CARE Social Ventures Gender Lens

Women farmers gather during morning milk collection session in Bangladesh. Source: Flickr (Akram Ali/IFPRI)

One of the main tasks for my internship at CARE Social Ventures is adding a gender lens to preexisting marketing materials and incorporating gender criteria into the business plan, stage gate process and portfolio evaluation criteria. The parent organization, CARE International, has the gender lens built into their work and methodology and all projects are evaluated with a gender lens. However, at CARE Social Ventures, there has not been an explicitly stated focus on gender despite CARE International's broad commitment to improving gender equality. I was tasked with updating all marketing and investment materials to explicitly mention the gender lens based on the gender criteria set by CARE and industry standards.

The gender criteria for social ventures is broken into two categories; direct criteria and indirect criteria. The direct criteria takes into consideration entrepreneurship, leadership, employment and consumption factors. The indirect criteria is comprised of an evaluation of the portfolio companies that meet the direct criteria. The incorporation of this information into marketing materials allows CARE Social Ventures' partners and investors to get a better sense of the priorities of the organization, namely the specific focus on poverty eradication and gender-inclusive growth.

Latin American Social Ventures

One of the most challenging tasks I was given for the internship at CARE Social Ventures was working with the Latin American team to evaluate three social ventures; ASOCLIM (Ecuador), IMA LIMPIA (Colombia) and COODEPTH (Mexico). Prior interactions between the CSV team and the Latin American team did not make much progress due to the language barrier. Because I speak Spanish, I was asked to step in and have a call with a group of CARE employees providing support to these three social ventures. The social ventures operate the same business model creating stable and safe jobs for paid household workers in Latin America and promoting women's economic empowerment in the region.

I attended a 90 minute call with the Latin American team on the status of the three social ventures and asked questions about their legal status, financial model, origins and relationship to CARE. Spanish is my second language and these topics are ones that I continue to learn more about in my graduate program. Asking questions about a complicated financial structure and investment plan in Spanish was a test of my communication skills, accounting knowledge and my understanding of investment models.

After the call concluded, I created a transcript of the meeting in English and shared it with my supervisor. We discussed further questions for the organization and I began an email thread to address areas that needed further explanation. This work culminated in an understanding between CARE Social Ventures and the social ventures in Latin America and opened up pathways for future collaboration.