Introduction
In cooperation with the WIDE foundation I am going to do a project in India. After finishing my bachelors I thought it would be time to give something back to society. This is why I am going to help out in an orphanage and provide the orphanage with the ability to cook on solar power. This will not only help them reduce costs on cooking gas usage, it might also give them a source of income.
The Project
Below you see the original assignment as given to me by WIDE, it is in Dutch but if somebody needs it translated please let me know.
Project Duurzaam Energiegebruik: Bakkerij op zonnewarmte
Stichting Support WIDE Children’s Home heeft een solar cooker of beter gezegd een solar steamer gedoneerd gekregen. Op het moment zijn we bezig met het transport en het uitzoeken hoe het apparaat in het Indiase klimaat gebruikt kan worden. Wij denken aan bakken met granen, omdat de kinderen nu vooral het niet zo voedzame rijst eten. Afwisseling met granen zou goed zijn. Omdat het koken/bakken/stomen op zonnewarmte niet gewoon is moet geëxperimenteerd worden met recepten en werkmethodes. Hiervoor zoeken wij nog een vrijwilliger die dit als project op zich zou willen nemen. Als het zonne-stoom-bakprincipe aanslaat willen we een bakkerijtje beginnen. Niet verkochte graanproducten kunnen door de kinderen van het weeshuis opgegeten worden, dus verliezen zullen er dan niet geleden worden.
Before going to India I will focus on gaining sponsors and getting things over to India, the solar steamer needs to get to India and the children could use some more cloths. This is why I am going to promote the orphanage with flyers and a sponsor letter.
Research Plan
I subdivided the whole research into three parts; the product research and the feasibility study.
Product research
The solar steamer is currently in Holland and needs to be transported into India. The device is pretty big and heavy; this raises the question whether the whole device should be transported into India or that we should strip it down to the most important parts and transports those to India. In order to make sure what is important about the solar steamer I will need to gain a lot of knowledge on different aspect of the solar steamer. Questions about the solar steamer can be subdivided into the questions I need to answer in Holland and questions that can also wait and be answered in India.
Questions in Holland:
1. How does the solar cooker work?
2. What parts does the solar steamer have? And what do they do?
3. What is the weight of the parts?
4. What parts can also be produced in India?
5. What do you need in order to cook?
Questions in India:
6. How well does the solar cooker work?
7. Is the solar cooker easy to use?
8. How long does the cooking take?
9. How much can be produced with this solar steamer?
I will try and answer the Holland questions before I am leaving for India, talking to people who did similar projects and searching the internet will hopefully give me some more information. If the weather allows me I am going to try out the solar steamer in Holland. I am going to contact Jonne who did something with food in Tiruvannamalai, and I am also going to contact Hester who is doing something with a solar cooker. I will try out the solar steamer in India to find answers to my other questions. I will try and make food with this solar steamer every day for two weeks in order to find out how it works and if it works. I am planning on getting up in the morning and prepare some food for the solar steamer which we might eat at lunch. I hope that some children of the orphanage can help me with traditional food, and their likes. If the steamer works fast enough we might prepare more food for dinner.
Feasibility study
After finishing the product research I need to find out if it would actually help the orphanage to use this device. These questions can also be subdivided into food related questions and questions related to the solar steamer:
Food related questions:
1. What do people eat in India?
2. How many times do people in India eat a (warm) meal?
Questions on the solar steamer:
3. Do they need a bigger solar steamer? Is it possible to make a bigger solar steamer?
a. How much bigger does it need to be?
b. How much bigger can it be?
c. What materials should be used?
d. Are these materials easy to get in the area?
e. What would happen if something breaks? Can they fix it?
4. Are there enough people in the orphanage that can help out with a “bakery”?
To gain answers to these questions I hope to communicate with /talk to the community a lot and look around in the area. Apart from that I will ask the children of the orphanage for help.
Schedule
I want to plan my days in such I way that I can spend time with the kids but also work on my project. In the morning I will help out with the kids, while during the day I will work on my project. I will need to go into the city for materials as well. I also want to take on a weekend to teach the kids how to create their own stuffed animal. (see the yellow block) As I do not know the whole situation in India just yet, date’s might change which I will correct in my schedule, but for now this schedule goes.
I know that everything in India takes a lot longer than here in Holland. This is why I plan on doing everything but I need to keep in mind that I might not be able to do everything, due to the fact that I will be helping in the orphanage as well and I am all by myself (no one can help me in a western way). Wide is fine with me doing as much as I can as long as I can figure out if this project has any potential.
Learning objectives
· Learn to set up and execute marketing research in practice, having limited resources.
· Learn how cross cultural bridges during the research, as western students, while, on the other hand, preserving the achievement of the project goals.
· Learn to achieve project goals, operating in a country with a foreign language; Tamil.
· Learn to set up business relations in an entirely different culture.
· Learn to analyze which relevant information is needed to build a start-up abroad and gather this information in the specific context in an effective and efficient way, making smart use of local networks and other resources.
· Learn to analyze a product in such a way that I can reproduce it, and even improve it if necessary. So learning how a solar steamer works.
· Learning how to make a product with local materials, whilst being in a foreign country.
· Learn to raise money for an organization, get sponsorship.
Role of Entrepreneurship
If you read the questions of the feasibility study carefully you will find the role of the entrepreneurship. I would like to investigate the Indian market, and see if our orphanage bakery would be profitable. In essence I am going to create a little business in the WIDE orphanage; the solar steamed bakery. With this project I am also bringing the cost of the food and gas down, which is of great benefit to the orphanage.
Role of Technology
Again you can find more about the role of technology in the feasibility study and also in the product research. I want to find out how the solar steamer works in essence, if I can improve it and if I can reproduce it in India. I am going to have to work with the technology in India to make this product and need to keep in mind that I will have to use local materials and thing that they can replace when it breaks down. This means it will have to be user friendly and easy to fix.
Deliverables
My primary goal is to give a definite yes or no to this project, giving answer to the question; does WIDE need to continue working on this project? I do want to deliver a new better working solar cooker at the end of my project, but I will only do this when there is time to do this. Because I know that everything is going to go slower in India, I think that this is not possible. That is why I will at least deliver a report on how to continue with this project, with all the questions in my research proposal answered. Apart from that I hope to get sponsors for the WIDE organization. I will maintain a blog with which I hope to gain publicity for the organization.
