Keep Up with the Latest News on Our Award Recipients
Our recipients are actively engaged in creating change on nearly every continent and across multiple sectors. Read more about the most recent developments from our awardees and stay updated with the latest news from us.
Prosterman’s report: improved farming rights in Vietnam
The following is a report from Roy Prosterman, Founder and Chairman Emeritus of Landesa. For his work with Landesa, Mr. Prosterman was named the 2006 Recipient of the Henry R. Kravis Prize in Leadership. Since our initial work on land tenure reform took place in what was then South Vietnam – accompanied by a 30% increase in rice yields and an 80% decline in Vietcong recruitment within the South – we have continued to follow with interest any major land-law developments in post-conflict Vietnam. (You may recall that Tim and I were invited back by the Hanoi government in 1993 to do fieldwork and provide an independent confirmation that collective farming had been ended in favor of a system of individual family farms, and that farmers were indeed pleased and more productive under the family-farming regime.) At the time of the 1993 fieldwork, Vietnam had just adopted a new Land Law which gave farmers 20-year rights on land used for annual crops, and 50-year rights on land used for perennial crops such as tree crops. Following our fieldwork, and in light of farmers’ general response, “the longer the better” as to how long they would like their land rights to be, we recommended a regime of permanent use rights for all agricultural land. This issue of the length of farmers’ land property rights has continued to be on the policy agenda in the unified Vietnam, and we are pleased to report that we have just learned from the Government’s English-language website that Vietnam has now adopted a Revised Land Law, to become effective on July 1, 2014, which... read moreThe key to the Kravis Prize: A focus on ‘fundamentals, not fads’
The announcement of Helen Keller International as this year’s recipient of the Henry R. Kravis Prize in Leadership coincides with an article on the Kravis Prize featured in the latest issue of the Stanford Social Innovation Review. What challenges remain in the nonprofit sector? Read about the Kravis Prize and the enduring lessons of nonprofit management in the Stanford Social Innovation... read moreSakena Yacoobi’s educational efforts honored with Opus Prize
Sakena Yacoobi’s long efforts to improve the educational opportunities for women and children in Afghanistan have been awarded this year’s Opus Prize by the private, independent nonprofit Opus Prize Foundation. Yacoobi, 2009 recipient of the Henry R. Kravis Prize in Leadership, received the top $1 million prize for humanitarian work along with two runner-ups who each received $75,000. Yacoobi founded the Afghan Institute of Learning in 1995 to first establish learning centers in Afghan refugee camps in Pakistan. Prior to this, her own education in medicine and public health care occurred in the United States, where she studied at the University of California, Stockton, and at Loma Linda University. She began her career as a professor at the University of Detroit before being hired to survey a refugee camp in Pakistan by the International Rescue Committee. That was the beginning of her life’s work. Today, AIL is the largest Afghan NGO. “At that moment, as soon as I arrived … I said, ‘I have to do something, and what could I do as an individual? How could I help them?’ ” she says in an interview conducted for the Opus Prize. Yacoobi’s fellow Opus Prize recipients this year are Fahmina Institute, a center of progressive Islamic research in Cirebon, Indonesia; and Sr. Carol Keehan of the Catholic Health Association. The Opus Prize, according to the prize website, is a faith-based humanitarian award “given annually to recognize unsung heroes of any faith tradition, anywhere in the world, solving today’s most persistent social problems.” RELATED LINKS: About the Opus... read moreVicky Colbert honored with the Wise Prize: Watch the video here
“Without quality education, nothing can be achieved,” says Vicky Colbert, founder/director of Escuela Nueva, in a video honoring her selection as the 2013 recipient of the Wise Prize for Education. Colbert, who received the Henry R. Kravis Prize in Leadership in 2011, was chosen because of her organization’s long efforts to improve education in Colbert’s native Colombia. Colbert received the award during the fifth World Innovation Summit for Education held in Qatar. The announcement of Colbert’s award also includes the following video: RELATED LINKS: Pratham Books is a contender for a Google Impact Award For more on the World Innovation Summit for... read morePratham Books is a contender for the ‘final four’ for Google Impact Awards
Google’s Global Impact Awards are honoring the powerful ways that tech produces substantial, positive outcomes in the lives of communities around the world. A program related to Kravis Prize recipient Pratham is among 10 nominees for this year’s award as part of the Google Impact Challenge initiative. While three winners will be determined by a panel of judges, a fourth winner will be based on an internet-wide vote. The deadline for voting is October 30. Go here to cast your vote. The Global Impact Challenge is an award program providing help to Indian non-profits that are targeting some of that nation’s most serious problems. Among this year’s candidates are several employing digital tools to address situations including sanitation in India’s slums, gender-based violence, and education in rural areas. Pratham Books, which fits under the umbrella of efforts by Pratham (recipient of the Henry R. Kravis Prize in Leadership in 2010), is under award consideration for its development of an easy access web platform to support children’s literacy throughout the country. According to their proposal, reading levels fall far below satisfactory standards — “Nearly 50% of Indian 5th graders currently read at a 2nd grade level” — and this dire problem is largely due to a lack of available age-appropriate reading materials. With the help of a Global Impact Award, Pratham Books will construct an open source website where children’s e-books can be created and existing children’s books from around the world can be translated into at least 25 languages. “The word Pratham means ‘first’ or ‘priority,’ and we think that having every child in school and learning well should be... read moreOur Mission
To identify extraordinary leaders in the nonprofit sector, celebrate their accomplishments, and share their best practices with others.
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The Henry R. Kravis Prize in Nonprofit Leadership recognizes and celebrates extraordinary accomplishment and bold, visionary leadership in the nonprofit sector. While the Prize typically recognizes an outstanding individual, in exceptional circumstances the Prize may be awarded to an organization.
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Our Recipients
We are celebrating over 10 years of awarding the Kravis Prize to nonprofit leaders around the world. Learn more about our prize winners and the work they are doing to change the world.
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Kravis Prize recipients are improving the lives of people in more than 100 countries around the world.