1. Poverty Stoplight Office
South Africa

2. Laura Bergh, Chief Enabler for the Poverty Stoplight Office, South Africa
The Poverty Stoplight Office has been set up in South Africa in response to a demand to provide a platform and service that will support the use of the Poverty Stoplight approach.
Aim: To assist in improving the success rates of organisations delivering social impacts through poverty-related and enterprise development programmes

3. Who is using it. What are the results showing
Who is using it? What are the results showing? What activities are organisations doing to eradicate poverty? How contextual is poverty in South Africa? Main insights from 3 years of data?

4. Who is using Poverty Stoplight in South Africa?

5. Current PS members – 50 Orgs
Dr Mark Trevor Marais Development Facilitation PSSA

6. Social Enterprises and Non-Profits Corporates and Businesses
 The Clothing Bank
Business Activator
Habitat for Humanity
Beautiful Gate
Shonaquip
FoodForward SA
Learn to Earn
Ikhamva Labantu
Drakenstein Transformation
Church Alliance for Social Transformation (CAST)
Westlake Union of Churches
Development Communication Solutions (DevCom)
Community Action Partnership
New Leaf Development
Izulu Orphan Projects
Timbali Flower Growers
Afrique du Sud, Bidonvilles (ASB) for Township
Bhongelethu
Dr Mark Trevor Marais Development Facilitation PSSA
Ranyaka Community Investment Managers
WDB Trust
Jewels of Hope
Afrika Tikkun
Learning In Reach
Fair Trade Trust / Turqle Trading
Sustainability Institute
Heartbeat Community Project
Refilwe Community Project
uThungulu Community Foundation
TLP Services
Seed of Hope
Pinotage Youth Development Academy
Allan Gray Orbis Foundation Endowment
Fix Forward
Careerlinx
Vastfontein Community Transformation
Domino Foundation
Fisantekraal Centre for Development
gold Youth Development Agency (gold-youth)
Black Umbrellas
Harambee Youth Employment Accelerator
Africa Co-operative Action Trust (ACAT)
Rural Dev Support Prog
Food Lover's Market
ContainerWorld (Pty) Ltd
Sappi Southern Africa Ltd
Belgotex Floorcoverings PTY LTD
Bowler Plastics (Pty) Ltd
Sinapi biomedical (Pty) Ltd

7. Over 7,000 surveys completed to date, urban and rural

8. What kind of PS results are we seeing in South Africa?

9. CASE STUDY 1: Two main programs – self employment
2 year program for unemployed mothers, teaching them how to run a business selling clothes
1 year program for men, teaching them how to fix broken, electrical appliances and to run a business selling appliances

10. 3 surveys over 36 months (baseline, 12, 24 and 36 months)
An example of a scorecard showing the movement from 2014 to 2015 to 2016 in the life of a beneficiary

11. Impact stories coming from households
Start to “nest” – renovate homes and build on more rooms, separate sleeping spaces for teenagers and children / boys and girls
Debt eradication - builds resilience and confidence in the future!
Move to other areas – better school, better transport, away from poisonous relationships and community, closer to work
Overcoming abusive relationships
Bringing children back from other parts of the country
Start second business, e.g. laundry or hair salon or sewing or taxi
Collaborating with other people to increase buying power
Transferring knowledge and skills learnt on programmes to family members, e.g. husbands, boyfriends, aunts and sisters involved in business and selling
Changing mind about contraceptives and family planning - daughters now attending clinic
Dressing more smartly, with pride
Buying shacks and building on extra rooms for rental – becoming landlords
Able to afford a car - independence, enhances business opportunities

12. Validation of Theory of Change!
42 intakes = about 1,000 women

13. For every challenge (indicator), there is a set of possible solutions … and we can see which solutions are starting to work well in which context
“This last financial year, when we had to do our annual financial report, it was the easiest annual report we’ve ever done, because we had so much data. When you can quote xxx, that’s music to your donors ears … you can extract data quickly in real statistical terms and be able to present that to any interested party” – Tracey Chambers, CEO

14. CASE STUDY 2:

15. 96 households in Pelican Park, Cape Town
New housing development where community lacked confidence and self-worth, no social networks
Sneaky, well planned, 9 month programme
family coaching sessions
DIY workshops (how to fix a drain, change lightbulbs and plugs, paint walls, save water, recycle, etc.)
Various focus days (e.g. women’s day, elders day)
An entrepreneurial programme that ran over 15 weeks for 33 people
An information day where the whole community was invited to attend to learn about other programmes that could assist them (e.g. The Clothing Bank, Learn to Earn, Parent Centre, Harambee, etc.).

