Create Outstanding Payment Mail for NPOs Effortlessly

Outstanding payment mail for NPOs

Varada: Welcome to another episode of DevX. Yes, this one is one I'm very excited about because today we are going to be talking with and talking about a funder that I think pretty much everybody in the sector knows off, but. Surprisingly, a lot of people know very little about and they're a huge, huge contributor to the overall social development impact space. We ourselves have been very fortunate to work on programs funded, by, this organization. But I think easily about, maybe a decade now and the organization I'm speaking about is USAID. And yes, today I'm really, really keen to learn more about USAID, the kind of work that they do, and how non profits in the sector at large can, can benefit from collaborating with them. And we have with us today to shed light on that. And share some knowledge about USAID. Today we have with us Mr. Arvind Kumar Pandian, who is senior advisor at USAID and leads the charge for their partnerships and collaborations across the sector. So welcome Arvind absolute pleasure to have you here today. Arvind: Thanks a lot. This is super exciting. Thanks for the nice intro. I was actually thinking that you're going to completely keep this as a suspense about my organization because you didn't tell the organization's name till the very last minute. So thanks a lot. Thanks for having me in this podcast. I think this is my first podcast, so I'm super excited about it. And I've seen your podcast, the way you are covering some of the development issues, really focusing on very specific topics. Important questions that different stakeholders have to understand whether it's the government, whether it's a civil society, whether it's the community based organization. So I'm super, super excited to be a part of this podcast. A little bit about me as you introduced I, my name is Arvind Kumar. Been with USAID for the last 18 years I had a very interesting career. I had my commerce graduation from Chennai and they did my master's in marketing from Pondicherry University. It's just a coincidence. I started my career with with a project when I was doing my MBA for condoms. And then I never in my lifetime realized that's going to be pushing me towards the developmental sector. So, from just a project that I took on working with Hindustan latex as the regional manager coordinates, and then I moved to a local NGO in, in Chennai for doing AIDS prevention and control. And here, I'm with USAID after almost 6 years of commercial and social sector experience with NGOs into the development space. USAID, as you rightly said many people will be knowing about it. Many organizations know about it. We are fairly well, established. We are U. S. government's lead agency for development programs. We are present in about 80 countries, even in India, our programs have started almost 70 years back. So, USAID has been having a very long standing fruitful partnership with the government of India Within the program, so we work on multiple sectors. Health is one of the biggest focused areas for us. We work on water and sanitation. We work on education. We work on clean energy and climate change programs. That's a little bit of a very brief introduction about USAID. We work with multiple stakeholders across the country. We have had programs. If you take health, we have worked in right from polio, eradicating polio in India and limiting polio in India. We have worked on TB eliminating TB in India, which is a prime minister's major objective. I'm sure you'll be aware that well, the entire world was planning to setting a target for eliminating TB by 2030. Our prime minister was very bold and ambitious to set that. Okay, let's eliminate it by 2025. We also work on the HIV space. So, creating an AIDS free generation is another a big space for us that we are working on. We work to prevent maternal and child deaths. That's again, one of the major focus for us. We work in the primary space because we all know if we are able to do good primary care and good preventive care, it really, really would be a big advantage for the overall health systems. So that's briefly about programs. I'm happy to add or build on this if you have any other questions. Varada: Yes, I have. I have many questions. But before that, I want to add a little bit of trivia here. Not many people know, uh, okay. A lot of us would have heard of moods condoms, right? So they are one of the larger players in the space. But I think very few people would know that Arvind is actually one of the key people. Who is behind the creation of the Moods condom brand where he took charge of HLL's marketing HLL is for those that don't know, Hindustan Latex Limited and saw the need to actually involve the Let's call it private sector thinking and involving the consumers at large beyond the, government partnerships that HLL was part of. So we have a very major brand maker with us today. And that's a bit of trivia that I didn't know about you. Arvind: That's a very, very proud moment for me, but that was one of the most embarrassing moment for my wife. So she will always say, They say he works for HLL because people usually think it's Hindustan Lever Limited and Latex was never thought about. Wife works for the ministry of defense. So whenever her colleagues meet, she'll say, my husband works for HLL and never go and expand what is HLL for just on the lighter side. Varada: Yeah. And I imagine expanding HLL and then talking about what you do. Might have been a slightly different level of embarrassment also back then talking about condoms and things like that. We've also had a lot of experience working in HIV communication. And I remember when we used to work on it and we used to do these road shows and demos, my desk in the office would be filled with condoms. Like I would have condoms everywhere. And the rest of the organization would be like, what is this person doing? So yeah, that's very Varada: