Week 10&11

Team: COPRA

Grand vision

Increase the income of 3.5 million Filipino coconut farmers.

Filipino coconuts farmers should be able to earn a livable wage

No Fillipino coconuts farmers should live below $2/day 

Explain how the extant system around your innovation works

Farmers harvest their coconuts, smoke/sun dry them, and sell them to the middleman broker, and the middleman broker sells it to the processing plants where it is then processed into higher value added products. In this process, the coconut farmers are unable to make significant income due to the middleman broker paying lower costs due to the consistency and quality of the Copra. 

Our innovation will reconfigure the extant system by enabling farmers to process their coconuts into higher value added products on their own, thus enabling them to take in more money than they did before.

Develop a conceptual framework of the extant system highlighting the systematic challenge, and when possible/relevant, the human experience

Corruption is high in the coconut industry.

Copra production tends to be in more isolated locations because the coconut farms closer to the cities and good highways supply the large urban fresh food markets or the very large integrated coconut processing factories such as Peter Paul, Franklin Baker, Celebes and others.

Small-hold copra farmers do not have access to a reliable electricity grid.

Small-hold copra farmers do not have access to processing equipment or technology to produce higher value-added products.

Task: Develop 2 visuals before and after the configuration describing how money/coconut/copra stakeholders are flowing in this system

October 23 Blog Post

  1. If you are the Chief of Police for Afghanistan, what solution would you develop to pay the cops that are actually working, reduce corruption, and boost their morale.

If our team were acting as the Chief of Police for Afghanistan, we would ensure that systems were set in place in order to help address the issue of corruption and boost morale. To begin with, we would ensure that additional administrators are hired in order to manually regulate the payroll system, this way we can help prevent Ghost policemen. These administrators must not only hold themselves accountable, but also hold their coworkers accountable for any acts of corruption. Yet, in understanding that the corruption present in Afghanistan is hierarchical, we must have a leverage point in order to prevent corruption at the administrative level. In this scenario, our leverage point would be increasing the countrywide literacy rate. By increasing the literacy rate we can:

  • Increase education and knowledge among the general public
  • Allow more Afghani citizens to be involved in their local services
  • Increase voter turnout and accountability

These effects experienced by increasing the literacy rate will all directly impact levels of corruption and the likelihood for corrupt officials to stay in power. Additionally, we can also implement activities within the bureaucracy in order to build deeper relationships, increase teamwork, and boost morale.

 

A second solution is to create an anti-corruption agency (ACA) that works independently from the police. The ACA will be held to an international standard of monitoring corruption; its workers will have to go through an arduous screening process before employment to ensure they are noncorrupt. One way to accomplish this is to ask employees to report their official tax and financial records each year. It is important that there is a single ACA, however. In countries where there are multiple ACAs – like Iraq – certain areas are overlooked. Additionally, multiple ACAs compete for the same financial resources so it would deter it from its true mission – to limit corruption.

2. If you are the entrepreneur, what multi-final solution will you develop so that you succeed, your venture succeeds (takes water hyacinth off the lake), and the people living along the lakeshore also walk away happy. Please be specific on how your solution might function and precisely whom you would work with. For example, refrain from including vague stakeholders like entire communities.

One of our solutions will be hiring interested community members who want to work on removing the hyacinth from the lake and getting paid for it. This can especially work well with the fishermen or other community members who have boats, so that they can remove the moss from different areas of the lake. This will work by her giving a portion of her profits in the shape of wages for the workers. It is important to have community members involved in the venture, so that they don’t feel as if they are being excluded. Although this will likely result in having to let go of her current employees, it is more cost effective and a good way to take advantage of the community members’ navigation knowledge of the lake since they know it best and they may know which area of the lake the hyacinths are most densely populated.

 

Another one of our solutions is for her to give a portion of her profits back to the community through charitable donations such as removing wastes and donating to their environmental focused organizations. This will show community members that she is not just there for profits. Additionally, the community will be more willing to help her advance the venture forward if they notice she invests in the local community.  

 

In addition, another solution could be educating the community about the great advantage that she is adding to their environment by removing their water hyacinth infestation from their lake and improving their community’s fishermen’s access and ability to work on the lake without any charge to the community itself.

 

Q1: Describe at least 5 partnerships with individuals and/or organizations that have been formed to support your project and that impact the success or failure of your venture.

 

Please identify partnerships at the individual, team, and Lehigh / GSIF level.

 

1.What constituted the partnership?

2.How did the partner help you? How did you help them?

3.Was this a symbiotic relationship? Why or why not?

4.What would help strengthen this partnership and make it more equitable?

