Mick Ryan

It was a few days into a field trip in rural Yunnan before Carol Chyau and Marie So realized that what they were looking for was all around them: yaks, lots of them.

The pair had met at the Harvard John F. Kennedy School of Government in 2004, as classmates on a master’s degree program. Both were interested in social enterprise – addressing poverty by creating for-profit businesses that have a direct, social impact. Their backgrounds — So is from Hong Kong and Chyau from Taiwan — meant that they wanted to encourage philanthropy in China, a ......ent, it is also stepping up its activities: having hosted its first social enterprise forum in China last month. Venture’s mission to become a “social innovation factory,” where different ideas for social enterprise can incubate, seems to be well on its way.

For two young ladies who shunned the call of officialdom after graduating from the Kennedy School, Shokay seems to be the right model to balance their social conscience with their capitalist zeal.