A great day for Broccoli
Dec 12th
Thursday was a great day for Broccoli, what we have been planning and planning for nearly a year now, finally came to fruition in a full circle. We worked with Desmond Tutu HIV testing and in exchange for taking an HIV test, we printed out R80.00 (±$11) food vouchers that are redeemable at any Pick n Pay. Getting to this stage was a notion that I have become enamoured with - “gradually then suddenly” – all things of consequence seem to follow this simple truth.
A central theme behind The Broccoli Project is ‘rewards that matter’ – and when considering that the people that we deal with don’t have a regular income if any, it becomes meaningful to provide a means of access to food.
Some of the men – young, intelligent and willing to work but without work – what are the options to feed and shelter themselves and their families, it is saddening to see this and it is a common sight around the country.
One of the men said to me “I am so happy with this voucher, I can buy some food now for me and my children” – heartbreaking.
Analytics – Buzzword and SaaS
Nov 25th
One of the compelling features of The Broccoli Project business model is its blended / hybrid offering. It is a variation of the classic two sided market that credit cards use.
The word “analytics” is the latest in internet buzzwords (along with realtime, the semantic web etc.) for some help in creating buzzwords you can check this out.
The 2-sided market of Broccoli:
Side 1:
The Broccoli Project to it’s participants is a rewards program that offers rewards that matter – food, clothing shelter (as opposed to toasters, nick nacks and stuff you didn’t know you didn’t need!) on the other side, it offers transparency to donors as to exactly how the funds will be used. But there is an exchange that takes place.
The Broccoli Project encourages positive social behavior in exchange for rewards that matter – so rather than just another hand out, its a hand up. Rewards for attending a skills development workshop, for learning how to use a mouse on a computer, for take preventative health care, for staying in school – simple acts that overtime can cause compounding effects on a personal and societal level.
The act of helping somebody can be found in the bible, but the problem with just handing aid out is that it creates a dependency that has the long term effect of learned helplessness.
It’s not that it is a bad thing to give, but western aid in its current form ironically has given birth to a self-serving industry that is estimated at about $100bn annually, with an estimated $1trillion poured into Africa alone over the last 50 years. [1] [2] [3] [4] Africa doesn’t look much better and in fact in some cases is worse off! [5] The irony here is that estimates indicate that upto 80% of aid supports the aid industry rather then the people it was meant to help!
Side-2:
The other side of the market is a donor dashboard into seeing how deployed funds and programs are working – we have called this Broccoli Analytics. For each activity or behaviour, a value is ‘earned’ and the values can be redeemed. This gives donors a view into how funds were used in a realtime [buzzword alert] manner. In final development is a activity statement that shows each casual donor at what stage funds are giving true real-time transparency to how funds are being used.
Bloggoli 2.0
Nov 3rd
If you are reading this, then you have been following the unexpected success of The Broccoli Project, and idea that has gained momentum in a way that I could not have expected.
The idea was simple, rewards that matter and a way to earn the rewards that do not require purchasing. This is not to say that this is not about the economy, it is about creating frameworks that enable those that are unemployable and unable to gain a foothold in the formal economy with a mechanism to allow participation in programs that will provide dignity, and hopefully over time the skills transfer that will result in prosperity in mind and material.
There are some exciting developments in both sides of project – watch this space for more to come.
MaZ – head of broccoli