 

University of the Philippines Diliman (UPD) (HEED Program)

  1. This partnership was born during the assignment or our project. We were given this connection initially.
  2. UPD students and a professor have given us insights on conditions in the Philippines as well as contacts for the Philippine Coconut Authority.  
  3. No, because of the pandemic we were not able to travel to the Philippines to collaborate with the UPD students. The UPD students were also sent home due to the pandemic where many of them did not have access to wifi so we shifted to communication with Jill Manapat only. However, due to poor connection it is hard to have productive zoom meetings
  4. More communication efforts would help strengthen this relationship but given the circumstances of the Pandemic 

 

Prof. Jedlicka

  1. Professor Jedlicka is the co-advisor to our project (for both TE Capstone team and GSIF).
  2. She provides guidance and insight to our team based on her expertise. We give her more information about different aspects of the copra industry, which in turn allows her to provide us with more suggestions and direction.
  3. This is a symbiotic relationship, as we are both reciprocating value. As we navigated through this complex coconut industry together as students and mentors, we taught and learned from each other: we taught her about the coconut knowledge that we found from literature, and she taught us how to better use that knowledge to advance our venture. 
  4. An increase in the team’s efforts would strengthen this relationship since the more we put in allows for more input on Professor Jedlicka’s end. 

 

Prof. Haden

  1. This partnership was built through GSIF and Professor Haden is a co-advisor to our project
  2. She helped us organize our ideas and helped us with where we should start with our project. We have helped her by teaching her about copra and the marketing of it in the Philippines. Also we will eventually publish a paper which will reflect well on her. 
  3. Yes, because Professor Haden acted as a guide for where we should start and we were able to teach her about our project. 
  4. More communication would strengthen this partnership.

 

Wilber (Brian Slocum and Michael Moore)

  1. Our partnership with the Wilbur Powerhouse is based on our need for help in designing and prototyping our dryer. We connected through our advisor and our own relations.
  2. They have helped us through the design, but also mainly the physical construction of the prototype through their skill sets, expertise, and their access to Wilbur. 
  3. This is less of a symbiotic relationship because they have given us more value than we have given them, through advising us through our designs and helping us build it.
  4. A more proactive approach to our design methods and an increase in understanding of the building process from our team. 

 

Lynne Cassimeris

  1. Cell Biology professor at Lehigh, whom one of our team members is taking a class with. 
  2. This partner has helped in furthering the understanding of what goes on a cellular and molecular level inside of cells, which can be applied to copra.
  3. This is less of a symbiotic relationship as she is providing her teaching on her profession and we are learning from it.
  4. What would strengthen this relationship would be being in more communication with her and asking more directly about potential guidance on how to work on copra more effectively.

 

Gregory Lang

  1. One of our team members worked at Dr. Lang’s Yeast lab
  2. Dr. Lang answered an email about what to do about aflatoxins when our team member emailed him and he provided his knowledge as he is a microbiology professor and has experience working on bacteria and yeast.
  3. This is less of a symbiotic relationship as we do not have anything valuable from our side of research to offer him in return for his teaching.
  4. More communication and working alongside him would strengthen the relationship and bring more equity to our project as we would profit from the more knowledge we gain about how to counteract spoilage and molding.

 

Blog Post 6

Q1: List ten specific ways in which your teaming approach has changed/ evolved since you started, teamwork skills you have developed, and lessons you have learned

  1. When we first started this project in Spring 2020, I was assigned to the later discontinued team called Birthing Practices  in the Philippines. Going into GSIF, I thought that I work on a 4-person team to design birthing tables, but this project was later refocused to joining the copra team. This changed my approach because I had to be adaptable to join a new project so late into the semester, when the copra team had already formed their team dynamic, etc. It forced me to become flexible and adaptable so I could fit the styles of the new team and become a contributing member.
  2.  At first my role to this team was to look at the supply chain and product analysis of the coconut industry; however, when working on Mountaintop this summer, I discovered a startling fact about aging trees in the Philippines. This changed my focus onto learning about replanting and intercropping plans in the Philippines instead of focusing on ways to improve the supply chain.
  3. We began our transition from our small team to  a big group during the COVID-19 pandemic, which made integrating communication and collaboration even more difficult. To fuse both teams we decided that the best approach was to meet biweekly to make both the engineering and business/science research side familiar with our work and to still have individual meetings with our sub-group teams to make important progress within our sections.
  4. In fall 2020, my work has again shifted significantly. Instead of continuing my independent research on aging trees and replanting programs, I am now assigned the role of writing background information for the engineering paper. Although this task is not difficult per se, it has made me more of a team player because I am filling the gaps of my teammates’ paper. This is a big transition because I am used to autonomy with research, but am enjoying collaborating and filling the needs of peers instead.
  5. For our first presentation, the business/science research team did not include back-up slides. This made answering questions more difficult without the accompanying visuals, and made us appear unprepared. Moving forward, I have always made sure to include back-up slides in every presentation.
  6. I assumed the role of organizing our one drive folder for the business/research team and provided each person a subsection to include their weekly research. This has made it a lot easier for my team to hold each other accountable.
  7. Per Khanjan’s suggestions, we should have more concise answers to questions during presentations. Our spring 2020 presentation, we would spend 40 seconds per question, which limited us the opportunity for more questions and suggestions. Moving forward, we plan to only allocate 10-15 seconds per question and to have more concise answers. For instance, we planned responses to commonly asked questions during our last class and ensured they were concrete and short.
  8. For our last Q&A session, only two of our team members answered the question. For our next presentation, we plan to assign each team member a category of questions to answer to prevent this same occurrence.
  9. To boost our team dynamic and create more interpersonal relationships with our team, we plan to organize a team dinner sometime throughout this semester.
  10. If we do not know the appropriate answer to a question (whether it be posed by Khanjan, our PIs, other teammates, guests for presentations) we should be honest and say that we do not know the answer, instead of deflecting their question with a general response. I know I did this during our first presentation because I was nervous of appearing ill-informed, but moving forward being honest is the best way to succeed with our goals.

