Articles by Blair Miller

At a time when the world is experiencing an incredible economic crisis, it was powerful to sit in Lehman Brothers’ Midtown Manhattan office Tuesday night to hear Jeffery Sachs, head of the Millennium Project and Director of the Earth Institute, and Jacqueline Novogratz, CEO of Acumen Fund, speak about how to address the issues of global poverty.

More than 300 Lehman employees and guests filled the auditorium, listening to two of the most influential leaders in the social sector discuss the role of public and private approaches in alleviating global poverty. Millennium Promise and Acumen Fund have each received significant philanthropic support from Lehman Brothers, and Lehman Brothers’ $5 million gift to Acumen Fund made them our first Corporate Steward in our $100 million capital campaign.

The evening served as an opportunity for Sachs and Novogratz to explore ways to bring together top-down and bottom-up approaches to fight poverty. And while we would all love to know that there are simple, straightforward solutions, it was clear from the speakers’ comments that multiple approaches are needed to tackle poverty.

This idea was wonderfully illustrated by Jacqueline’s vivid story of the seven-foot-tall sunflowers growing in the middle of the Thar desert of Pakistan. Local smallholder farmers can grow these sunflowers because they are finally able to receive water through the use of a micro drip irrigation technology distributed by a local entrepreneur and Acumen Fund investee, Micro Drip, in addition to a government subsidy that provided solar panels to power the generators that extract groundwater.

Can you imagine a world in which water is so scarce, it has to be transported to your community via a government-operated train or if the only safe way for you to consume your morning glass of water is via a dirty pond with a 12-inch long filtering straw? Believe it or not, for billions of people across the world, quick fixes like these are their everyday reality.

1.2 billion people lack access to safe drinking water; 2.4 billion lack access to improved sanitation (UNEP). Adrien Couton, Acumen’s Water Portfolio Manager, cited these statistics and others at Acumen Fund’s Water breakfast this week. Despite such sobering numbers, I came away from the breakfast with a sense of hope that even though there is no silver bullet, we are getting closer to understanding how to address the complex issue of water.

Adrien first discussed the need to move beyond our strong inclination that the latest and greatest technology will solve all of our problems. A perfect example is Water Health International (WHI), an Acumen Fund investment since 2003. Water Health International recognized that just because they had a proven technology didn’t mean the poor were going to buy their water.

As I walked into Desmond Tutu Center in New York on Thursday night, I wasn’t quite sure what to expect from the social networking event hosted by Good Capital. Good Capital is an investment fund aiming to accelerate the flows of capital to social enterprises, and they successfully convened an incredible group of colleagues, investors, and friends.

Just to give you a sense of the event, my first conversation was with two women from Scojo Foundation, an Acumen Fund investee that reduces poverty and generates opportunity through the sale of affordable reading glasses. I then had the pleasure of talking with Tim Freundlich, a partner at Good Capital, who - among other things - told me of the upcoming conference they are hosting in San Francisco in October. This was followed by a conversation on community building with Jed Emerson, one of the leading thinkers on Blended Value and also an Acumen Fund and Good Capital Advisor.

I finished up the evening discussing the growing spectrum of capital with two fellow Michigan Alumni, Josh Cohen of City Light Capital, a money management and business development firm that focuses on the security, media and energy sectors, and Michael Baratoff of Equilibrium Capital, a growth equity fund focused on sustainability.

As I walked out of the event into the breathtaking and serene courtyard of the seminary behind the Tutu Center I realized that we are no longer a few disparate mavericks but instead an interconnected community leading a movement that can demonstrate the power of the market as a tool for sustainable and innovative solutions to social problems.

I just returned from an energizing trip to the University of Virginia, which is both Jacqueline’s and my alma mater. At UVA, I taught two classes in the business school’s newly developed Integrated Core Experience (ICE) program - one on Acumen Fund and the other on Social Venture Capital. The students - all undergraduates - were an engaged and inquisitive group. Throughout the 7-week course, the students are exploring different ways to approach global poverty, ranging from a charity-based model to a market-based approach.

There were two really exciting things about this trip. First, I continue to be energized by the way top universities are integrating the field of social entrepreneurship into their core curriculum. This is really an essential piece of what we are doing in our knowledge pillar, in terms of sharing our best practices and institutionalizing what we’re learning.

Second, I was amazed by the students‘ passion and curiosity as well as that of the professors. They are really working to understand the unique business models, challenges, and insights of our work. There is momentum here that brings to life the entrepreneurial spirit in so many. At Acumen, we are thinking hard about the best ways to harness the energy of students and young professionals. We would love to hear your thoughts, so please respond to this blog posting with ideas and suggestions!

A recent article in the McKinsey Quarterly, drawn from a joint report conducted with the IFC and Gates Foundation, predicts that due to the growing demand, $20 billion of additional investment in private sector (which includes private, social enterprise, and nonprofit) health care in Africa will take place in the next decade. From my perspective this study reveals two important issues for social investors. First, this is a great opportunity for us to make smart investments, collaborate with others, and provide the assistance needed to help scale and replicate innovative healthcare models. Second, and perhaps most pressing, we will all have a significant role to play in sharing our insights and lessons learned to ensure that this enormous flood of capital hears the voices of Africa’s poor.

On Tuesday, Acumen Fund hosted its annual Investor Gathering and Celebration, two of the most important events of the year for us and our community, and the culmination of months of preparation.

Our day-long Investor Gathering allowed us to share our past progress and future strategy with our partner community. Katherine Fulton set the tone for the day, noting shifting trends in philanthropy and the work of engaged donors in leading this new movement. (You can read more about her remarks - and the day - on one of our favorite blogs, nextbillion.net.)

The day was full of memorable discussions, but perhaps the most memorable was a moving performance by the 2008 Acumen Fund fellows who shared their personal stories about the winding road that lead them to Acumen. The Fellows left yesterday for their work with our investment enterprises in Kenya, Pakistan and India, so it was a beautiful way to end their time with the Acumen Fund team in New York.

Overall the day was a celebration of our community and a reminder of how important this work is. You will hear more about the day in coming weeks, from our team as well as from others in our community.

One of the things we heave heard from our community is the value they place on insights direct from the field. As we think about how best to make this information readily available, we have discovered the importance of creating connections to those who have truly lived and experienced our work on the ground.

Recently we held a breakfast in New York with our 2007 Acumen Fund Fellows who have just returned from eight months working with our investees in India, Pakistan, China, Tanzania and Kenya. As I listened to this incredibly gifted group of individuals, I was captivated by the sense of humility, passion and empathy they demonstrated when speaking about their work. For me, there were two key themes that emerged from the breakfast. The first was echoed in the words of Nadaa Taiyab who eloquently articulated the reality and the barriers to accessing the fortune at the base of the pyramid. Nadaa shared her story of scaling Medicine Shoppe’s operations through listening and learning from the poor as consumers, employees, and partners.  The second theme was best revealed in Keely Stevenson’s story of the tension she faced when helping A to Z Textile Mills discover the sustainable price point for an insecticide-treated bednet coupled with the reality of the tradeoffs that a woman living in rural Tanzania must face to protect her children from malaria. The provocative stories told by the Acumen Fellows revealed some of the greatest challenging we face in the world today and reaffirmed the importance of building a community of engaged and inspired problem solvers.

You can listen to an audio recording of the session, and we hope to post video soon! (The audio is a large MP3 file, so it may take a while to download.)