16. Pelican Park – 100 households … 9 month programme
2016 Average 32:14: Average 41:8:1

17. DevCom and Sappi CASE STUDY 3:
Northern KZN - SAPPI don’t understand or ‘know’ their communities – burn forests down
Sappi was working on issue management, not partner development
36 people trained from 9 communities – “Abashintshi” – social mobilisation strategy
PS Results
Functional literacy is very low
Not nearly as poor as they thought they were!
Incorporated goal setting and action plan into Life Skills module
Foresters love PS!
This partnership just won a Golden Loerie at the 2017 Awards for Shared value!

18. CASE STUDY 4: Large retail corporate - they have been
working through ways to identify how best they can understand their 16,000 employees, including the underlying social issues facing many of their staff in their day to day lives outside of work.
FLM is rolling out the PS implementation across all its South African locations, conducting surveys for those staff who wish to participate – aim is to cover at least 10%.
Branded this people initiative as
FLM recognise that, as an organisation, they cannot solve their employees’ problems; but with Poverty Stoplight they can work with employees to generate opportunities so that employees can help themselves.

19. – Lynette Liebenberg, HR
Based on the results of the surveys, FLM has been assessing the needs at their various business locations and exploring strategies to assist. For example, at their Epping DC, they have identified 4 indicators trending red where they can impact directly on their employees.
“The feedback from those that had volunteered was overwhelmingly positive. I feel that this project is going to morph into something more than we had anticipated.” – Kate Marais, CSI Manager
“Another woman in the DC told me that she had been smiling so much when she got home, that her family thought she had come into money!”
– Lynette Liebenberg, HR

20. Kate Marais, CSI Manager:
“We have no idea what goes on in people’s lives …and we had no way of finding this out until we met Poverty Stoplight. Up till then, there had been a lot of assumptions made about people’s lives. This gave us a tool to stop assuming. Biggest lesson learnt is that we don’t know anything. And that’s great, at least now we know that we don’t know.”
“At the end of each (survey) session, it seemed really positive and empowering … more of a celebration than anything else. It’s changed the way we see each other.”
“You can feel the difference when you walk into a store that has had Love My Journey (PS) and one that hasn’t. The energy is different. They become accountable to each other. It’s changed the dynamic.”
Lynette Liebenberg, HR Manager:
“The most beautiful moment for me is when you sit with that person and we are sharing an honest moment … a part of their lives … and they say this is the first time they’ve had the opportunity to share something like this with someone. Our sessions are to build relations. It’s so rewarding.”

21. Partnerships and collaborations are emerging within the community of practice as a result of information being shared at the PS Forum and conference events.
Many PS members are referring their employees/beneficiaries to each other to assist in areas where they don’t have competencies.

22. Main insights after
3 years of data

23. Main insights #1
Context plays a huge part in South Africa’s poverty. We have seen how poverty in one area can have a completely different flavour to another area just 8.5 km away! For example: Westlake Village community vs Lavender Hill community in Cape Town.
Context signposts the type of poverty …never a ‘one size fits all’ solution

24. Westlake Community Village
Surrounded on all sides by affluent suburbs
With 700 households and around people, the community appears to be divided into 2 groups – those that stay in main houses and those that stay in bungalows, as backyard dwellers