Q2: Provide an updated Collaboration Plan for your team, clearly articulating your Goals (Small g and Big G), Roles, Procedures, and Relationships.

Team Name: COPRA                                                                          Date: 09/29/2020
Goals Personal goals:Brianna:

Make as much useful contribution as possible, positively influence the group, create strong relationships, Improve my group work skills, ask more critical questions.

Then I hope to use all these personal improvements to make a social impact that matters.

Tri:

Learn more about coconuts processing and get hand-on experience on making coconuts dryers!

Build life-long friendship with peers at Lehigh and those in the Philippines

Jake:

Provide hands on help with computer aided designing, fabrication (if at all possible), and testing of our drying chambers. Provide next year’s team with the necessary information to build off of and move toward getting our venture going.

Sammy:

Gain experience in conducting meaningful research and working on an interdisciplinary team. Make valuable contributions to move the project forward and create sustainable impact. Improve my interpersonal skills and develop a new mindset

Ami:

Contribute to the project in a meaningful way, understanding my own strengths and weaknesses , and learning how I can efficiently and effectively work within a diverse team. Help to better enforce communications within the team and outside the team, and become a better researcher and writer. Improve my own hard and soft skill sets including communications, and better understanding design thinking, engineering design, and supply chain.

Rozhin:

Complete experiments and write results in a lab report

Publish a paper about the experiments and their relationship to the overall copra industry and how the result is an asset to copra farmers.

Michelle:

Publish a paper about the different antioxidants we have researched on

Pinpoint one antioxidant we can use for the copra processing

Continue with our research and see if there are other things we can improve on

Brianna C:

Help team with adding background information to paper to provide readers with a deeper framework and history of its problems and clarity on why proposed solution are innovative and helpful

Project Goal:

The project aims to improve copra processing and process streamlining for elevating the livelihoods of copra farmers by generating additional income.

Is our Project Goal scaled to our resources (dreams, materials, skills, differences, etc.) and constraints (assignment, time, skills, etc.)?

As a team, we have the given resources and knowledge needed to design and prototype a device that can better process copra. Unfortunately, due to given circumstances, our access to both each other and the tools required are constraining the timetable for which this project will operate on.

Since COPRA is a multi-year project, we as a team will lay up a strong foundation so that we can transfer the knowledge to other teams. The hope is that future teams will be able to scale upon the ideas and designs we come up with throughout this year.

 

Metrics for Success

    • Design, energy efficiency, and sustainability of the processing technique
    • Amount of high-quality copra that can be produced using new methods
    • Amount of additional income that can be generated for copra farmers
    • Scalability and Sustainability of the business model (can we actually get people to use this)
Roles Who is responsible for which deliverables?

  • Rozhin, Michelle, and Brianna C. will be responsible for the antioxidant testing and the deliverables that come from this.
  • Jake, Tri, Brianna W, Sammy, and Ami will be responsible for the engineering components and the corresponding deliverables that arise from this.

Which deliverables that require collaboration, subgroups & individual work? Who does each person depend upon to succeed?

Deliverables 

  • Presentation – Collaboration
  • Preliminary Design Concepts – Sub group/Collaboration
  • Prototype – Sub group/Individual
  • Testing Data – Sub group/Individual
  • Final report – Collaboration

Do we need a project manager to coordinate?

  • Yes, we do need one. However, specific to our group, we rotate our project manager once every three weeks so that everyone has a chance to step up and take responsible for the group’s success
  • We realize the importance of having a manager to help organize and coordinate group work and research, but believe that having a rotating leadership position helps alleviate the stress from one individual
Procedures Decision-making 

  • Consensus, our group has had very few disagreements
    • If consensus can’t be achieved we will default to majority rules/the advice of our project advisor

Effective meetings

  • We’ve conducting weekly meetings (along with multiple weekly sub meetings) to keep everyone on track and updated with all the key information regarding our project
    • Before each meeting we lay out an agenda to increase efficiency of meetings and help steer the conversation in the right direction
    • We write weekly briefs (in accordance with our TE 211 course work) to keep documented records on what work and research we do each week
  • We plan to continue holding these weekly meetings over Zoom at the same time and in the same fashion
  • Keep track of time during meetings
  • At the end of every meeting we make sure to assign weekly work to each group member to ensure that we can hold each other accountable

Meeting roles

  • During meetings the leader will facilitate the meeting and assign a different scribe for each meeting.
  • The leader role will be rotated every 3 weeks

Communication

  • Up until this week we had planned Zoom meetings once a week on Fridays from 2:00 – 3:00 PM
    • Bi-weekly meeting with two sub-groups, Prof. Jedlicka, and Prof. Haden
Relationships Teamwork

