As a former investment banker and CPA, I understand firsthand the importance that companies place on their bottom lines and creating shareholder value. Through my years of development experience, I have also come to appreciate how sustainable development in emerging market countries is critical to corporate bottom lines. Yet, longstanding development issues such as clean water, stable governments, an educated citizenry, and many others cannot be successfully solved solely through development assistance.
Members of Devex's Strategic Advisory Council meet with USAID Deputy Administrator Donald Steinberg and IDEA Deputy Director Ricardo Michel at its inaugural meeting. Photo credit: Pat Adams, USAID
Fortunately, I see the landscape evolving. Companies are increasingly looking at development as a core strategy issue rather than a matter of corporate philanthropy. Through innovative alliances, USAID is partnering with corporations, private foundations, other donor agencies, philanthropists, NGOs, social entrepreneurs and diaspora communities to mobilize the ideas, efforts, approaches and resources of all partners towards common goals.
That is why I am excited about the launch of Devex Impact’s Strategic Advisory Council. In their commitment to this initiative, the Council’s corporate, donor and NGO leaders have embraced the importance of public-private partnerships—that global challenges cannot be solved by one sector alone. The founding members of the Council—AusAID, The Boeing Company, Business for Social Responsibility (BSR), Chevron, DFID, Exxon Mobile, GAVI Alliance, IBM, KPMG, and Orange—will provide advice to enhance Devex Impact, a collaborative website initiative by USAID and Devex, that brings together corporate, NGO, foundation, and government actors around public-private partnerships for development.
At our first Council meeting on June 3, Raj Kumar, President and Editor-in-Chief of Devex and I led a discussion of how business and development are coming together more now than ever before. Listening to representatives on the Council share their insights on developing trends in the business world confirmed for me that the 1,600 public-private partnerships built by USAID over the past decade are just the beginning. With developing countries now representing over half of global GDP and an even greater percentage of GDP growth, the places where USAID works today are the customer bases and workforces of tomorrow.
Earlier this year, I had the opportunity to speak at the Global Entrepreneurship Congress in Rio de Janeiro. It was an amazing gathering of private and public sector leaders, all focused on defying boundaries to get at the crux of the world’s problems. It also reinforced for me the idea at the core of Devex Impact—that partnerships are key to enduring development. In order to bring the message of partnerships to a broader audience, we need a platform that gathers partnership builders, enabling them to share their experiences and lessons, and connecting them to each other—and future partnership opportunities.
This is exactly what Devex Impact is doing today.
As the “go-to” site for business and development, Devex Impact showcases incredible collaborations taking place across the globe. It is a resource for companies and organizations of all sizes looking to tell the story of doing business in emerging markets. And it is a tool for professionals looking to create more sustainable supply chains, develop new business models to reach consumers at the base of the pyramid, and partner with local and international organizations. Devex Impact enables partnership builders to connect with peers across industries and disciplines to build the partnerships of tomorrow.
I encourage you to learn more about the amazing work being done by Devex Impact, the Strategic Advisory Council, and partnerships around the world at devex.com/impact.