interesting stories around, around HIV and But I'm so glad that the space has evolved so much and to an extent where today we don't need to say. Use a condom. I think the awareness levels are, which are so high that even in the high risk communities, it is it is something that is now the norm as opposed to what it was when you started out and even let's say about 12 to 13 years ago, when we started working on the cause I think that's a sea change. Arvind: And yeah, yeah. The situation at that point of time was like even a holding on condoms was not allowed to be put in some states. That was the sort of situation we were all facing. Varada: And I'm really looking forward to unboxing a lot more, but just to quickly pull back and summarize. So USAID's key focus areas are education, clean energy. Food security, health, right? These are the four key areas that you work in. WASH. What, water and sanitation. And climate change yes. Climate change is the newest very key entrant into your strategy bucket. And we're going to talk more about that today. So coming down to very quickly, the health space that USAID works in within that we have MNCH, that is maternal and child health. That's a key area of focus for USAID. And like you said, tuberculosis is another area. We also have worked on tuberculosis. The TV Harega Desh Jeete ka campaign was one of our. Pet initiatives that we spent a couple of years working on HIV and HIV free generation and what any other areas in health that I'm missing that USAID works. Arvind: Another major area is about primary care. Promoting primary care and though even the government of India's initial primary care programs are focused on maternal and child health. I think now there is a much more comprehensive primary care program, suddenly there's a push for how do we promote NCDs? How do we make geriatric patients be covered? How do you address the ear issue, the ENT issues? And the system needs to be geared up to provide this comprehensive services in the integrated in the health and wellness centers. Varada: I think health system strengthening is what you're talking about, about working with the government delivery system and how to make it more robust, more efficient, more effective. And I think more responsive to, to be rapidly evolving needs. That's what I'm gathering to a large extent as well. Excellent. Arvind: There has been elements of health system strengthening, like your workforce development, your supply chain strengthening. These are some core areas that we have been providing technical assistance for several years, but when COVID came. That's the time when we really understood the need for very robust health system strengthening, whether it is your availability of stocks, whether it's your availability of oxygen supply systems, whether your availability of drugs, your people management systems. All those things really, really came into flow. And I would say that that really made USAID to give a greater emphasis on health system strengthening. So while we were doing that, it actually was a turning point for us to really look into it and say, okay, there is a need for us to expand or provide more support in this particular space. And there was a felt need, not just by us, but the government is also feeling the same, Varada: so, Arvind, superb. That's really good to learn. And as you know, so DevX is really a podcast that focuses on how do we build better partnerships? Right? How do we facilitate the knowledge exchange between funders and between implementing partners? So I'm also gonna, I'm also going to keep double clicking on aspects that make it a little real, right? For people. So there's a conceptual and there's the real. So just help me understand. So what's the kind of annual budget that USAID India has? That you deploy Arvind: so annual budget varies and I can, it depends on various situations. Thankfully, our spending levels have been fairly good. It also depends on scenarios. For example, when there was COVID, we were almost like getting about $200 million. I'm speaking about the health part alone if you take USAID overall. Our annual budget would be anywhere around 60 to 70 million, approximately about 500 crores, you can say. 50 to 60%, a large majority of this funding would be for the health sector. And then it goes for the remaining sector. Varada: Wow, that is huge. I didn't know that. And I've been working with USAID for like in some form or the other, our org has been working with USAID for about 10 years. Also I think USAID's funding is very catalytic in nature. I think it amplifies, it brings together, not just financial capital, But I think also intellectual capital and amplifies it to a great extent. You don't just fund a project and say, this is it, go to the community and do this. Your way of thinking is very different. Can you talk a little bit about that? Because I would want implementing partners, NGOs, other sector stakeholders to understand the Outlook that that USAID has Arvind: so our funding is and resources are all determined by various factors. One is that. U. S. congressional priorities. So that is going to be one big part. Now, added to that the most important thing is that when we go to a local country, then the country's priorities become our topmost priority. So, to a large extent, even, entire bilateral programs is based on agreement with the government of India where programmatically, what should we focus on? What is the type of activities that we should think about which states or geographies we should focus on? All these are to some extent, largely decided in consultation with the critical and the most important stakeholder, which is the government of India. In addition to that, we also have some substantive discussions and engagements with academic institutions, research institutions, NGOs, civil society organizations, private sector it requires a substantive holistic effort and there are multiple stakeholders who could play a very, very