  • Our team has been very agreeable up to this point – we’ve had few disagreements if any
    • Our assumption is that transitioning to video chatting as our primary form of communication will not be a problem
  • For the Engineering team:
    • We have backgrounds in Materials Science Engineering, Mechanical Engineerings, Industrial Systems Engineering and Product Design
    • The team also consists of different backgrounds such as athletics, international, cultural, and greek life.
    • We have different interests outside of engineering: make-up and sports, band music, music composition, nature, and chess.
  • The Science Research and Business teams have been added to the to Copra team
    • The Science Research team have backgrounds in biology and are working on developing antioxidant research and experiments to help further the project
    • The business has background in economics and international relations which will help further the project in terms of working on the business background of the project

Listening – As a team we enter group meetings with an open mindset and are ready listen to each other

Team Name– Copra

Team: COPRA

Members: Ami Yoshimura, Michelle Hu, Sammantha Powers, Jake Donoghue, Brianna Wanbaugh, Tri Nguyen, Brianna Cimaglia, Rozhin Zahrouni

 

Top 20 FAQs and Answers

 

  • What happens to the middlemen if you eliminate them in the supply chain? (Ami)

 

A: At this stage, we don’t have a concrete answer yet, because we are still in the development phase of our products. 

 

  • What is the scale of the coconut farms in the Philippines? (Tri)

 

A: The majority of coconut farms are small to medium sized (around 5 hectares / 40 – 100 trees per farm).

 

  • How will you implement your product in the Philippines? (Sammy)

 

A: We are not yet sure at this stage, as we do not currently have a definite business model since we are still developing our product. 

 

  • How do you know that there aren’t better antioxidants out there that are just as effective or more than the antioxidants that you are using now? (Rozhin)

 

A: We have done extensive research on many different potential antioxidants and have read many scientific articles and journals on them before coming into our conclusion of the top antioxidants for us to use on our experiments. Unfortunately, there is no way for us to know about all of the potential antioxidants that exist, however, we believe that from our research we have found the best ones that are available and cost-effective.

 

  • What are some of the current solutions to the aging tree problem in the Philippines? (Bri C)

 

A: There are replanting, intercropping, and education programs designed by the Philippines Coconut Authority to address these challenges.

 

  • How do you make sure the coconut farmers will benefit from your solution? (Tri)

 

A: We will provide coconut farmers the cost-effective technology to produce high-quality copra and higher-value added products that they can sell directly at a higher price, which will earn the farmers additional income.  

 

  • To what extent do coconut farmers have access to energy? (Tri)

 

A: It is noted that 6.1 million households (half of the rural population) have no electricity in the Philippines. Our investigation suggests that more than 30% of coconut farmers do not have access to the power grid.

 

  • How will this solution be sustainable? (Brianna W)

 

A:  We hope to partner with a company based in the Philippines that can continue to aid and distribute our solution after we leave the Philippines

        How successful are efforts to address the aging tree problem? (Bri C)

 

A: The PCA has established a few programs to address this issue, but many of them are purely informational with little execution and direct aid to farmers. These programs have certainly helped inform farmers about the issues, but there has not been significant change.

 

  • How long will this copra & antioxidant experiment take? (Rozhin)

 

A: This is a two part experiment that has been started from July, however, since it was decided that better results were needed with improved procedure plans, the experiment will be restarting during the fall semester and will most likely finish before the end of the semester depending on the results found.

 

  • What do you expect to see in your experiments and what is the goal of the experiments? (Jake)

 

A: On the engineering side, the experiments are set up with the goal of optimizing air flow inside the drying chamber. We expect to gather data that will allow us to decide whether we should utilize horizontal or vertical airflow moving forward.

 

  •  What are your next steps for the venture? (Ami)

 

A: The next steps entail testing antioxidant solutions, prototyping the dryer, and submitting research proposals to a few conferences. 

 

  • What are you doing in your experiments currently and what is next? (Jake)

 

A: We are constructing benchmark prototypes of our drying chambers and comparing the effectiveness of horizontal vs. vertical airflow on drying time. The goal is still to uniformly dry all the coconut meat in the drying chamber as fast as we can, so whichever method works better is what we will include in our drying design moving forward. Once we have identified the optimal air flow method, we will move to experimenting and designing our heating source and heat exchange mechanisms. 

 

  • Why are you doing this experiment and how do these antioxidants work on the copra? (Rozhin)

 

A: The current problem is the copra browning which reduces their financial value because of their unappealing visual quality, even if they are safe to consume and use even for other means. The browning of the copra occurs from a chemical reaction from its exposure to oxygen, known as enzymatic browning. The enzyme that plays the major role in this chemical reaction is called Polyphenol Oxidase (PPO) and another major enzyme that contributes to the enzymatic browning and is involved with the internal browning is called Peroxidase. Therefore, this reaction can be prevented from occurring through the application of higher acidity (pH<4), which lowers the chances of oxidation of the food and causing the enzymatic reaction to occur. Moreover, the copra also needs to have antimicrobial protection, so that they can last longer and prevent spoiling. Since the best antioxidants that we have chosen from our research are both acidic and have antimicrobial properties (which we also plan on combining the best ones together to create an even stronger antioxidant preservative), they are one of the best natural and cost-effective preservation methods for us to use on the copra.

 

  • Why are natural antioxidants being used instead of cheaper alternatives? (Rozhin)

 

A: Natural antioxidants are the best materials to use as preservatives of copra as this will make it safe and have no/less harmful side effects than other chemical or other cheaper alternatives. Natural antioxidants are the next best option, from their effective protection against oxidation and microbes, in comparison to more expensive preservation treatments (e.g. freeze drying), so they are the best option considering their ease of access, effectiveness, and reduced cost.

