Excerpt Five From A Recent Interview With University College London | State Of Social Enterprises Ecosystems In Kenya

Earlier this year, The Youth Café was interviewed by Eliana Summer-Galai, a Masters student with the Institute of Global Prosperity at University College London (UCL). This interview was to provide insight into her research on the Kenyan Social Enterprise Ecosystem. The research explores the actors across the ecosystem, looking at stakeholders from four stages of the entrepreneurial life cycle (entrepreneurial education, idea generation, funding, and growth), and the opportunities and challenges for local social entrepreneurs.

The questions asked and our responses form a series of 8 blog posts dissecting important issues with regard to the Social Enterprise Ecosystem in Kenya. This is the fifth post of the series on How do you see the challenges and the opportunities within the SEE?

Since the ecosystem is still young, risks and opportunities present themselves. In terms of the risks, there is little in the way of institutional knowledge in relation to social entrepreneurship dating beyond a generation. The leaders of Social Enterprises also tend to be young. This means that there are few ‘lessons learned’ which are specifically anchored in the Kenyan context. It also means that there are few successful exit stories for impact investors to draw upon. However, the relatively young ecosystem presents an opportunity for impact investors who actively pursue early-stage investment opportunities. Yet they would need to see some sort of a track record or experience from a Social Enterprise before feeling confident enough to invest. In order to get around this, we may start to see a closer collaboration between international nonprofits and local for-profit organisations, particularly as the Kenyan government seeks to enforce stricter requirements on international organisations. 

The more that the ecosystem becomes populated with service providers and linkages are created across borders as well as in the country, the more depth that business environment will have and the more cross pollination of ideas and best practice between local and international Social Enterprises there will be. Social Enterprises face high barriers that are often increased by the difficult markets they serve. Common challenges include unconducive regulation and policy, lack of financing solutions, weak infrastructure and human capital and lack of information and networks. Social Enterprises are not organized as a sector and fall between traditionally recognized public and private organizations.

The Social Enterprises sector lacks a supportive ecosystem, or enabling environment, which would allow these organizations to thrive and grow. 4 ecosystem dimensions capture the enabling environment for Social Enterprises: policy and regulation, financing solutions, infrastructure and human capital, and information and networks. With improvements in these dimensions, Social Enterprises can significantly contribute to a service delivery challenge.

The Youth Café works with young men and women around Africa as a trailblazer in advancing youth-led approaches toward achieving sustainable development, social equity, innovative solutions, community resilience and transformative change.

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