Innovation and Entrepreneurship to Address the UN Sustainable Development Goals

*Pritpal Singh*

### **Abstract**

The UN Sustainable Development Goals (UN SDGs) were developed in 2015 to address many global development challenges. Some of these goals include bringing affordable and clean energy to all (UN SDG7), provide clean water and sanitation for all (UN SDG6), providing quality education from early childhood to adults (UN SDG4), and decent work and economic growth (UN SDG 8). Technology has been advancing and can be deployed to address these challenges through entrepreneurial ways. In this chapter we will describe how technology-enabled innovative and entrepreneurial solutions are being brought to address these goals. The specific research questions to be addressed are: What types of Innovation and Entrepreneurship models are most effective in addressing the UN Sustainable Development Goals? This book chapter reviews different innovations in technologies and business models in the energy sector, particularly off-grid renewable energy, health care, water and sanitation, agriculture, and education sectors. The common themes of innovations in business models and technologies will be drawn from these case study reviews to guide researchers in developing new entrepreneurial approaches to addressing the UN SDGs.

**Keywords:** UN sustainable development goals, business models, information and communication technologies for development (ICT4D), electricity access, clean water and sanitation, good health and well-being

### **1. Introduction**

The UN Sustainable Development Goals address many development challenges. The 17 UN SDGs and corresponding 169 targets cover a range of challenges including no poverty, ending hunger, quality education, access to clean and affordable energy, access to clean water and sanitation, etc. [1] **Figure 1** shows all seventeen goals.

To address these global development challenges, a variety of models have been used. These include donor aid models, development bank lending models, and entrepreneurial models. Looking at the history of success of these different approaches, the donor aid models, and development bank lending models have had some limited measure of success. However, the aid and loan models have been strongly criticized for creating a dependency on aid, particularly in African countries [2]. The entrepreneurial approach

**Figure 1.** *UN sustainable development goals [1].*

has been promoted by several authors, primarily by Paul Polack [3] and C.K. Prahalad [4]. Entrepreneurial models require strong consideration of both sustainability and scalability which are somewhat limited in the other two approaches. In the donor aid models and bank loan models, the money donated or loaned for a specific project tends to support the development activity for a limited time or scope. This is useful for some infrastructure types of projects and certainly have their role to play. However, given the scale and urgency of the needs in this space, more entrepreneurial venture approaches are required. The entrepreneurial approaches also offer opportunities for new revenue streams, as well as long term growth and sustainability. In this chapter, we will present case study examples of entrepreneurial ventures that are addressing various UN development challenges. The original research project for finding common business models for successful ventures in emerging economies was the Monitor Group's report titled "Emerging Models, Emerging Markets" [5]. It described seven business model types that work well in emerging markets. While this report considered successful business models within the context of LMICs, it did not explicitly link the models to the UN SDGs. A more recent report that did focus on the UN SDGs is the book titled "Entrepreneurship and the UN Sustainable Development Goals" [6]. This edited volume is a collection of papers that focuses on research in this field but is focused on theoretical frameworks offering only a few case studies. The goal of this chapter is to build on these reports and describe innovations in technologies and business models that are having significant impact on addressing the UN SDGs. In particular, the common themes that appear among successful business models from research in the field will be described. By identifying these successful models, the opportunity to apply them to other UN SDGs may be explored.