 

  • How do you imagine implementing these antioxidants into the supply chain and how will the farmers gain access to them? (Rozhin)

 

A: We are still in the process of determining which antioxidants will be used for preservation, so we have yet to know the full logistics of when and how they will be incorporated into the supply chain. We imagine that the antioxidants will be either sold to the farmers in packages or the farmers will be taught how to make those antioxidants treatment themselves (depending on the antioxidants chosen as preservatives).

 

  • How will the optimal antioxidants be integrated into the engineering team’s product? (Sammy) 

 

A: The antioxidants will be included in the drying and preserving process, though we are not sure exactly how until we discover more through our experiments. We are still determining if the antioxidants will be put on the copra before or after drying, and if they will be included as a part of our product, or if they will be sold separately.

 

  • How will you be able to scale this effectively? (Ami)

 

A: By improving one niche/aspect of the drying process and building a better drying solution with affordable materials, accessibility will be easier. We also have connections in the Philippines who could help with distribution. 

 

  • How likely is it that farmers will take to this kind of solution? (Jake)

 

A: This is something that we still need to figure out. Given that our project is in early stages, and that we have not been able to conduct field work, it has been rather difficult to gauge interest in our ideas. 

 

  • Why are we choosing the specific antioxidants we are using?  (Michelle)

 

A: All the specific antioxidants  we are using are all cost effective so it will not be another hardship on the farmers. Also all of these antioxidants do not affect the taste of the copra or the texture and they are accessible. 

Case Study: Lesotho

  1. Facts Ethical Issue- 
    1. You are planning not to pay the locals for helping you find their water sources
    2. Lesotho is a small developing country in Africa
    3. The study requires significant assistance from the community.
    4. Several publications are expected from this research study
    5. Pathogen is found only in this region of Lesotho
    6. Other researchers/scientists can use this foundational knowledge to provide a long-term benefit to the locals
  2. Stakeholders & motivations
    1. Scientists/ Researchers
      1. Recognition, helping create a profile of the pathogen
    2. Funders
      1. Recognition, profit, 
    3. Local natives aiding in the research
      1. Monetary gain, simply being proud of their community, just wanting to help people who take an interest in their community, seeking more recognition for themselves or their community, build connections, potential elimination of pathogen in the future
    4. Population of Lesotho
      1. Eradication of the pathogen
    5. The University
      1. Recognition to uphold or heighten the reputation
  3. Solutions, add ethical principle for each
    1. Survey CHWs from all parts of the country
      1. Separate each survey by PHU each CHW is based
      2. Community health workers are nominated by their peers to serve in this capacity: thus, it makes sense to survey CHWs as representatives of their communities.
    2. Survey random samples of individual community members on where they get their water instead of looking for specific people to do it (which may also not cover all the bases whereas surveying many people may) and thus, providing a smaller incentive for those who do take the survey rather than a larger monetary incentive for a few people  to take us around
      1. This smaller incentive could be a lunch or a snack as a token of gratitude if the goal really is to not pay anyone monetarily
    3. Request a meeting with the local government to formulate a relationship of trust and relay the research to the community with the intention of educating and appointing  the appropriate community members to aid in the study

Steps 5-7:

To decide the optimal solution, it was vital to draw off experiences of other group members to understand their perspectives and consider previous studies.  For instance, the approach to request a meeting with local government would not be the best choice because local leaders might not have the time to meet with us. Furthermore, the local leaders might want to get too involved with the project and expect greater compensation than we may provide, which would cause a difficult situation where we could lose their trust. Also, the government might not have the proper knowledge of which community members would be best fit to help with our study.  Additionally, surveying random samples of community members on where they get their water would not be efficient.  They might not understand the purpose of our study and be unwilling to help because of this. If I were in this situation, I would definitely go with option 1 which is to survey CHWs from all parts of this community.  The community health workers, unlike option 2, would have a definitive understanding of our surveys purpose and be willing to help us in the study. They would be able to understand its benefits more easily and since they are nominated by their local community, they would be inclined to help as that is their role.In doing this, we would gain the CHWs respect and form connections that would make them more included to assist us with the study. For the people that help us with this study, I would offer to give them credit for thie help by offering to publicize their names in the publication and mail them a copy of the publications. This is a cost efficient solution with long-term benefits and experiences for the CHWs involved. Especially compared to offering them a small sum for their assistance, they will have something that can help them remember their contribution indefinitely.

Ethics Case Study

  • Facts- Ethical Issues
    1. Syringe is a single-use item that has the potential to help individuals in hospitals and clinics in low to middle income countries (LMIC)
    2. Its success is contingent on hospitals and clinics having the ability to pay for the syringe.
    3. For its cost to remain low, designers must forgo a significant safety feature
    4. Syringe’s without the safety feature can spread disease when disposed

The ethical issues of this case are that in order for the syringe to reach its intended users (hospital and clinic patients in LMIC), it would need to be inexpensively produced without the safety feature, endangering others and contributing to the spread of disease. The other relevant ethical issue is that if the safety feature is included in the design, it would cause its price to increase which would make it unaffordable to its intended users. This would mean that it could not benefit the populations that need access to it. In this situation, the designer must decide if they should continue to produce a syringe that can be widely used (forgoing a significant safety feature) or if they should make a design that eliminates the potential spread of diseases, but simultaneously makes it more expensive – and less likely that LMIC hospital and clinic patients can use it.

