Meet Patricia. She’s an agriculture expert from Kenya — and a little bit like Goldilocks. In her community, she’s known for creating her own recipe for chicken feed, and making sure farmers can buy the amount they need — not too little, not too much. Juuust right. She also processes chickens to sell, so families …
Agriculture Cambodia Ethiopia Ghana Her Time to Grow Mozambique Paul Polak Innovation Fund Zambia
Back in 2024, iDE excitedly welcomed Support Her Enterprise — aka SHE — into the fold. SHE is a Cambodian organization that specializes in providing business training to female entrepreneurs. Women in Cambodia struggle to access and benefit from business training. There aren’t many networks to connect them, and business training isn’t tailored to their …
Bangladesh Paul Polak Innovation Fund WASH
Say you have a candy wrapper in your pocket. What do you do with it? Do you leave it in there, destined to tumble through the wash? Do you throw it in the trash? Or on the ground? What if you could recycle it? What could it turn into? Like most countries, Bangladesh is facing …
Ghana News Paul Polak Innovation Fund
Northern Ghana is a dry zone, with a rainy season from May to October, and a dry season from November to April. During the dry season, very few people can farm, which means families don’t get the nutrition they need. But, farming in the dry season is possible, with the right innovation! Thanks to generous …
Ethiopia Ghana Newsletter Zambia
Maybe you can relate to this? Many women in Zambia, Ethiopia and Ghana noted the challenge of dividing their time between various roles — mother, wife, homemaker, and income earner. We heard this over and over again in interviews for Her Time to Grow, our project supporting women in agriculture — a project you passionately …
Have you ever been nervous about trying something new? Did you have a safety-net in place if something didn’t go as planned? Since 2021, your support has been providing a safety-net for innovators and entrepreneurs through iDE’s Paul Polak Innovation Fund. Thanks to your generous donations, the Polak Fund has distributed 50 awards in 11 …
“How am I going to pay rent?” Thoughts like this were what kept Salima Nosiku up at night. A Zambian mother of two, she sold farm supplies, but her store was too small, and sales were slow. Without enough income, she was at risk of losing her store and the ability to provide for her …
The Polak Fund is risky. That’s the thing about big ideas. You don’t know if they’ll work or not until you test them. As Nadia Campos, iDE’s Director of Global Design says; the Polak Fund “was meant to support projects [and] experiments that other donors will never dare to do.” That’s why we are so …
This year, we are celebrating our 40th anniversary by spotlighting 40 entrepreneurs who are changing their communities and helping end poverty, all before the age of 40. Amina Bacar and Aspara Timilsina are two of the 40 Under 40 entrepreneurs featured. Both possess the strength and commitment to take on traditional gender roles and turn …
Ethiopia Ghana Newsletter Zambia
Your enthusiasm and support of the Her Time to Grow project has been inspiring! In just over one year, you have donated nearly 70% of the matching funds needed to see this project through its four-year implementation. That’s $527,996!! That is a HUGE accomplishment – THANK YOU! Another thing that’s needed to get big projects …
