CASE STUDY: AN INCUBATOR APPROACH TO SCALING EFFECTIVE RESILIENCE SOLUTIONS

This case study examines the role of the Global Resilience Partnership (GRP) Incubator in supporting five selected grantees to scale their resilience innovations. It details the Incubator's methodology, which includes gap analysis, leadership training, and business model development, and evaluates the progress of projects focused on food systems, risk financing, urban habitat, water governance, and smallholder market access across Africa and Asia.

• The GRP Incubator employs a four-step assessment process to identify projects for scaling: evaluating resilience based on seven principles, assessing scalability (user appropriateness, sustainability, and scalability), conducting capacity assessments and gap analyses, and implementing a jointly agreed action plan.
• The Incubator defines four distinct pathways for scaling resilience solutions: expanding geographically (growing activities in a country or region), widening horizontally (adding related functionality), replicating geographically (copying and adapting to another country or region), and diving vertically (expanding scope and depth).
• Five specific grantees received scaling support with funding of up to US$250,000 from USAID: Groundswell (food systems), IFPRI (risk-contingent credit), Mahila Housing Trust (urban habitat), MetaMeta (water governance), and Producers Direct (smallholder leadership).
• MetaMeta achieved significant policy influence, with its 'Green Roads' principles endorsed by the World Bank and the Asian Development Bank (ADB), and its approach incorporated into national road water management guidelines for Ethiopia.
• Mahila Housing Trust supported 135,539 people and trained 102 women as entrepreneurs for renewable energy products, with 25 women becoming 'Climate Sathis' selling solutions in cities including Ahmedabad, Surat, Ranchi, Jaipur, and Bhopal.
• IFPRI developed a risk-contingent credit (RCC) solution that benefited 10,180 people and was adopted by financial institutions such as Equity and KCB in Kenya.
• Producers Direct scaled its digital tools to reach 66,500 smallholder farmer households in Kenya and Uganda, and employed 8 full-time youth coordinators across 4 centers of excellence.
• Groundswell supported 60,021 people across 148 villages in Mali, Senegal, and Burkina Faso, and enabled the modification of five-year communal development plans and budgets in Mali and Burkina Faso.
• The Incubator identifies a critical tension in sustainability models: relying on user payments for financial viability often leads to a divergence from serving the most poor and vulnerable populations, who typically require grant funding.
• A key lesson for scaling is that the skills required for project delivery differ from those needed for scaling; the Incubator addressed this through a Leadership Academy to help professionals manage high-stress, high-uncertainty circumstances and dysfunctional situations.

APA

Stott, C., & Robens, S. (2020). CASE STUDY: AN INCUBATOR APPROACH TO SCALING EFFECTIVE RESILIENCE SOLUTIONS. Global Resilience Partnership. https://www.globalresiliencepartnership.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/case-study_-an-incubator-approach-to-scaling-effective-resilience-solutions.pdf

Chicago

Stott, Clare, and Sarah Robens. CASE STUDY: AN INCUBATOR APPROACH TO SCALING EFFECTIVE RESILIENCE SOLUTIONS. Global Resilience Partnership, 2020. https://www.globalresiliencepartnership.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/case-study_-an-incubator-approach-to-scaling-effective-resilience-solutions.pdf.

Wikipedia

{{cite report |last1=Stott |first1=Clare |last2=Robens |first2=Sarah |title=CASE STUDY: AN INCUBATOR APPROACH TO SCALING EFFECTIVE RESILIENCE SOLUTIONS |publisher=Global Resilience Partnership |date=March 2020 |url=https://www.globalresiliencepartnership.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/case-study_-an-incubator-approach-to-scaling-effective-resilience-solutions.pdf |access-date=17 August 2026 |via=Climate Insights Directory}}

BibTeX

@techreport{stott2020case, author = {Stott, Clare and Robens, Sarah}, title = {{CASE STUDY: AN INCUBATOR APPROACH TO SCALING EFFECTIVE RESILIENCE SOLUTIONS}}, institution = {Global Resilience Partnership}, year = {2020}, month = mar, url = {https://www.globalresiliencepartnership.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/case-study_-an-incubator-approach-to-scaling-effective-resilience-solutions.pdf}, urldate = {2026-08-17}, note = {Indexed by Climate Insights Directory} }