The project “Leveraging Viet Nam’s Social Impact Business Ecosystem in Response to COVID-19 (ISEE-COVID)”, co-implement by UNDP and the Agency of Enterprise Development (AED); Ministry of Planning and Investment, with sponsorship from Global Affairs Canada (GAC), aims to enhance the resilience of SIBs in Viet Nam and contribute to reducing the impact of COVID-19 on vulnerable groups, especially women and girls. To achieve this, the project will have two primary objectives: (i) improving the effectiveness of Social impact businesses (SIBs), especially those led by women and vulnerable groups, to address the social and gendered impacts of COVID-19 and to accelerate the achievement of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs); and (ii) strengthening the regulatory environment for SIBs to be more gender-responsive, inclusive and transparent, thereby supporting the resilience of SIBs to COVID-19 impact, with a particular focus on SIBs that are led by women and other vulnerable groups. The project will prioritize support to SIBs in four key industries heavily impacted by COVID-19, namely sustainable agriculture, sustainable tourism, education, and health. These are also areas with a large female workforce and many SIBs are offering innovative solutions dedicated to reducing poverty rates for women and girls.
Under this project, SIBs are understood as: Organizations that have both business activities and a commitment to positively impact society/environment as central tenets of their strategic operations. In such models, balancing social/environmental aims with a commercial model allows businesses to sustainably solve social and environmental challenges. As determined by the project design, examples of SIBs include:
(i) Social enterprises;
(ii) Social impact start-ups;
(iii) Inclusive businesses; and
(iv) Cooperatives where a majority of members are vulnerable people.
The Consortium of Towards Development and Integration Consulting Co., Ltd. and the Institute for Sustainable Development (ISD) - the National Economics University developed and completed:
(1) A substantive report on the SIBs ecosystem in Viet Nam, which encompasses existing reports so far and recent developments in the context of COVID –19, including with and in-depth analysis on gender, and social and environmental aspects; and
(2) A detailed data collection and management system involving baselines, indicators and targets for Monitoring and Evaluation for the ISEE-COVID project.
These products provide the technical assistance in collecting the baseline information of the SIBs and its ecosystem in VietNam in the context of Covid-19 pandemic, developing the data collection system, which will be used by UNDP and MPI on designing and implementing the project activities to meet the needs of the beneficiaries.
Reference link: https://doanhnghiepvn.vn/doanh-nghiep/76-doanh-nghiep-tao-tac-dong-xa-hoi-keu-thieu-von/20220429113157479