  • Stakeholders/Motivations
    1. Designer: to design the optimal product; making sure that it is affordable, but also safe.
    2. The firm: wants to produce syringes at a rate that will maximize its profit (contingent that they can avoid potential lawsuits for the spread of diseases in a case of improper syringe disposal).
    3. The hospital administrators: want to avoid getting sued for malpractice, but also maintain an image of success of curing its patients.
    4. Doctors and nurses: desire the patients to be treated properly and become cured; the patients also want to be cured.
    5. Local community: wants to remain healthy and avoid acquiring diseases from properly disposed health products.
  • Other solutions:
    1. Government subsidies: hospitals can still have access to the product with the addition of the safety feature. This is not a viable solution; however, because LMIC typically do not have the infrastructure and reliable political parties to uphold subsidies.
    2. Educate the hospital administrators: on how to dispose the syringes so it will have the least harmful effect on the environment. Although this solution would minimize the spread of harmful diseases, it would not totally eliminate the spread. Therefore, this solution does not uphold the interest of all the stakeholders.
    3. Design orally ingested medicine: A con of this is that it would take time for the designers to create this mechanism and in the meantime, people would not be able to have the medicine they need
  • The best course of action in this situation would be for the designers to create a product that does not contain a syringe. This would eliminate the possibility of the syringe to be improperly disposed and spread diseases, while continuing to keep its production cost affordable to local hospitals and clinics. For instance, the designers should create the medication in a way that it can be consumed orally. The benefits of this solution are that this would prevent the syringes from being improperly disposed and contributing to the spread of disease and that it can be affordable to its intended users. The cons associated with this solution is that to change the design and structure of this medication would take time and lots of test trials, delaying when it can help sick patients.  Currently ill patients would not have access to this product immediately, meaning they could become even more ill or die. This would cause stresses on hospitals as patients continue to get sick and need to stay longer. Additionally, if the patients are not paying for hospitals and they are funded by GMOs – for instance – this would strain its resources. Another potential downside is that for this solution to work, it must remain inexpensive or else it is not a viable solution. An orally ingested medication must not exceed the price of the syringe without its safety feature – or else it will not be available to the hospitals and clinics that need it. This situation will uphold the stakeholders’ interests. For designers, it will create the optimal product – one that hospitals and clinics will have access to and one that will heal its intended users. The firm will produce products that they can sell to maximize its profit. The hospitals administrators will have a product that can cure its patients and not cause harm to the local community. Doctors and nurses will also be able to help their patients; the patients themselves will be cured; and the local community will not face the side effects of its improper disposal.
    As this situation fulfills the interests of all the stakeholders, it is the optimal solution. It maximizes its benefit because it helps cure the patients at a cost the hospitals can afford while also not affecting the local community by contributing to the spread of diseases. The integration of technological, social, economic and environmental impacts is relevant in this case study. As seen, they are all interconnected. For instance, patients’ wellness correlates to their social wellbeing, which is also dependent on a clean, syringe-free environment. Furthermore, technology and its economic costs affect the social and environment impacts, as the technology has to be strategically priced for it to not pollute the environment, while benefiting the society by curing diseases. This case study illustrates how they are all interconnected at a level where designers must realize that technology affects social, economic and environmental well-being and must keep this in mind while designing the product.

Post 12

1.Refine the detailed income statement for your venture for two years (at six month intervals) or a more appropriate time scale. Explicitly state the assumptions that underlie your financial model. (https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1-WIxZ3CC9vYgOMTpigO463_WqpJ4y-VNHmjukTpSUmM/edit#gid=576516736)

 

See the assumptions listed in Question 3.

2.Refine the Business Model for your venture based on your revenue model. You may use the Osterwalder BMC to refine your business model but prepare one or more visuals that explain how your venture will work and accomplish your BHAG.

 

Partner network

  • Shipping/Transportation services

PCA

  • UPD
Key ActivitiesProcessing Copra to create value added products

  • Coconut Milk, Flour, Oil, Vinegar, Wine
  • etc.
OfferIncrease the income of smallholder filipino coconut farmers by providing them with faster, efficient, and value-added drying systems for their copra. Customer Relationship

  • Personal Assistance with technology use and finances
  • User Communities
Customer Segments

  • Filipino Entrepreneurs
  • Low Income Coconut Farmers
Key Resources

  • Engineers and employees to operate the machinery
  • Machinery required to process coconuts
  • Money to fund R&D
Distribution Channels

  • Local processing plants
  • Farmers
Cost structure

  • Fixed Costs: Communications, Utilities, Transportation, Marketing/Managing Staff
  • Variable Costs: Raw Materials for machinery / value-added product, Shipping, Production costs of product
  • Economies of Scale: Reduce average cost/unit with increased sales due to lower fixed costs.
  • Economies of Scope:  Leverage resources for more operations, Ex. Make more profits by using same machinery for two different value added products, instead of two different machines
Revenue Streams

  • Asset sales from selling the machine to entrepreneurs in the Philippines (2 Options: $23,999.95 upfront or payback option of $2000  every 2 months over 24 months)
  • Maintenance Contract (entrepreneurs only), $2799.95 for an annual subscription
  1. Develop an M&E plan for your venture.
  • Clearly list all assumptions.