important space. And based on these consultations, then we determine, okay, what's going to be our geographies. How is our funding going to be planned for which programs? That's how it's all Varada: right. Say more about also how the government perceives your support, where it's not really about the capital, the funding that comes in, but more the technical skills that you bring in to support the government. Say, tell us a little bit more about that. Arvind: Yeah, so. I think the government of India has identified that our capabilities or expertise goes beyond just funding. And so many times, what happens is that very important strategy papers they have involved us and asked our inputs and we have provided critical support that if you take because we have access to global best practices and global developments. And there's a lot of progress, a lot of achievements. So at this point of time, The government is not looking for a traditional type of support from us. I think they're really looking for next generation. How do we move to the next mile? That's the type of support. So we bring in a lot of best practices from other countries and share it with the government of India. We have access to several private sector solutions. Whether it could be pharmaceutical solutions, it could be a digital technology or emerging technology or AI. So there are so many new developments that are coming, which can shape the. Development and accelerate the developmental agendas in a much more faster way or more efficient way. So these are the types of expertises that we're trying to bring to governments, both national and state. Varada: Sure. I think , that's very interesting. And I think that's very important for for organizations, NGOs, nonprofits that are looking to partner on USAID programs, because that speaks to yeah, the capabilities that they need to have to be able to contribute to this. And also to be able to absorb and cascade in their programs. I think that, that is a very important lens that organizations need to have when they think of working with USA. So one more Arvind: area I would say is that India is also a leader now, correct? India is also, you take E Sanjeevani program, you take the way we managed our COVID programs phenomenal scale phenomenal achievements, right? So India is now also becoming a. A major learning opportunity for other countries. So as we speak there is my team, which is actually coordinating a couple of exchange visits from other countries. So it's just not bringing, from outside to India for India's development or India's gap filling. But India, we're also moving into the space of, okay, India has done a lot. So how do we take it to the external world? Varada: That's amazing. That's amazing. I think, yeah. So that's a very it's a very unique when you're also helping to showcase and share. We could have to teach the world. Oh, super. So you spoke about geographies. Can you shed some light on what is your geographic focus within India? Which regions, which states are of higher priority that the government feels and that you partner on? Yes. Arvind: Yeah. So this is a very interesting and sometimes a challenging question for us. I'll tell you why, because, if somebody looks into our, all our programs, they may see that we are spread across the country. So how we, we put this across is that if you take HIV, our footprints are going to be only in two states, Maharashtra and Telangana. If you take maternal child health programs, then we are spread across 12 states. Madhya Pradesh, Jharkhand, Odisha, and I think the entire Assam and northeast. So that part, wherever there is the need and where the sort of indicators are not that very encouraging, where the performance could be much more improved. So this is if you take our TB programs, they are slightly in a different geography. But what we are trying to do is that we are trying to see How do we consolidate so that in, in the particular state or in the particular geography, or even it need not be a state, it could be a district, it could be a block. How do we bring in all our forces together? So that you bring in all the advantages and that particular district or block. Has overall better health outcome indicators and not just specific to 1 particular disease. We have started bringing that sort of synergies. Varada: So the kind of work that you're doing is very, very strategic in partnership with the government. The scale at which you operate by default would become higher because you're working at that level with government systems that anyway have very widespread, very deep penetration. Now, to me, what that automatically becomes is, I would say a kind of a filter for the kind of organizations that you work with, right? Like I said earlier, they need to be organizations of a certain large strength, a caliber in, and robustness in terms of systems processes, right? So that becomes inherent to the nature of the organizations that you directly work with. But how, is there a way I want to just ask if there is, uh, how do smaller organizations, mid level NGOs, grassroot NGOs, how can they participate? Is there a way, is there a way for them maybe be subgrantees to your larger organization? How can they participate in this kind of change that you're bringing? Arvind: So because we get the money from US government and it's a US taxpayers money. There is a need for us to be extremely diligent about the way the funding is going to be spent. Funding cannot go for unproductive activities. Funding cannot go for terrorist type of intervention types of activity. Their organization should not be involved. So the due diligence that we take. And the fund management is very, very critical. But that does not mean that we are only limiting our programs to large international organizations. We have been working with several Indian organizations. We have partnered with an organization called karnataka Health Promotion Trust. We are partnered with IPE Global. We are partnered