Grameen Danone Foods Ltd

GAIN and University John Hopkins about fortified yogurts in Bangladesh : preliminary results.

Laurence Saquer

on the Wednesday, 1 February, 2012 - 15:26

In the small world of social business, many people probably already heard about the study led by GAIN (Global Alliance for Improved Nutrition) and University John Hopkins, about the health impact on children eating Shokti Doi, the Grameen Danone Foods Ltd’s product. The first cup was sold in 2007. 5 years after the beginning of this story, what can we say about impact ?

End 2011, GAIN has published on its website an interview of Dr. Sunil Sazawal, who was in charge of the study. Today, we share this interview on our blog to make more people know about the preliminary study results.     

"Between 2008 and 2011, the Global Alliance for Improved Nutrition (GAIN) funded a study conducted by Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, to evaluate the impact of fortified yogurt on the nutritional status and cognitive performance of school-aged children in Bangladesh. The yogurt, produced by Grameen Danone Foods, was supplied during one year to school children aged 6 to 9 years in the town of Gabtali in Bogra District, where Grameen Danone Foods has a factory. Every day, the children were fed one cup (60g) of the fortified yogurt to help meet their daily vitamin A, iron, zinc and iodine requirements. The preliminary results are promising.

Bangladesh - Where It Makes All Sense

Vítek Vojtěch

on the Tuesday, 15 November, 2011 - 11:59

Vitek Vojtech (from Danone Czech Republic) is the winner of the Social Innovation Quizz. With Laurence, he came to Bangladesh, and like her, he's not probably the same when he came back home. Thanks to him for his story and the feelings he shares. Thank you Vitek !

"You won´ t find many travel agencies going to Bangladesh. Hell you won´t even find many people that were in Bangladesh and can share some tips with you. So why should you go to Bangladesh anyway?

To be bluntly honest, it was not something I was planning or even hoping for. Being responsible for CRM and new media in CR [Czech Republic], I was just curious to see invitation to danone.communities Facebook competition. My first goal was to see how is global doing on Facebook but very quickly I was caught in the game and the spirit of competition took over.

Few weeks later I am getting call (which first I was very sure it is prank call from my colleagues) from France to find out I am the winner and I go to Bangladesh. If you know where there is Bangladesh on the map, then you knew more than me at that point. Little research on the Internet, Lonely planet slightly scary read, quick visit to doctor for list of vaccinations, several handy tips from Laurence and Melinda and I was good to go. 70% excited, 30% scared!

Back to Bogra for the "Back To Growth" plan

Emmanuel Marchant

on the Thursday, 6 October, 2011 - 17:22

Bogra is the place where Grameen Danone and danone.communities were born: it is in this town of 300,000 inhabitants of Bangladesh that has been installed the first factory, "the Zidane’s factory" as we can here sometimes here. This is also where we started door to door sales of Shokti Doi, in villages. At the beginning of the project, I spent a lot of time here and I am happy to return today at the convention "Back to Growth" of Grameen Danone.

After a year of sales more or less stable but not growing, this meeting marks a new beginning.

Corinne Bazina, the new CEO since one year, has done extraordinary work to strengthen her team and organization. "We have to be better every week" - she said.

In fact, she has recruited almost entirely the team around her today (Rashed in logistics management, Dippesh in HR, Rafiqul in production, Sultan in sales) and I am impressed with their passion and professionalism. I also met Marjana, a young professional from Danone Slovenia that came to help for the launch. I asked her how she arrived here, she said "Oh I heard about danone.communities two years ago and it took me two years to convince my boss to let me go, it's not easy because we have a small team. But I am here finally ". I also learned that four employees have gone to overseas training this year. In short, I see with my eyes the consolidation of teams that will be the true foundation of success and sustainability of Grameen Danone.