 

+Assume that our venture will be launched in 2 years from now

+Assume that the cost of production is $17,000 per machine

+Assume that we will be able to sell our product at a price of ~$24,000

+Assume that we will be able to scale production

+Assume that 1 machine can impact 100 coconut farmers (entrepreneurs will be able to network to this amount of farmers)

+Assume the copra farmers will want to use our technology

+As of right now we are assuming exponential growth of overhead costs

 

  • Identify short-term and long-term success metrics.

 

Short-term

  • Total number of machines sold
  • Efficiency of the machine (ie. Quality of copra, value-added products produced, robustness)
  • Net profit after one year (*MOST IMPORTANT)

Long-term

  • Percent increase in average income of copra farmers (*MOST IMPORTANT)
  • Total number of coconut farmers that use the machine
  • Steady growth in number of machines manufactured and sold

 

  • Identify specific methods to measure the metrics.
  • Track additional income generated for smallholder farmers (method to be determined)
  • Track additional income generated for local entrepreneurs (method to be determined)
  • Track number of machines sold annually
  • Consumer input (from both the entrepreneur and customers of the entrepreneur)
  • Measure volume of products produced

Blog Post 11

  1. Develop a detailed income statement for your venture for two years (at six month intervals). Explicit state the assumptions that underlie your financial model.

 

  1. Identify two SPECIFIC funding sources for the design phase of your project and two SPECIFIC funding sources for the dissemination (implementation / distribution / commercialization) phase of your project. For each funding source, explain why this is a good fit for your project, and what SPECIFIC aspect of your project might the funding source support.

 

Design Phase:

 

USAID: $35 Million Water and Energy for Food Challenge (WE4F)

This initiative aims to increase sustainable agricultural and food value-chains, food security, and climate resilience in developing countries and emerging markets – with a focus on the poor and women by investing in small enterprises that work in combinations of food, water, and energy. This grant seems like a good fit to our project because our coconut processing in the Philippines lies in the perfect intersection of energy, water, and technology.

Source: https://www.usaid.gov/news-information/press-releases/oct-23-2019-usaid-announces-35-million-water-and-energy-food-challenge

 

The Global Innovation Fund supports the development of social impact ventures by investing in innovations that aim to improve the lives and opportunities of millions of people in the developing world. This investment is an appropriate fit for our project because our goal is to improve the lives of coconut farmers in the Philippines by generating additional income through the innovation of a new technology that processes value-added coconut products.

https://www.globalinnovation.fund/

 

Dissemination Phase:

 

SOW Asia is a charitable foundation based in Hong Kong that supports early-stage social enterprises working to scale their social impact. They have an accelerator program that supports social enterprises by providing investments through opening networks to help build connections and find funds. Their goal and vision is to help local social enterprises attract external funding and become self-sustaining. Due to the fact that SOW Asia is looking to increase impact, we believe that they could be a perfect match for our project when we reach the point where we are ready for dissemination and scaling.

http://www.sowasia.org/about-sowsaia

 

DBS supports over 100 social enterprises in Asia since 2012. They support social enterprises that are looking to scale their business to increase social impact by improving operational capacity, innovation capabilities, and geographical reach. Specifically, they look to support social enterprises that not only have a market validated business product/solution with clear plans to scale up business, but are also committed towards scaling social impact. We believe that once our venture is up and running, financial support from DBS will prove very helpful as we try to scale up.

https://www.dbs.com/foundation/our-support/grant-programme

 

  1. Identify five specific partnerships that you need to forge to advance your project forward with the ultimate goal of positively impacting at least one million people. Describe exactly how that partnership might help you achieve scale and why that entity might be willing to work with you.

 

Philippines Coconut Authority (PCA)

PCA is an agency of the Philippine government under the Department of Agriculture mainly responsible for developing the coconut industry to “its full potential in line with the new vision of a united, globally competitive and efficient industry.” The PCA might be willing to work with us, because our goal aligns well with their mission – we aim to develop a novel value-added coconut processing that will improve the livelihood of coconut farmers. If our technology and products are approved and endorsed by the PCA, this will help increase our credibility and improve our product’s marketability. In addition, our partnership with PCA will give us the opportunity to reach out to a rigorous network of coconut companies and, of course, a community of 3.5 million coconut farmers.

 

UPD

Our partnership with UPD will allow us to leverage the proximity of the HEED students working on the project in the Philippines to the copra farmers. Their ability to access stakeholders who can be easily reached in the Philippines will help drive our project forward by allowing us to utilize important stakeholder information without physically being there. This partnership will also provide us with additional research from UPD students and will act as a resource for getting to know specific aspects of the Philippines that influence our project.