with Voluntary Health Services, which is again a local NGO , and they became the mother NGO as our main implementing partner and through them, they have given to about 80 to 90 smaller NGOs across different districts. We have worked with during times we had partnered with another organization called catalyst management services was again, an Indian organization and through them, almost like 100 different organizations were given some either technical or support or financial support. So it's not that we have not worked with the, Indian or smallest scale organizations, but by design, because our systems have to be very robust and diligent, we tried to go with, fairly established organizations. And they then work closely with local partners. And for any new any award that's going to be announced by USAID organizations can always reach out to our grants. gov website and then that will have a complete listing of all. Upcoming procurements that USAID has got, and any organization, they'll be able to get that information from the grants.gov. And we have a very transparent system. This is 1 model. The 2nd model is that there are unsolicited proposals that is also available. If somebody goes to a website, there's a link in the website says unsolicited proposal. So any organization can send their concepts. To that unsolicited link, and then that is seen by what we call as a program support office, which is not a technical office. They then see what is this concept for? And then they then transfer that particular concept notes to our team. So unsolicited concepts can also be submitted in addition to that, there are also Washington based opportunities. If organizations go into our website and search for development, innovations, ventures, DIVs. They can go there and they can then submit their concepts. Usually it is for innovative products, solutions, technologies new processes, and it could be a research activity also that's again, an opportunity. And there, again, there are different levels and organization can ask a minimum level of say a hundred thousand dollars, and it can go up to 5 million. So there are multiple opportunities for small, medium, large, in national or international or government, not government, the private sector or the civil society, all of them to be collaborating. Brilliant. Varada: Brilliant. I must say, thank you, Arvind. I think that is exactly what I was looking to understand better. So for grassroots organizations, smaller organizations that work in the community, because that's their super strength, their community connection, their community understanding is huge, is phenomenal. That may be large organizations might even miss. A little bit, and there is room, there is ample room for them to partner with, USAID programs. And I just want to again flag, so grants. gov, grants. gov is the place to go and look for these to see what all USAID is doing, where all they are, they're investing in projects. So it makes sense to map out their larger partners and then follow the work and see where you can contribute. If you are a fundraiser or a resource mobilization specialist for a smaller organization, that's the blueprint to work on these large prestigious impact making programs. Mid level organizations can also send unsolicited proposals. I'm just summarizing. I did not know that USAID accepts unsolicited proposals. They do. And the way to do that is again, through the website. So these are all the ways that are there. For small, mid and large organizations to work with USAID. So please, I encourage everybody watching to make the most of it. Arvind: Yeah, in addition to that, but there are a couple of more other arrangements. For example, IPE Global. They are a partner who's working on the blended financing facility. So the blended financing facility is an opportunity for NGOs startups. If they go to the. Samriddh project site, there are themes and if the particular NGO or a startup has a good idea and wants to do something, they can also then put it across . And it's a very transparent system. We have. Very reputed organizations and institutions in the governance committee. So some of our partners are also offering these opportunities for NGOs and startups and innovators to, get connected to our programs. Varada: Superb. You've used a keyword transparency. I think, thank you for removing some amount of, opacity that is only perceived in the ecosystem. Most people think it's not there. They just don't know where to look. So thank you for telling us where to look and making USAID that much more accessible. Through, your inputs, fabulous. So yes, that's another thing that I take away from this. So now that we're slightly in the space of innovation, right? I also understand that you're starting to do some very innovative work around climate and health. And that's a new emerging area of focus and need. That U. S. A. I. D. is looking into. Tell us a little bit more about that. Arvind: Yeah, so all of us know that climate is really affecting every person in the globe in some form or the other. It's just not the person alone. All the living species is being affected in some form or the other climate. Right. Arvind: And, many of your audience will also be knowing that there was a, Paris agreement, uh, declaration where they said that we should keep the temperature earth's temperature level to a certain level limit. So they took the pre industrial timeframe and they said that we shouldn't allow the earth's temperature to go more than 1. 5 degrees Celsius prior to the, pre industrial era stage 2024 may actually cross the dot. Whether it's in down south in India, in Kanyakumari, or if you're in Jammu Kashmir, everywhere we are now seeing, or any part of the globe, we are seeing extreme temperatures, heat waves, flood situations, water scarcity, air pollution, all these are really, causing a big, big issue. And, as a result of this, what is happening is that there's a large number of, climate associated disease or even accelerating some of the existing health conditions. So, health wise, if you see, the disease burdens and challenges are phenomenal. And some statistics are there for example Air pollution alone is contributing to about 8 million deaths annually worldwide. If you take flood and waterborne infections is contributing about 3. 