Public-Private Partnerships

The greatest global health challenge for children is disease related to water, sanitation and hygiene. To address these health challenges, Sesame Workshop and World Vision established the Wash Up! initiative with the ultimate goal of reducing the number of children suffering or dying from preventable and treatable diseases.

Too often, well-meaning aid programs meet bare-minimum standards of quality — just “good enough” for the world’s poorest people. But by addressing “wicked problems” through the lens of design thinking and a social business model, one public-private partnership has been able to improve the health and livelihood of residents in eastern Congo.

Noncommunicable diseases lead to over 90 percent of all deaths in Ukraine, many of them preventable. With technological advancements and the removal of financial barriers, one public-private partnership is working to deliver essential services to improve prevention, diagnosis, treatment and medicine to patients at little to no cost.

Equatorial Guinea struggled with malaria for years. The Bioko Island Malaria Elimination Project, a public-private partnership with a stakeholder perspective, has tackled the problem, leading to medical innovation, improved health of inhabitants and increased infrastructure and productivity.

Though agriculture is important to Nigerian economic activity and rice is a major food staple in Nigerian households, the domestic supply does not meet demand. The Value Chain Development Program public-private partnership is designed to improve the livelihoods of economically disadvantaged farmers.

In less than five years, Myanmar coffee went from a low-grade commodity to a high-value specialty sold for premium prices globally. Through training in farming, expertise and training itself — as well as attention to both the supply and demand sides of a market — Value Chains for Rural Development helped farmers and others across the value chain.

Environmental conservation and economic development can both be sustainable — and are not mutually exclusive. The Andean bear is a symbol of the potential for the multiple wins of preserving land and growing incomes in Colombia, where Conservamos la Vida serves as an example of a public-private partnership improving the world.

Haiti is one of the lowest income nations worldwide. Though the government provides many public health care clinics, they’re under-resourced. One public-private partnership is working to deliver sustainable primary care to low-income families through a social enterprise model.

The Wireless Access for Health initiative uses computing and mobile technology to improve public health care delivery for millions of people in the Philippines. It’s an example of a public-private partnership that makes strategic use of business’ ability to innovate and scale with the public sector’s understanding of the underserved.

The sourcing, manufacturing and logistics within corporate supply chains can benefit from partnerships with governments and nonprofit organizations. These joint endeavors support a range of social and business objectives by employing the expertise and assets of multiple sectors.