:In response to the great need to support entrepreneurship in the water sector, GWC partnered with Ashoka to organize the Changemakers.net competition, a contest to promote social entrepreneurs in the WASH sector. After the close of the competition, GWC and Acumen Fund worked closely to evaluate the potential of the entries to scale up and create sustainable enterprises and identified four organizations to receive support from Coca-Cola: the Manna Energy Foundation (Rwanda), the Center for Community Organization and Development (Malawi), Ecotact (Kenya), and the Naandi Foundation (India).

• The Manna Energy Foundation installs water treatment systems, biogas generators and high efficiency cookstoves, all funded with profits from the sale of carbon credits generated by saving trees that would otherwise be cut for fuel.
• The Center for Community Organization and Development (CCODE) used the grant to make loans to individual households for sanitation facilities and to support two entrepreneurial groups that are working to develop small sanitation enterprises.
• Ecotact’s program features the “Toilet Mall” business model that combines unique architecture, behavior change commuinications, an emphasis on cleanliness and innovative waste disposal technologies to promote sustainable sanitation for the urban poor. Funds from the Changemakers.net grant were used, along with other funds raised, to construct 24 Iko Toilet facilities that serve approximately 40,000 people daily and provide direct employment to around 400 people.
• The Naandi Foundation developed a project that utilizes a cutting edge reverse osmosis purification technology to provide water to economically disadvantaged communities. Naandi serves as a bridge between communities and the technology provider with a goal of providing clean water to five million beneficiaries in 1000 Indian villages by 2012.

This competition highlighted the wide range of entrepreneurial solutions for water and sanitation problems that already exist and can be scaled up with adequate funding. Many of these programs have become exemplary business models for sustainable water and sanitation service delivery. GWC has continued to create learning opportunities for the water and sanitation sector based on lessons learned from Changemakers.