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The 5 Best Social Entrepreneur Business Opportunities for Californians

Bay Area Energy is a small California based company that believes strongly in the value of social entrepreneurship. They encourage recent graduates to join their team and run their own small businesses offering alternative sources of clean natural gas to consumers. It’s a way to help students, offer cleaner and more affordable energy sources for consumers, and to do their part to tackle global warming as well. Here are 5 ideas for social entrepreneurship businesses that California college graduates can use to start their careers with a positive contribution to society.

Energy Entrepreneurs

The first idea we’ve already touched on. With the deregulation of the California utility markets there are many opportunities for students to develop businesses built around selling clean energy alternatives to consumers. Companies like Bay Area Energy offer a great opportunity for students to develop their entrepreneurial skills in a socially conscious way.

Technology Entrepreneurs

There are also many opportunities for the social entrepreneur with an inventive streak. Sites such as GoFundMe are popular places to find financial support for great initiatives that can help find solutions for common global problems. Providing technology that offers reliable sources of electricity, cooking equipment, and farming tools, are just some of the entrepreneurial ideas that GoFundMe has supported in the past.

Clean Water Entrepreneurs

One of the greatest obstacles in the developing world is accessing clean and abundant sources of drinking water. Social entrepreneurs can help tackle this problem. Several technological solutions have already been developed, including ground water pumps and various filtration systems, but there’s plenty of room for other ideas. It’s an issue that’s likely to become more acute as the global population rises and clean drinking water becomes more scarce.

Female Entrepreneurs Leading the Way

Most of us are familiar with the concept of a glass ceiling that prevents females with strong qualifications from achieving their full potential. Social entrepreneurship is one area where women seem to be doing quite well at breaking through the glass ceiling. India is home to one of the world’s greatest success stories. Ajaita Shah, is a female entrepreneur that’s bringing useable technology such as solar lamps to poor areas of India with no reliable power source.

Entrepreneurs Helping Refugees

Helping refugees integrate into their adopted countries can be a challenge, but it also presents a great opportunity for social entrepreneurs. In Germany, a recent initiative gave refugees the opportunity to learn how to program computers so that they could make a meaningful contribution to society. It’s a novel approach that could easily be adopted in other countries.