India April 2012

This is GiftVest at work. The month of April saw us make our first 1to4 trip to India since making our initial impact investments.

The scale of the challenge in India but also the scale of the opportunity become apparent when considering some of the numbers involved (see below). There are more impoverished families in India than in any other place in the world. There is more infant malnutrition in India than in any other place in the world. Increasing our activities in India makes sense in terms of social impact as well as from an investment perspective.

During the field trip with Hardika Shah, CEO of Kinara, we were able to see for ourselves multiple examples of job-creating businesses in such diverse sectors as manufacturing (auto parts), artisan groups (production of bags made from banana rope - above) and trading activities. Quality jobs for a sustainable future.

Consider this:

• 1 million young people enter the Indian job market every month and this will continue unabated for the next 10 years. 
• 300 million people are already in employment or are seeking employment without necessarily having the required skills to do the job.
• The National Skill Development Corporation projects a need for 244 million skilled jobs in the next 10 years. Current output of vocational skills training is only about 3 million people per year.

The investment thesis for vocational skills training and employability training is absolutely compelling. Watch this space...