5 million deaths. This is something which could have been controlled well, if all humans acted responsibly, but somehow for various reasons, it does not work. Again, the vector ecology is changing because of changing temperatures. In some places, the temperature rises or temperatures grows, and so you see a lot of potential vector bond diseases increasing. So there's so many things which are happening. Because of this. So that is a reason why India, as well as several other countries have prioritized the need for working on the climate and health space. If you take the climate changes can affect our, Agriculture productivity, and if the agriculture productivity is lost, , it could lead to a further increase in malnutrition. Some statistics even say that about annually India is losing about 4 to 5 GDP because of climate, uh, effects of climate. That's a phenomenally high number. Varada: Hmm. This is complex. This is complex. And I see why you're focusing so much on it now. So by and large, that is, the impact of climate change on health. There's also, the impact of the vulnerability of let's say health systems, to climate change. That's another piece that is also there. Arvind: Absolutely. Absolutely. You're very right. Thankfully, we have a good, public health system, which caters to a large population. We have a pluralistic healthcare system, which means it's just not the government. But even despite all these things, our burden of disease is so high that it puts tremendous pressure on people getting, quality services. . Again, if you see our healthcare providers, doctors, nurses, if my understanding is correct, we are only about 10 or 11 healthcare providers for every 10, 000 population, whereas the ideal number should be about 45 or 46 number for about 10, 000 population. So we have a very challenging situation in terms of the infrastructure. So I think that is the reason the health systems needs to be much more better equipped, in terms of managing this disease burden. Number one. Number two, if you take the health facilities, many of the health facilities have not done the vulnerability assessment. And because of their lack of not doing a vulnerability assessment, when there is such a weather issue, their systems gets affected. How to manage such situations and while, climate changes are not totally in our control. Resilience is in our control. How do we plan it? How do we make sure that we are able to manage those situations? We need to have a supply chain systems in place. Again, heat and extreme weather conditions can affect your drug and vaccine efficacy. So how are we prepared for that? So I would say that the health systems is doing an excellent job. But if you, when it comes to climate. I think they have feel the need for doing something, but their systems are still not fully geared to manage a calamity or an issue. Varada: Understood. And I think the third point that you made was a, is a light bulb for me, if the efficacy of medicines drop, even if, for example, there is adherence that has been achieved after, I don't know how many decades of efforts, and if you imagine the plight of the poor patient, if they are adherent, but the medicine is deficient. Because of climate change and the efficacy dropping. It's catastrophic impact. Arvind: I see what you're saying. And it could also contribute to the challenge for the challenges of antimicrobial resistances and all. So there's a lot of such connected issue. Another major issue is that many of our facilities, particularly the rural, smaller facilities and all. Power supplies can be interrupted during flood situations. How do we manage those things? And if power is not there in a health facility, just imagine, it's not a movie theater, correct? If we don't act now. Decisively, if we don't take actions now, it could be a big issue. Varada: And I think my single biggest takeaway or summary to that will be that, at this point in time, inaction is likely to cause far, far more damage. 100 percent anything very well put. So it's, yeah, Varada: So it's about being proactive, being preemptive to what is likely to happen right now so that it doesn't happen. Right. Absolutely. Makes sense. So tell us a little bit now about what USAID is doing in this space. That, that's something I'd be very interested in. Arvind: Sure, so just before that, maybe 1 more point I wanted to highlight is also about sometimes this is not getting the required attention and we don't speak much about it. So, if you see the greenhouse gas emissions. There are certain sectors, which contribute a very high percentage. For example, the energy sector, the transport sector, sometimes agriculture sector, they all contribute. Health is usually not seen as a top contributor for greenhouse gas emissions, but there are some studies globally, which so is that health sector is now also emerging as one big contributor anywhere from 5 to 7 percent depending on the country. Thankfully, India is much lower even than what the 5 percent is, but there is also a need for us to focus on. How are our facilities are they contributing to these greenhouse gas emissions? And what can we do to address those? Because every small effort is going to make us advance in our net zero goals and priorities. It's not just necessarily the facility, the supply chains, everything is adding to that. Varada: I know you said that India is lower than the 5 to 7 percent that is the global average, but I read that a little differently. The way I see it is it's a little lower because our overall systems are still getting from good to better to great. Right. It's growing. I think by the time we reach the system where 1. 