Aakar Innovations

The Social Issues • Lack of affordability and access: Branded napkins are not affordable for most of the rural population. This is coupled with the fact that local kirana shops, or general stores, in rural areas are run by men, which makes women feel shy or embarrassed about purchasing pads. • Lack of awareness: Most of the women in rural India are not aware of the benefits of using sterilized napkins. As such, they resort to damaging alternatives such as rags and leaves, which are unsanitary and can result in irreparable health problems in the long term. Many women from affluent, rural families are not informed of proper menstrual hygiene because cultural practices are passed down from mothers and aunts to daughters, creating a vicious cycle of unintentional ignorance. • Social stigma: Menstruation is a cultural taboo in most parts of rural India. For many women in India, getting their monthly period can often mean experiencing isolation, humiliation or marginalization for a biological function over which they have no control. Women often think it is shameful to even discuss menstruation. Women who are both affluent and aware might not use sanitary napkins for this reason. At the core of it all, adolescent girls often end up skipping 1 week of school every month and eventually, prolonged absenteeism forces them to drop out of school completely. What Do WE Do? With our sanitary napkin production unit, we manufacture 100% biodegradable sanitary napkins that are competitively affordable and adhere to all of the quality requirements dictated by the Bureau of Indian Standards. To reach the rural masses, each of these units is strategically placed in the most remote parts of India, usually inaccessible by common vehicular routes. Otherwise known as a mini-factory, 10 women are directly employed in our production unit to make our pads, while another 10 more are trained to become village entrepreneurs (change agents) in their own communities. These women then go on to conduct regular health talks to be the last mile distributor of sanitary napkins within their own communities by using their existing social circles. Most companies are not able to distribute sanitary napkins in rural areas without bearing high transportation costs. As such, many of these rural areas are often left out in the distribution network.. This is where we value add; we collaborate with local grassroots organizations in these underprivileged areas to set up the production units. This creates extra income aside from farming, and adds a distribution point that is significantly more appealing than man-operated stores. Given the quality of our napkins, women no longer experience discomfort that occurs when using the traditional methods, and allows them to participate fully in their daily physical tasks. Why We Need Your Help? We currently have 10 production units running all over India, and we are quickly expanding to 30 more within the next year. This means an additional 600 women will have a sustainable source of income, while equipping 150,000 rural women with the Anandi pad. But we want to go even further. To fully enable the furthest reaches of distribution of products and awareness to rural women in India, we have worked relentlessly to dispell stigmas surrounding menstruation in each community. We do so by educating women to become village entrepreneurs (affectionately called "Anandi Ben,") who become the spokespersons in their communities and act as the last mile distributors of sanitary pads to their peers. This means a significant amount needs to be invested so that we can integrate those who have been left behind in India’s growth story, and train them to become confident enough to sell the pads, run their own micro finance business and speak out against ineffective menstrual hygiene management,. With your help, we can achieve our full impact of training women to become successful village entrepreneurs by hiring more trainers and introducing more learning activities such as simulated role-playing for sales tactics, on top of public speaking and basic accounting skills. A Big Thank You To have come this far, it would not have been possible with the help of our incubator, Center for Incubation, Innovation and Entrepreneurship - Indian Institute of Management-Ahmadabad, and our partners who have lent their support in making this a reality. Since our inception in 2011, we have won the Indian Innovation Growth programme organized by FICCI and has been featured on multiple publications including The Economist, Live-Mint & The Wall Street Journal, Wired UK and The Hindu.