 

The Philippines Partnership for Sustainable Agriculture (PPSA)

PPSA brings together companies, government agencies, civil society organizations, farmer groups, and financial institutions to link smallholder farmers to the market. Their main goal is to improve farmers’ profitability and productivity while increasing environmental sustainability. As our project aims to improve the livelihood of smallholder farmers, partnering with this organization will give us more direct access to the smallholder farmers and allow us to have a larger impact on their lives.

 

Axelum Resources Corporation 

Axelum Resources Corporation is a Filipino company with a global mindset. They deliver premium products to the global market while maintaining a spirit of communal unity, work, and cooperation. A partnership with Axelum would prove beneficial for both sides. We would trade our processed goods to them, which would provide both sides with security. In addition, by partnering with us they would be able to continue to support local communities as that is part of our mission as well.

 

Innovation For Social Impact Partnership (isip)

 

This partnership aims to support innovative social enterprises in the Philippines to collectively contribute to the achievement, acceleration, and sustainability of sustainable development goals. They provide targeted assistance to SE’s in becoming scalable and sustainable ventures that create a positive social change through workshops and mentorship programs. This partnership would be willing to work with us because our goals align and we are also focused on creating a novel, sustainable, and social change for copra farmers in the Philippines.

Blog Post 10

  1. Refine your Business Model Canvas:

1.Include a Visual Canvas

2.Extremely specific notes for each block

 

*****LET IT BE KNOWN – We do not have A SPECIFIC PRODUCT in mind yet*****

 

Partner network

  • Shipping/Transportation services
  • PCA
  • UPD
Key Activities

Processing Copra to create value added products

  • Coconut Milk, Flour, Oil, Vinegar, Wine etc.
Offer

Increase the income of smallholder filipino coconut farmers by providing them a faster, efficient, and value-added drying systems for their copra.

Customer Relationship

  • Personal Assistance with technology use and finances 
  • User Communities 
Customer Segments

  • Filipino Entrepreneurs
  • Low Income Coconut Farmers
Key Resources

  • Engineers and employees to operate the machinery
  • Machinery required to process coconuts
  • Money to fund R&D
Distribution Channels

  • Local processing plants
  • Farmers
Cost structure

  • Fixed Costs: Staff Wages, Utilities
  • Variable Costs: Raw Materials for machinery / value-added product, Shipping, Production costs of product
  • Economics of Scales: Reduce average cost/unit with increased sales due to lower fixed costs.
  • Economies of Scope:  Leverage resources for more operations, Ex. Make more profits by using same machinery for two different value added products, instead of two different machines  
Revenue Streams

  • Asset sales from selling the machine to entrepreneurs in the Philippines (2 Options: $349 upfront or payback option of $29 every 2 months over 24 months)  
  • Subscription for maintenance fees (entrepreneurs only), $99 for an annual subscription

 

3.Explain how exactly you will deliver an end-to-end solution.

 

We design and manufacture a machine that we then sell to Filipino entrepreneurs, who will then maintain and provide services for farmers at a centralized location.

 

2.Ten practical lessons from the business (revenue) models of ventures we reviewed today (or others you research) as they relate to your venture.

 

  1. Envirofit found success by designing devices that are practically price, easy to use, environmentally friendly, and provide health benefits for its users. By doing this they’ve created a desirable product for low income individuals, which is something that we are looking to do.

 

  1. Envirofit has done an excellent job of getting their product out there. The way they use international distributors and local businesses to get their product to the people that need it is something that we can learn from and apply to our project.

 

  1. Reel Gardening found success by making their device incredibly easy to use. Our project, along with probably every venture, needs to consider how consumers will use our product and how we can make it easier.

  2. The way Reel Gardening paired their seed strips with an app to provide additional instruction is a great way to integrate simple technology into their design. Additionally, it shows that they’ve put a great deal of thought as to how to optimize user experience, which is something we will need to do when designing our product.

 

  1. Greyston Bakery’s business model is to crow about hiring people who’ve been marginalized from the workforce. They do not pay attention to what people have done in the past. They are interested in what they’re going to do in the future, and they invest money and support into helping them to be successful into helping them to be successful in the future. 

 

  1. Greyston Bakery creates a business model such that it both made profits but also contributed positively to the community.

 

  1. The partnership with Ben & Jerry’s allowed Greyston to transition from a small local business to a supplier for a well-known company. However, Greystone adopts a Benefit Corporation model to allow it to keep implementing its social and environmental agenda. 

 

  1. This venture was very unique because it was an educational system that allowed the students to be teachers and the teachers to be students. The indigenous knowledge of the Students was then cultivated by the teachers to improve crops on the land, design solar cookers, install solar panels and so on. This example emphasizes the importance of indigenous knowledge which will be very crucial to the success of our final product. 

 

  1. This method although it was not sustainable as it relied on the grants for materials and construction it created a wealth of knowledge that could be shared and spread to benefit more areas that are similar. Creating a wealth of knowledge that is applicable to other communities is something we hope to replicate when we scale our final product to other communities. 

 

  1. This venture also focused on empowering women as they can have a huge impact on the progression of a community. Instead of giving women a certificate such as a degree, they are given knowledge to solar electrify homes/entire villages. From the speaker it was mentioned that men generally want a degree and to move to a big city to apply their knowledge whereas the women stay behind. These women can be empowered with knowledge and make an impact on their own community which is a strategy we could use for the low income copra farmers in the Philippines.