25. Occupants of main houses:
A lot of people stay in each of these houses, between 4 and 15 people.
Majority of household have 1 to 2 people earning a small, irregular income while other adults in the household don’t feel they have to go out and work.
All houses are receiving rent from back yard dwellers – average rate is R500 per month from each bungalow.
Passive rents from back yard dwellers is assisting financial situation BUT it is also (a) creating a huge dependency (entitlement) on this income and (b) an apathy and indifference to do anything more to improve their lives.
Particularly among the younger adults, there appears to be little motivation or desire to develop themselves further or the need to find dignity and independence in work.
Occupants of bungalows:
Many backyard dwellers have grade 10 or 11 completed but seem not to have aspirations to develop themselves further.
Huge apathy.
2 backyard dwellers are being “sponsored” by a parent in the main house and doing no work.
Lack of access to water and toilets. Use main house facilities, where possible.
Passive incomes should be assisting families to close financial gap between earned income and expense budget, but instead it seems to be ruining all motivation to find work and build independent, dignified lives.

26. 8.5 Km away …
Lavender Hill

27. About 5,000 households, families live in council houses/flats or shack homes.
Very little income and stable employment, with low entrepreneurial spirit.
High levels of gang activity with the presence of alcohol and drug abuse.
Younger generation is bullying older family members.
Big issue is self-confidence and self-esteem.
Serious lack of knowledge of what assistance /opportunities are available to them.
Some families don’t even collect social grants – don’t know how.
BUT, they are hustling … families look for ways to survive and are eager to get assistance and try new things … their fear of violence and gang activity keep many people locked away in their homes.
Lack of self confidence and self-esteem, and living in fear from violence, keeps this community in poverty. They are very willing but afraid.

28. Of these 3 elements, the most important is healing.
Main insight #2
Effective programmes appear to contain 3 main elements:
Socio-economic development (building financial skills and ways to earn an income)
Personal development (building personal skills, life skills and knowledge)
Healing (past trauma, social contact, trust)
Of these 3 elements, the most important is healing.

29. 782 orphan-led households – IOP have stopped all programmes where they gave out stuff for free and provided copious knowledge and skills.
Realised that so many households are living in isolation, not communicating with each other. Not socialising at all. Very little social capital.
Serious lack of the parent generation. No role models, broken families.
Realised that nobody’s lives were really changing. PS helped to realise that poverty is not a lack of resources, poverty is a mindset.
IOP decided to not to tell people anymore what they have to do. Finding good tools to help community to help themselves. Get them talking to each other and start building trust.
“Poverty Stoplight really showed me … oh my gosh … that we’ve got to grow communities, but how do you do that? That’s when I realised, through Poverty Stoplight, that all our families have experienced such trauma. Death, rape, no socialising …they are so worried how neighbours are going to judge them on how poor they are. My staff don’t have the skills to deal with this kind of stuff. Now I’ve started to visit other organisations and we now have a proper Zulu psychologist and we’re putting our families through counselling. When we can see that they really want it, and they ask for it, then we’ll organise it.” - Kate Bain, CEO

30. Main insight #3
Programmes appear to be seeing better levels of impact with beneficiary/client/employee engagements if design includes:
Length of engagement time >6 months
High number of “touchpoints”, e.g. discussions about family planning is more than just 1 conversation/module
The messenger is ‘credible’
For business and enterprise development – programme is extended to include mentoring for a period up to 1 year

31. Finally … what does REAL social impact look like in South Africa?

32. Social signals are changing - people are not afraid to show that they are doing well. No longer hiding their success in getting out of poverty from neighbours and friends. Houses looking good on the outside as well as on inside.
It has becoming acceptable to run your own business and to be self-employed.
People are growing braver and are trying new occupations such as owning a taxi and getting into the transport business or buying up plots of land and building shacks to rent out.
Many people have 2 businesses going at the same time, e.g. selling clothes and catering for events …. running laundry and funeral business.
Families are focused on providing the best education they can for their children, even if it means having to move to a new area to get access to better schools.
Many people with scores of greens are passing their skills on to family members.
Women and men have started to feel deeply empowered and to find their voices in public - now helping community by transferring skills and giving back.
Some have started to be seen as role models and leaders in their communities - people coming to them for advice or help.
Toxic and dysfunctional relationships have been confronted and many women have moved on to better relationships.
Some individuals continue to withhold income and/or knowledge of their income from their family and partners - they have a plan for the future and don't want this plan disrupted.

33. Thank you! Any questions?
Laura Bergh