Sector
Water, Sanitation, and Hygiene

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"Resources to validate new sanitation technologies and prepare for market entry – prerequisites for achieving sustainable, scaled solutions – tend to be quite scarce compared to those available to scale proven solutions. As such, a problematic ‘Pioneer Gap’ exists. This funder landscape seeks to both clarify the ‘Pioneer Gap’ and point readers to potential funding and other resources poised to help fill this problematic gap. Two promising forms of funding are explored in detail: catalytic philanthropy and blended finance leveraging impact investment."

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"Micro, small and medium private and social enterprises (hereafter referred to as 'enterprise') are emerging as important players in enabling or delivering sustainable water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH) services. This area is highly dynamic, thus pointing to a need for recent consolidated evidence about the effectiveness, sustainability and quality of services provided by such enterprises. A synthesis of literature on small-scale sanitation entrepreneurs was conducted in 2008, and at that time reported that the "quality research was relatively scarce, and few good case studies were found" (Valfrey-Visser and Schaub-Jones 2008, p.4). This paper reviews literature over the five years since 2008, once again taking stock and examining the nature and quality of the evidence for private enterprise engagement across both sanitation and water sub-sectors. In particular, we review of the evidence concerning if and how poor households and communities are being supported."

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"What does it take to scale up the growth of green sectors? This study was initiated to shed light on the common challenges that have limited the scaling of green enterprises and the emergence of competitive green sectors in developing countries. It also aims to uncover and catalog emerging opportunities that offer potential for enabling the scale up of these sectors in ways that might not have been possible in the past due to lack of a technology platform, mature business model, or other emerging opportunity. Finally, the study offers key recommendations for donors, governments, development finance institutions (DFIs), and entrepreneurial supports organizations that support green enterprises and seek to scale green sectors in developing countries.

The study focuses on enterprises operating across five green sectors – climate-smart agriculture, renewable energy, solid waste management, drinking water purification and management, and wastewater management. Within these five sectors, the study takes a deeper dive into seven sub-sectors that provide an interesting mix of business models, some of which are scalable and replicable, offer insights for other subsectors, and highlight innovative responses to the common challenges that green sectors face. These sub-sectors are solar home systems (SHS), mini/micro grids, community water purification, drip irrigation systems, online platforms for waste management, e-waste management, and industrial wastewater management."

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