4 or whatever the billions is that we are going to be are fully served by our health systems. That's a significant delta away. And as we build that system, we need to be mindful of this. Right. Absolutely. Arvind: Uh, now, coming to your point on What is USAID doing again? So it's a different levels. We do our programs. So at a state level, in some states, we have helped bring some best practices across the country and help to put together a very robust climate health action plan so, in the last 2, 3 years is where many of the states have come together and put together their climate action plans. Now, how do you operationalize the climate action plans? So, in some states, in some facilities, we're actually doing this and trying to show if it can be a model for other states to be undertaken. That's the 2nd type of thing. Third is that we also integrate many of our climate action programs. We really want every of our project to be integrating climate as part of that. But we are a small group, correct? We can't manage everything. And so we largely focus on highlighting some of the good practices. And playing the convening role to bring together more and more players to understand this issue, understand the opportunities and work together. So that is where SACH has come out with SACH stands for Sustainable Action for Climate and Health. This is actually managed by one of our partners called Center for Health Innovations and Research, which is a PATH group. And in a very short span of last 9 months, I would say they have been able to do some phenomenal work. So they have working with Mumbai Corporation and a few other corporations to see how do we support establishing a metropolitan surveillance unit and these metropolitan surveillance units actually do a. Disease is the check for disease outbreaks and all and make it a little bit more prepared. Second India is, as I mentioned to you sometime back private sector is a huge space. And if you take many people go to the private sector health facility as their first point of contact, they may go to their local, clinic or local, healthcare provider. It could be a corporate hospital. It could be a mom and pop type of a clinic. But the private sector has not. Taken active role in addressing The required thought process of how do we deal with the situation? So, that is an area. And when we speak to them, all of them, or at least a majority of them are interested to do that, but they don't know what to do. They can't get where to get themselves trained because the government program largely focuses on training the government health facilities. That itself is a substantive number. So, for the private sector, then it has, they have to sort of do it on their own. They may go to different programs. It may not be standardized. So you, SACH initiative has now come out with standardized learning resource packages for a private sector. It can be used by the public. Also, we, these very recently provided the support to Mumbai, Corporation for training their healthcare workers. But this is largely also focused towards how the private sector can use this training facilities. for using it. The other important initiative that has been supported by SACH as the, they're establishing a platform, which actually is bringing together. If a hospital wants to do something, or if an NGO wants to do something, they get logged into our platform. There will be also in the same platform organizations, which have got solutions. So, a startup or a private company or any organization will say that, okay, I have a heat management solution or a water conservation solution or an air pollution solution. So, those solutions are also brought into the same platform and there are also an opportunity for several funding organizations. It could be an investment group. It could be a CSR type of a funding. So, all 3 of them are in 1 platform. And we are facilitating this process. And by this way, what we are trying to do is address many things. One, expand the, climate health, engagement opportunities to multiple organizations, provide an opportunity for enough, a new, innovative startups and companies to come and say, okay, here's my idea. I want to test it out. And third to also, Channelized funding, different types of funding for climate health programs. So I would say that this is again a very, very interesting initiative. It's just getting a rolled out. I think as of now, I think they're doing their final test. They had recently a pledge as called the SACH pledge. And about 85 organizations have signed in. So many such interesting interventions are, have started to take place in Delhi. So Varada: 85 organizations are already part of the SACH initiative, Sustainable Action in Climate & Health that's true. Arvind: And that's a very interesting mix from technology companies to, Hospitals to youth associations to civil society organizations. I'll give you two good examples, which you may want to highlight. One is an organization called DCVMN. This stands for Developing Countries Vaccine Manufacturers Network. So developing countries, that means they are beyond India. And they had approached us. To see if we can, provide the sources to make 1 or 2 vaccine manufacturing companies be completely net zero, that's 1 example. Another example is, for example, a company, which is, doing, pharmaceutical supplies, that company wants to do some research on, Drug efficacy is affecting getting affected due to temperature changes. So it's just not the NGOs alone who says, okay, I want to do a an intervention in my catchment area. But this would be even for much broader scope is what we are trying to provide through this plan. Varada: That's very interesting. So you're creating a collaborator of different players who are coming in with their strengths, their expertise, and they're able to cross pollinate. Absolutely. And , also, of course you have other funders also who are part of this. So let's say nonprofits. Can