François Hollande Names Bassita One of the Best Social Innovations in a Developing Country

Social media is the colosseum of the internet, a circus arena where people gather to marvel at the grotesque, the deplorable, and, occasionally, the noble and worthy. Bassita falls under the latter category; those who aren’t busy cyber bullying one another, following Trump’s late night rants on Twitter, or – worse – going through Kim Kardashian and Fifi Abdo’s Instagram accounts, turn to the crowdfunding platform to do some good.

Ever since its launch in 2014, Bassita – an Egypt-based startup that raises funds for social initiatives and causes from corporate sponsors in return for exposure on social media – has helped educate children in Upper Egyptian villages and create a welcoming environment for migrants in their local communities from behind a computer screen in under two years.

Today, their ingenious and ambitious crowdfunding concept is a success that continues to grow and spill over beyond Egypt’s borders. It wasn’t long before La France S’engage, an initiative by French President François Hollande that recognises young social entrepreneurs and gives them exposure and access to finance, took note.

Bassita was among 800 applicants La France S’engage au Sud – an offshoot of La France S’engage concerned with social entrepreneurship in developing countries, mainly south of the Mediterranean – has received from Africa, Asia, and South America, and together with nine other outstanding projects, has been selected among the 10 best social innovations in any developing country. “During the award ceremony, ClickFunding has been described by the French president as a model able to contribute to better societies, in the South [of the Mediterranean] but also in Europe,” says Bassita Co-founder Alban de Ménonville. “Clickfunding is indeed one of the very few models coming from the South - it is an Egyptian innovation - and aiming to conquer the North, starting with France.”

Photo provided by Alban de Ménonville.
Check out Bassita on Facebook and Instagram.