The social and economic implications of the COVID-19 pandemic range from an increase in unemployment and social exclusion to food insecurity in developing countries. During these challenging times, it is more important than ever to foster human solidarity and find new ways to tackle the modern world’s social problems. Startups have a key role to play, as social entrepreneurs are developing top-notch solutions that bring out the best in people and create social impact.
Innovative technology is changing the game in social impact movements and startups are paving the way. It’s a phenomenon across sectors. The fintech, edtech, ecommerce, agtech, foodtech and social media (to name just a few) sectors have all seen a rise of startups that are underscoring social impact as foundational to business approaches and goals.
This article showcases LatamList’s top picks for the best impact startups in Latin America in 2022. These startups are taking a variety of approaches to innovating inside of the social impact industry in Latam and around the world. They are all exceptional startups well worth a follow.
We wanted to highlight some of the startups helping Latin America’s society change for the better. There are so many amazing startups out there that are improving the world we live in, so this is a comparatively short list of just 10 (and it goes in alphabetical order).
Are there any others you can think of? Let us know!
Aflore – Fintech
Aflore is a financial services company empowering the un-banked of Colombia (65% of the population) to achieve financial goals. Aflore identifies and partners with trusted financial advisors within communities and mobilizes them with support and tools to distribute loans and financial products within their networks.
The company was founded in 2012 and is headquartered in Bogota, Colombia. Aflore developed a tech-enabled direct sales channel to help informal advisors realize goals through loans and financial products.
Agrotoken – Agtech
Agrotoken is a grain-backed, transactional digital asset used to save or exchange for supplies, services, and other assets. The startup is a grain-backed, transactional digital asset used to save or exchange for supplies, services, and other assets. Agrotokens allow to carry out commercial and financial transactions with the direct support of the grains. Agrotoken creates a safe ecosystem to make trading grains easier, more efficient, and more reliable.
To date, Agrotoken is focused on tokenization of commodities, smart contracts, and digital economy solutions for Agribusiness.
BAYZ – Play-to-earn
BAYZ is a play-to-earn gaming guild that helps members earn money by playing video games and being part of a global gaming community. BAYZ is a decentralized autonomous organization focused on bringing people into the metaverse through blockchain gaming and play-to-earn engagement. With a focus on content and competition, BAYZ partners with leading publishers, content creators and gamers to help people engage with leading NFT-based games such as Axie Infinity, The Sandbox, EmberSword and Big Time to help build the jobs of the future and reward people for doing what they love.
Dinie – Debt financing
Dinie provides flexible, convenient and easy-to-use financing solutions for small businesses embedded into digital platforms. Through an end-to-end lending API, the startup enables digital platforms (marketplaces, Saas, ERPs) to offer instant credit to their customers to help them grow their businesses.
As more companies incorporate financial services into their existing product offerings, Dinie is seizing the huge market opportunity of next generation embedded banking services.
Elenas is Latin America’s top social ecommerce platform, empowering micro-entrepreneurs to start their online store. The platform has empowered tens of thousands of women across Colombia to launch online businesses and earn extra income by selling products on WhatsApp, Facebook and other social media sites. Currently, 11 million women across Latin America sell consumer good products through direct sales catalogs and door-to-door sales. Elenas provides a digital solution for them to start an online store, manage clients, and grow their business from home, without having to worry about product sourcing, delivery, or payment collection.
Insole – Fintech
Insole is a fintech company that provides financing services to companies and individuals in the clean energy sector and solar projects. Insole is the first Clean-Fintech in Brazil, combining economics with sustainability to present a new way of consuming energy. The company is a pioneer, innovator and leader in the distributed solar generation market in Brazil, transforming the cost of energy in economical advantages.
Jefa – Fintech
Jefa is a digital bank for women that offers access to savings accounts, loans, insurance, easy payments, debit and credit cards. Jefa is a digital financial platform for women. Starting in Mexico, Jefa provides a digital app with access to a financial marketplace in an affordable, convenient, and secure solution.
Jefa’s goal is to empower women in Latin America to live without limits or obstacles. They do this by giving its clients access to fair, affordable, and secure financial services through a mobile account.
Platzi – Edtech
Platzi is an effective online education platform that offers classes on marketing, programming, business, and design. It teaches courses on design, marketing, and programming with a 70% completion rate, to over 80,000 students worldwide. All of their classes are live-streamed and recorded, with real-time collaboration among students and industry leaders as teachers. It aims to be the professional home for lifelong learning of advanced skills.
Platzi also helps students from all over the world to acquire new, in-demand skills and stay up-to-date with the tech industry. It uses video and interactive lessons to teach tangible skills rather than academic education, in Spanish, English, and Portuguese.
The Intern Group – Edtech
The Intern Group is an EdTech company that connects global talent with opportunity bridging the education system with meaningful careers. The purpose of the company is to enable people to realize their potential by creating a borderless world for talent.
The Intern Group brings global, diverse talent to over 3,000+ partner host organizations, who range from governments and multinationals, through to SMEs, entrepreneurial start-ups and NGOs. 100+universities including Princeton, UPenn, London School of Economics, Tec de Monterrey and National University of Singapore partner with them to achieve their employability and internationalization goals, creating internship opportunities for talent.
They’re tying into MIT’s Refugee Action Hub (ReACT), which offers a platform to leverage the potential of refugees, migrants, and economically-disadvantaged populations who are keen to pursue careers in tech.
The Live Green Co – Foodtech
The Live Green Co, is a foodtech company with the vision of accelerating the world’s transition to health and sustainability using proprietary technology. Their software (called Charaka) blends nature with science and replaces the animal, synthetic and ultra-processed additives in our food, recommending 100% natural plant-based product formulations… at just a fraction of the R&D cost & time.
This technology makes plant-based foods tastier, healthier & more sustainable. With a market that is projected to be US$25Bn by 2026, visionaries like Bill Gates, Richard Branson and Jeff Bezzos have all already invested in plant-based foods.
What do you think about our list of 10 Latam impact startups worth a follow in 2022? Do you think we should include yours in the list? Leave us a comment or send me a DM!