For Small and Growing Businesses (SGBs)

Active

Take-a-Stake offers technical and financial assistance to small and growing businesses with a clear impact on delivering economic, social, and environmental benefits for the water, sanitation, and hygiene (WASH) and waste sectors. For investors, Take-a-Stake offers an opportunity for credible environmental, social, governance (ESG), impact investing in support of viable and scalable SGBs contributing to Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 6 (clean water and sanitation) in low- and middle-income economies.

Take-a-Stake is powered by Sida and IKEA SE, initiated by WASTE and developed in partnership with Yunus Social Business. Together, we are combining financial and business acumen with deep sector expertise.

Learn more about our expertise in innovative financing.

Our goals

Take-a-Stake imagines a world with sustainable water, sanitation, and hygiene (WASH) and waste supply chains, where small and growing businesses (SGBs) are at the forefront

Take-a-Stake’s mission is to demonstrate the feasibility of (and eventually set up) an impact investment fund which will address the financial and capacity-building needs of these overlooked WASH and waste SGBs in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs). The Take-a-Stake Initiative is:

Strengthening small and growing businesses (SGBs) that provide basic needs services

In particular water, sanitation, hygiene (WASH), waste, and linked sectors (i.e. health, agriculture, renewable energy).

Proving the investment case for the WASH and waste sectors in India, Kenya, and Uganda

Take-a-Stake is driving towards the ambition that in 5 years, the WASH and waste sectors are not seen as extraordinarily risky, but opportunities that commercial investors are actively pursuing.

Building a track record via successful funding in small and growing businesses (SGBs)

Setting up a best practice governance structure, create more traction and visibility to mobilise co-investments.

Our activities supporting small and growing businesses (SGBs)

Inception phase (2017-20): Through its work developing local sanitation markets in India and Kenya, WASTE noticed a pattern of where small businesses supported under its other programmes would fall off, causing progress to backslide. To address these issues, the Take-a-Stake initiative was envisioned.

TAS was founded by WASTE in 2017, with the first phase having been executed between July 2017 and June 2019, when the preparatory work was conducted. During the inception phase, we conducted quick scans assessing the present status of the market and the involvement of relevant stakeholders, including businesses and microfinance institutions (MFIs). Based on the results of the quick scans, plans for the implementation phase were reformulated.

Pilot phase (2020-24): Phase 2, the current Pilot Phase began on April 1st, 2020, and will continue until 31 December 2024. This phase is designed to roll out and prove the viability of a fund that supports small and growing water, sanitation, and hygiene (WASH) and waste businesses, as well as provide technical assistance to entrepreneurs. Yunus Social Business Funds gGmbH (“YSB”), joined as a partner in November 2021. Together, the partners will use this period to enable fundraising for the sustainability and upscaling of the initaitve. Phase 2 (the pilot) is funded by The Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency, Sida (Contribution No. 12620) and by YSB via co-investments. The geographic focus of the pilot is on Uganda, Kenya, and India.

"I thank WASTE for their great training, we have learnt a lot about plastic recycling and new business opportunities. WASTE brings the right public to the table to really have an impact.” Modou Fall, director Expertises et Solutions International

Sustainability

The outputs from this project will be utilized in other WASTE projects. This programme is a pilot for a potentially full-scale investment fund. Once successfully incubated, we presume the lifespan would be at least 10 years to contribute to sustainable regional economic growth and employment.

The Take-a-Stake programme is active from 2021-24.