also join the SACH initiative, the yeah, Arvind: absolutely provided it provided they bring any one of these things. They have a problem that they want to address or they have a solution that they want to put together, or they may say, I have resources that I want to contribute for. If they have any of these three things, they can be a collaborative. So this platform is actually encompassing these three things. Organizations who want to undertake some activities and looking for technical or financial resources, they can put here. And there's also this platform also provides an opportunity for different types of funding to come in, whether it's an impact investment funding or a CSR funding, or whether it's a grant funding. So this is how the platform is going to be an enabler. And any organization who is interested in joining this, can easily join. It's only a 5 minute thing. They have to just click the SACH platform. There will be a pledge form, which will open. They have to just sign the pledge form and immediately they can have access to various resources. Varada: Fabulous. I think that sounds like a possibly game changing intervention, that could be greater than the sum of all its parts. Right now you have 85, but as more people come in and they contribute and they exchange and they receive as well. Absolutely. I think this could be a very catalytic lever. Fabulous. Arvind: Absolutely. Varada: So the next thing I just want to understand from you, so we're talking about health, we're talking about climate change. And how we can correct that curve, right? For all our I'm very curious. What is the role that you see for youth in this entire endeavor, right? So, where do you see youth participating? Where do you see youth contributing? Tell me a little bit about youth, climate and health. If I have to bring those three together, what's your take? Arvind: So the good part is that, India's youth are super intelligent, correct? And India is, youth is also getting into the creative mode and getting into startups and creative problem solving. India is a land of engineers, correct? Today's youth is also a lot more conscious about social issues. They are aware about, certain aspects which should be avoided. A simple thing is some of the people are becoming saying that, okay, we want to be minimalistic. So there's a lot of youth which are becoming very, very conscious, socially conscious, and wanting to do good for themselves as well as for the society. So, we feel that the youth power could be a big game changer for us. We'll have to tap the youth power in a very, creative way. And I think, there's been opportunities where, organizations have undertaken some assessments, organizations have used youth people for camps. Advocacy, awareness camps. These are some things which are already there, but I think we need to think beyond that and see how do we get them into problem solving? Also, this provides substantive opportunities for green jobs and green livelihoods. It's not been very well tapped. And so what this could be also offering is that how can our youth be used for, using technologies, emerging technologies, AI or ML to address some of these issues, or they could be new opportunities in connecting climate and health, but that has got a huge potential and some of the programs have also started using youths, not just champions. They also use the youth to give them some earning opportunities by asking them to promote a certain few products, which is for addressing climate health issues. So that could be an income generation opportunity. Varada: And, I think to a large extent, you're still from what I understand in a very formative stage of this endeavor and this initiative. So I think a lot of depth and richness was also come from the stakeholders and from the youth on what can be done and what are the different things. Arvind: You are very right. You're very right. This is just, not putting some ideas from a boardroom meeting or, sitting in a podcast is going to be. Yeah. 1 percent of what will be required and what can be done in the field, right? So the power of community involving them, engaging them actively. Is something which we have to do. Varada: Fabulous. Arvind, I think that was it. I think that's our episode. And I think this has been such an enlightening conversation and, I want to specifically thank you. I'll tell you why, because for being so approachable, for being so open, for being so candid, because I think that is one of the things we need much more of in the sector. And especially you representing an organization like USAID, I think more people need to feel that. Yes, the it's accessible, right? Thank you for being so warm and so so sweet I think there's a lot that I'm taking away From this conversation and mm-Hmm? yeah. Thank you. If you have any No, I, I really Arvind: want to thank you for having the, having me in this podcast. I thoroughly enjoyed this, because as I told you, this is my first part podcast. I was thinking, oh, I always, I hope I'm going to do, I was a bit tense, but this was really very, very well done and I really want to commend you and your organization. For the excellent work you're doing, advocacy and communication plays a very, very critical role. You and several organizations like you are the voice for the community, voice for the NGOs, voice for the social entrepreneurs, voice for the individuals. So you taking this to a larger audience is something which is very, very important and we really respect this. It's not just a lip service. I'm trying to do this. I'm really, really meaning it and our organization also believes this totally. So thank you once again for the opportunity and I wish for all success to you and your organization. Varada: Thank you so much, Arvind. That means so much. And I know you're doing this from a completely opposite time zone. So thank you also very, very much for that. I look forward to catching up with you when you're back in India. Yeah. And, uh,