Supporting evidence-based policymaking and social interventions
Datuk Hisham Hamdan, KRI Executive Committee Chairman, presenting at the launch of ‘The State of Households 2018: Different Realities’ report.
To ensure we are making the change we wish to see, we strive to formulate more well-informed policies and more effective initiatives through knowledge-sharing and rigorous research.
Knowledge can have a transformational impact only if it’s plugged in. That is, people know what there is to be known, can find out when they need it, can understand it, and, be convinced that this knowledge should be put to use and be acted upon. This creates the cycle of learning, which further strengthens institutions, systems, and the capacities of individuals.
We achieve this by engaging with our grant partners and stakeholders in documenting, learning, and sharing evidence from our on-ground projects, through the various knowledge-sharing events that we convene and host. Knowledge-sharing forms the foundation in creating the positive change our communities need.
Hasanah believes in a bottom-up approach, working closely with development practitioners, policymakers and civil society partner organisations to ensure all our interventions for marginalised communities are needs-based. Because of this, we support world-class research addressing Malaysia’s most pressing issues through our research arm, Khazanah Research Institute (KRI). KRI shares data and information that help our policymakers develop sound policies and plans that are grounded in evidence and thus, more effective.
ILMU Hasanah is a series of knowledge-sharing events planned for Hasanah’s civil society partner organisations, stakeholders as well as the public, on a range of relevant topics led by sectoral experts. These sessions, as well as the capacity-building sessions we offer our civil society partner organisations, are aimed at enabling and supporting learning internally as well as for our partners and the wider stakeholder community. We believe that continuous learning is essential and that there should be no barriers to learning.
In order to drive sustainable change, we believe we should go beyond traditional grant-giving and invest in capacity building for our partners. Capacity building enables a non-profit to reach the next level of operational, programmatic, financial, or organisational maturity, so it may operate more effectively and efficiently, thus increasing its potential to enrich lives and solve society’s most intractable problems. We realise the importance of understanding the needs of our partners and designing relevant learning opportunities to support them towards organisational and programmatic efficiency.
To do this effectively, we work together with experts across various fields to provide a range of trainings and workshops to share knowledge and skills on how partners can manage and grow their organisations, and bring about solutions wherever and whenever needed.
In collaboration with INSEAD, Hasanah supported a workshop on Social Enterprise.
The Hasanah Forum in 2021 will revolve around advancing the justice narrative in philanthropy alongside the call for greater collaboration within civil society in order to effectively contribute to nation building. Throughout 2020, initiatives such as GDRN and MATCH revealed the far-reaching benefits of collaborative effort which this foundation has long advocated and aspired for the sector.
Themed From Charity To Justice: Vision For An Equal And Just Malaysia, the two-day affair will have three sessions exploring the relationship between people and society, institutions, as well as leadership, respectively. Its purpose is to learn best practices for a justice-oriented framework and ways to bring about long-term system level change from sector leaders, while exploring the challenges and opportunities that come with them.
Battling the pandemic has once again shone a spotlight on the notion that economic disparities exacerbate other social inequalities. In the past year, we witnessed economic impact spiral into issues of access to digital resources and poor educational outcomes for disadvantaged groups, increased family violence, and poor mental and physical well-being, amongst others.
On the matter of livelihood alone, research indicates that the pandemic could make a whopping 1 million to 2.4 million workers in Malaysia unemployed, resulting in losses of around RM95 billion in household income. Lower income households are also more vulnerable and face a higher risk of infection, further perpetuating or even worsening the cycle of poverty and inequality. This local context will set the tone for what is slated to be the first hybrid Hasanah Forum — conducted face-to-face and virtually — with local and international speakers and audience.
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