Empowering grassroots
Helping Community Based Organisations Become Locally Sustainable
Helping Community Based Organisations Become Locally Sustainable
Community based organizations are the backbone of the development cycle in any society, and ensure last mile delivery of government welfare schemes and policies to the communities. However, they often face challenges in terms of bandwidth and resources which impedes their potential and impact.
Traditionally, the Indian development sector depended on large corporations, multinationals or international grant making institutions for their major funding, but these were often out of reach for local social initiatives. However, with progressive policies, a rising middle class and the CSR mandate, several new doors have opened for community based organisations within the country.
Smile Foundation’s Empowering Grassroots programme is designed to help such grassroots social initiatives become locally sustainable, without dependency on foreign resources. Aligned with Government of India’s “Atmanirbhar Bharat” mission, Empowering Grassroots helps CBOs to become more efficient, scale up their welfare activities and enables them to tap locally available resources to ensure long term sustainability of the social projects.
With the aim to catalyze effective and impactful grassroots social initiatives, Empowering Grassroots empowers genuine and credible Community Based Organisations through a comprehensive two-pronged approach:
Matching Grant to CBOs
Extending critical investment to ensure the smooth functioning of the social initiatives, while also encouraging them to raise part funding through locally available resources
Handholding & Capacity Building of CBOs
Building the capacities of the CBOs for better organizational planning, local fundraising through innovative ways, effective communication, and robust monitoring and reporting systems
Workshop conducted on Local Fundraising
Under its Empowering Grassroots initiative, Smile Foundation conducted a comprehensive workshop on Local Fundraising (LFR) for seven grassroots organisations from across the country.
CBO in Assam holds Annual Day celebrations
Under the guidance of the Smile Foundation’s Empowering Grassroots programme, CBO Shishu Sarothi in Guwahati, Assam, successfully transformed their annual celebration into …
CBO in Maharashtra conducts food fair for local support
Smile Foundation, under its Empowering Grassroots initiative, equipped Action for Women and Rural Development (AWARD) with essential practices and skills for local fundraising…
International Training of Trainers in Ethiopia
Empowering Grassroots Programme team participated in an international Training of Trainers (ToT) in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. 49 trainers from 11 countries – Sri Lanka, Cambodia, Gambia…
Training for partners of Bharat Rural Livelihood Foundation
Smile Foundation, under its Empowering Grassroots programme, organised a Training Trajectory on Local Fundraising for eight partner organisations of Bharat Rural Livelihoods Foundation…
Trainers’ Refresher for Quality Enhancement
A Trainers’ Refresher was held under the Empowering Grassroots programme to enhance the programme quality and focused on reflecting, sharing, and learning as a team…
The growth of the non-profit sector in India in the last two decades has been phenomenal. India has possibly the largest number of active non-government, not-for-profit organizations in the world. Official estimates put the number. Read more…
Change the Game Academy in Bangalore
Smile Foundation in collaboration with The Wilde Ganzen Foundation, the Netherlands organized a national five-day capacity building workshop in Bangalore for grassroots NGOs and CBOs under Change the Game Academy.
In an effort to learn from, and exchange knowledge, with other countries, Empowering Grassroots partners with like-minded organizations from time to time. One such ongoing partnership is with Change the Game Academy, a global alliance established by the Wild Ganzen Foundation, Netherlands. CTGA has partners in 15 countries, and Smile Foundation is recognized as a co-creator of the alliance. CTGA aims to mentor local social initiatives from across the world to become locally sustainable by offering a range of physical and virtual training programmes.
