Platforms to help Businesses conduct effective CSR initiatives
Corporate Social Responsibility has gained a lot of importance in the last few years. Especially after the CSR mandate, the companies are investing their time as well as money in ensuring that the maximum impact is made in society. With rising popularity, CSR has introduced a lot more challenges for the corporates. One of them being, choosing the cause that aligns to all the stakeholders of a business, and finding a relevant partner to work towards the cause.
Partnerships between Corporates and NGOs have been increasing for a few years now. However, choosing the NGO which has an effective set of programs and proven commitment to the cause can be a difficult task for a corporate. According to the Central Statistical Organisation, there are around 3.2 million registered NGOs in India. To help the business choose an NGO which works best for them, several online platforms have emerged. Some of them are Samhita GoodCSR, SociallyGood and Goodera.
These three platforms together have a database of 5,268 NGOs, and have helped pool in funds to the tune of Rs 2,550 crore since 2016. They are spread across diverse social welfare projects – from providing education to the underprivileged, to enabling access to drinking water for people in rural areas.
Goodera has a database of around 2,000 NGOs spread across various causes, from healthcare to skill development. It lists NGOs after conducting due diligence with respect to the degree of impact, reliability, and functioning of the organisation. The Corporates can buy access to this database by paying a fixed charge on a yearly basis. The platform which is available on both web and app formats also has a tool to manage CSR resources and money. Once the company signs up on the platform, and onboards its CSR projects, the health of the project can be determined anytime based on certain key performance indices (KPIs) on its interactive dashboard.
SociallyGood was founded in 2017. It helps corporates take an informed decision when it comes to their CSR strategy. It allows companies to filter and chose an NGO based on location, cause, and scale of impact. Besides, it also employs artificial intelligence(AI) algorithms to recommend social causes.
Samhita GoodCSR was initially funded and supported by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and Tata Trust. In addition to connecting corporates with non-profits, it offers a project management feature, called GoodCSR Direct, on its web platform.
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