Bandar Utama, seven-year-old Chong Ray Shuen said she has learnt about helping othersfrom the workshop which includes overcoming her fears, especially of approaching others to buy the snowmen that she made for charity’s sake.

“That's my greatest accomplishment!” she said.

Together they hope to raise at least RM1,000 to buy foodstuff that can be given to Rumah Grace in Pandamaran, Klang. Last year, Chan said Isabelle came up with another idea of turning trash into cash to buy food for charity.

“This was when we started using old socks and other recyclable materials to make the snowmen,” he said. “However, this year, the idea has evolved into making more snowmen using socks that can be purchased cheaply from the wholesalers.”

Chan, a corporate trainer, said he is happy to share the idea with other non-governmental organisations. “We try to make the fundraising project as duplicable as possible,” he said. “After attending one or two sessions, even a child as young as eight can start teaching her own friends how to make the snowmen. We need to inculcate in them the love for people who may not be as privileged as themselves.”

For more information, contact Andy Chan (mobile: +60 12 214 7558)